Keynote Speaker

Sydney Lea, founding editor of The New England Review, has published the novel A Place in Mind; two nonfiction books, Hunting the Whole Way Home and A Little Wildness; and eight poetry collections, most recently Ghost Pain (2005). Pursuit of a Wound (2000) was one of three finalists for the Pulitzer Prize.

Workshop Leaders

PHILIP BARUTH is a novelist, and an award-winning commentator for Vermont Public Radio. His latest book, The X President was selected by the New York Times, as a Notable Book of 2003.  Referred to as a member of “the newer new generation of up-and-coming writers” by The Washington Post, Philip also teaches at UVM.

AUDREY BOHANAN has received a number of awards, including a Maine Arts Commission Fellowship and placement as a finalist for the “Discovery”/The Nation Poetry Contest. Her poems have appeared in many publications, including The Antioch Review, The Beloit Poetry Journal, and The Virginia Quarterly.  Her first book, Lime, won the Gerald Cable Book Award from Silver Fish Press.

TIM BROOKES was born in England to poor but honest parents who liked taking long walks in the rain. As soon as possible he fled to the U.S., where he ekes out a living as a journalist, reviewer, essayist, and guitarist. He has published six books of non-fiction and two more are on the way, which he will promote shamelessly at every possible opportunity.

ERIK ESCKILSEN, Burlington, Vermont, native Erik Esckilsen is the author of three novels for young readers, The Last Mall Rat (2003), Offsides (2004), and The Outside Groove (2006).  He has taught writing in the U.S. and abroad, and his articles, essays, and reviews have appeared in such publications as the Boston Globe, Entertainment Weekly, and Seven Days.  Erik is current at work on a new novel.

JENNY LANDstudied creative writing at Dartmouth College and at the University of St. Andrews, Scotland.  She writes and publishes poetry and children's fiction. A true Vermonter, Jenny teaches at St. Johnsbury Academy.  

DR. ROB WILLIAMS is a Vermont-based performing singer/songwriter. He's been making music since age five, and writing songs for two decades, recording three full-length CDs and performing in venues across the country. Rob also teaches history and media studies at Champlain College.

DEBORAH LEE LUSKIN holds a PhD in English Literature from Columbia University and has taught in a wide variety of settings, from the Ivy League to the local elementary school. She is a Vermont Public Radio commentator; an editorial columnist; and she has completed two novels set in the fictional town of Orton, Vermont. As a pen-for-hire, Luskin freelances for regional publications and writes technical copy for two major medical centers.

TONY WHEDON’S essays, criticism, and poems have appeared in Agni, Harper’s, American Poetry Review, Iowa Review, Notre Dame Review, Prairie Schooner, and in many other magazines. Tony won the Mid-List Press Prize for Creative Non-Fiction with his book A Language Dark Enough.  Tony Whedon teaches in the BFA in Creative Writing Program at Johnson State College, and is the heart and soul—and the trombone--behind The Vermont Poetry Jazz Ensemble (PoJazz).

SUZI WIZOWATY is the author of A Tour of Evil (Philomel, 2005, young adult) and an adult novel, The Round Barn (Hardscrabble Books, University Press of New England, 2002), a BookSense 76 pick.  She has won a Sydney Taylor Manuscript Award for an earlier novel for children as well as grants from the Vermont Arts Council and the NJ Arts Council.  She has a BA cum laude from Princeton University, an MA from Goddard College, and has taught at Goddard, Trinity, St. Mike’s, and Champlain. This is her fourth year teaching at the Young Vermont Writers’ Conference.

GEOF HEWITT lives in Calais, Vermont. Vermont’s slam champion, Geof has been teaching, editing, writing, performing, and passing out wolf calls for forty-five years. This makes him sound old, but he is not.

J.C. ELLEFSON is the director of the YVWC and is currently Poet-In-Residence at Champlain College. His poems have been published throughout the United States, Canada, Great Britain, France, and Japan, and he has taught writing and literature at Shanghai University, the Universidade Dos Acores, and now at Champlain, where he chairs the committee for verbal insurrection. Jim and his wife, Lesley Wright, own and operate Stoney Lonesome Farm.