By Bill Thorness
The Holiday Bookfest is all about celebrating local writers, and this year the audience gets a sweet treat: cheering a young author who has just published her first story.
Eight authors (see the list below) will offer brief readings at the event – Nov. 22, 2-4 p.m. at the PNA – and the day’s final reader will share her tale of gods and goddesses competing to see who can make the best dessert.
“I enjoy baking and the theme really called out to me,” said Elana MacNaughtan (pictured above, on left) of the writing prompt at the Bureau of Fearless Ideas workshop last spring at a neighborhood library. The Crown Hill student, now in eighth grade at Robert Eaglestaff Middle School, combined a writing prompt about gods and goddesses with her love of baking and, voila! “The Ice Cream Cake” story emerged.
Its path to publication was sweet too. BFI staff submitted the piece to the magazine Illustoria, which publishes work by school-age contributors from writing centers worldwide. They picked up the story for their Desserts edition and, true to their name, had an illustrator create art for the piece.
“I thought it was super neat that it got illustrated,” Elana says. “It was fun to get the surprise that it had drawings with it.” She’ll show the images while reading the story.
Preceding the young author will be writers with track records a bit longer.
Among the seven adult readers, Sonora Jha will read from her latest book Intemperance, Peter Ames Carlin will bring his Bruce Springsteen book Tonight in Jungleland to the stage, and Matt Kracht, tongue firmly in cheek, will expose the Worst Birds Ever.
Here is the full reading list:
- Lynda V. Mapes
- Caskey Russell
- Sonora Jha
- Joshua Mohr
- Peter Ames Carlin
- Matt Krackt
- Martha Brockenbrough
- BFI student Elana MacNaughtan
The Holiday Bookfest (Facebook, Instagram), now in its 16th year, helps to raise funds for youth literacy, including BFI and Page Ahead. It also collects donations for the Books to Prisoners program.
Perhaps after her reading, Elana will share the unique cookie recipe she created. It’s green, minty and chocolaty, and probably would go great with a book as a holiday gift.