Publishing & Marketing / SPECIALTY

Publishing & Marketing

9:00AM – 9:50AM
Command the Room: Mastering Your Personal Appearances as an Author
Bruce Rule

In today's world, writers must be their own best promoters, but personal appearances can be daunting for authors who would rather write than speak in public. Fortunately, even the most introverted author can excel before an audience by following simple, proven techniques I've shared with clients and in workshops for years.

Discover effective strategies to overcome nervousness, build trust with your audience, and, most importantly, boost book sales. This interactive workshop will cover optimizing your appearances from acceptance to the final guest departure, and include answers to all your questions about public speaking as an author.

BRUCE RULE is a veteran journalist and editor with four decades of writing experience, mostly with The Associated Press and Bloomberg News. He runs Rule Communications, a writing and editing service, and teaches public speaking. He has written one non-fiction book, Heartfelt Goodbye: How to Write and Deliver the Eulogy Your Loved One Deserves, and his debut novel, The Debutante Detective, will be published by Titan Books on July 7, 2026.

10:00AM – 10:50AM
Pulling Back the Curtain (or What is Happening to Your Submission?)
Linda Blaskey

You've submitted your work and now you wait for a response. But what is going on while you wait? This presentation is meant to answer that question. You will learn what is happening to your submission from the moment you send it to the decision on its acceptance or rejection. It will lean more toward the growing world of online journals, but many of the mechanics of putting together a print issue are the same. All of this is to pull back the curtain between editor and contributor in an attempt to increase understanding of what is happening while you wait. Rather like Dorothy exposing how the Wizard works his machines.

LINDA BLASKEY is editor of Quartet, an online poetry journal featuring the work of women fifty and over; poetry/interview editor emerita of Broadkill Review, and past coordinator of the Dogfish Head Poetry Prize. Her work appeared in Best New Poets 2014, and she is the author or coauthor of five poetry collections. She is the recipient of three Fellowship Grants from Delaware Division of the Arts, including the 2022 Masters in Literature: Poetry.

11:00AM – 11:50AM
The Power of Doing It Yourself: Why Authors Choose Self-Publishing
Atlas Creed, David Healy, James Irwin, & Nancy Joie Wilkie 

We now have the tools for high-quality, professional-level self-publishing, and the old stigmas have faded. Authors are making the strategic choice to publish some, or all, of their books themselves, for reasons that include creative control, increased revenue, faster time to market, and better reader engagement. In this panel discussion, authors discuss the reasons they chose self-publishing, their experiences in production and marketing, and whether it turned out to be the right choice. This is an opportunity to hear how independence in publishing can empower writers to tell their own stories, on their own terms, according to their own timeline.

ATLAS CREED is the author of the paranormal thriller Armitage, book one in the Children of Arcanum series, as well as the short story "Sentry" included in the anthology The Last Day Under the Sun. He won the Silver IPPY from the Independent Publisher Book Awards in 2025 for Best Mystery/Thriller Audiobook. He is developing character-driven stories in several genres. He lives in Virginia, and can be found at www.atlascreedauthor.com. 

ESWA board member DAVID HEALEY is a graduate of Washington College and the Stonecoast MFA program at the University of Southern Maine. He spent 21 years as a local news reporter and editor. He is the author of more than 30 books, including nonfiction books such as Delmarva Legends & Lore. His fiction includes Beach Bodies: A Rehoboth Beach Thriller, Civil War novels, and the popular Caje Cole World War II series. 

JAMES IRWIN is the author of the novels Nina's Friends and Lucky Guy. His short fiction and essays have appeared in Brevity, Bay to Ocean Journal, Big Windows Review, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, and Bay Guardian; he co-founded the film journal Cinematograph and is associate editor of the Atlantic Journal of Communication. He has taught at San Francisco State Univ., UC Berkeley, and Wm. Paterson University. Find him at jrirwin.com

NANCY JOIE WILKIE worked for over thirty years in both the biotechnology industry and the federal government's biodefense effort. She has released three collections of stories: Seven Sides of Self and Faraway and Forever, both collections published by She Writes Press, and The River Keeper and Other Tales, published by SubPlot Books. More information can be found on her web site www.mindsights.net.

3:00PM – 3:50PM
Secrets of Selling your Children's Book
Cindy Freland

You had a great idea for a children's book. Now how do you sell it? Discover ways to sell your book that you may not have ever thought about, including social media, audio versions, video, school presentations, creating book sets, teaching self-publishing classes, and events. Learn how to set up your display and what to say at events to attract customers. You had a great idea for a children's book, now let's sell it!

CINDY FRELAND's inspiration comes from her love of children and animals. Most of her children's books are based on true events. She is an Award-Winning International Author and her passion is teaching children about the Chesapeake Bay. After raising two daughters and working for a major health insurance company for 25 years, she started a ten-book children's series about the Bay in 2013. Cindy enjoys gardening, painting, cooking, and baking, and lives in Bowie, Maryland.

4:00PM – 4:50PM
Creating an Author Brand (Before Logos & Colors): What Is It and How Can It Work For You
Jean Burgess

I hear it all the time: "What content should I post on social media or write in my newsletter?" or "Why am I getting zero responses when I pitch to podcasts?" Having a well-defined author brand can help. Before you pick out your author colors & logo, you need to understand your "brand foundation." This workshop will help you narrow down 3 defining branding traits, provide a strategy for social media/newsletter content that aligns with your brand, and offer examples of how author brand translates to pitching podcasts and event requests as well as overall networking. Attendees will receive workshop materials as well as follow up resources.

JEAN BURGESS, Ph.D is an author, editor, playwright, and former theatre educator. In addition, she spent ten years as a Marketing Manager for an IT business before retiring to the world of writing. Her second fiction, Navigating Her Next Chapter: A Retro Novel will be published by Apprentice House Press in Spring 2026. Jean holds a Masters in Theatre from Northwestern University and a Ph.D. in Educational Theatre from New York University.

Specialty

9:00AM – 9:50AM
Hundreds of Stories from a Single Premise
Barbara Westwood Diehl

Would you like to develop a writing practice that feels more like play than work? A method that allows you to build stories in moments you steal from your hectic daily life? An approach that keeps ideas humming in your head? Participants in this session will learn how to generate story content with brainstorming and game-playing techniques. With a simple premise as the starting point, we will learn how to build hundreds of detailed and wildly different stories, from micros to much longer stories. While the joyful act of imagining will be emphasized, we won't neglect some revision techniques—which also don't have to feel like work—so that our stories can be published in the journals we love.

BARBARA WESTWOOD DIEHL is senior editor of The Baltimore Review. Her fiction and poetry appear or are forthcoming in a variety of journals, including Fractured Lit, South Florida Poetry Journal, Poetry South, Painted Bride Quarterly, Five South, Allium, Split Rock Review, Blink-Ink, Midway,Free State Review, Ghost Parachute, Pithead Chapel,New World Writing Quarterly, Cleaver, and Sky Island Journal.

10:00AM – 10:50AM
Improv Games That Help With Your Storytelling
Lynne Streeter Childress

In this interactive workshop, playwright, actor, and teaching artist Lynne Streeter Childress will introduce you to improv games and exercises that encourage and facilitate storytelling. We will confront writer's block by stepping away from the laptop for a moment and using our whole bodies and imaginations to play and create. Participants will engage in improvisational storytelling activities, then create short written pieces based on what they did. These games will make for an inspiring session that will inspire your writing at home.

LYNNE STREETER CHILDRESS is a playwright, actor, teaching artist and the founder of Building Better People Productions, an organization that uses theater to promote empathy. Her work has been performed nationwide, and she has taught for institutions like the Folger Shakespeare Library and Baltimore School for the Arts. She co-hosts the podcast Fine Beats and Cheeses"with her twin sister, Leslie Gray Streeter. Lynne lives in Annapolis with her family.

11:00AM – 11:50AM
Shapeshifting: A Mythical Writing Workshop
Hannah Custis

In this interactive and generative workshop, participants will explore the theme of shapeshifting through images and discussion using a variety of examples from mythology, folklore, literature, and popular culture. We will also talk about different ways shapeshifting appears in our lives and work as writers. After listening to and reflecting upon the story of Proteus, the Old Man of the Sea, as told in The Odyssey, we will engage in an associative free—writing exercise together and have the opportunity to share during the session. Everyone is welcome, regardless of prior knowledge of mythology—the only things you need are curiosity, imagination, and something to write with/on.

HANNAH CUSTIS is a teacher, writer, and independent scholar. She has been some kind of English teacher most of her life and is currently an administrator for an adult education program at a community college. She hosts the Mythical Writing Project YouTube channel and is working on a podcast series which combines personal narrative, mythic themes, and social commentary. She also facilitates bi-monthly live Mythical Writing Workshops online.

3:00PM – 3:50PM
Adapt a Book into a Movie Script 
Zorina Exie Frey, MFA

Master the basic structure of a movie script in order to adapt a published work into a screenplay. Get familiar with script formats for sitcoms, dramas, and streaming series. Practice intensive character development techniques for live-action. Draft "Treatments" used to pitch scripts. 

Content Covered: 

Treatments: Treatments are summaries of proposed or written screenplays. This workshop will explain what they are and why they are needed for pitching.

ZORINA EXIE FREY, MFA is an educator, mixed media publisher, and a recipient of the Pushcart Prize. Her short films, animations, book trailers, and screenplays have received both domestic and international recognition, winning awards such as at the Birmingham Film Festival in the United Kingdom. Additionally, she was a semi-finalist for the reality TV pilot America's Next Great Author, hosted by Kwame Alexander.

4:00PM – 4:50PM
The Abstract in Ekphrastic Poetry
Michael Salcman, M.D.

Join Dr. Michael Salcman as he takes on an exquisite journey through the history of Ekphrastic Poetry, and uncovers depth of the abstract poetry found in the unveiling of art.

Realist poems about artworks and artists began with Homer's description of the Shield of Achilles and radically enlarged by Keats and Robert Browning in the 19th century by having the object "speak" to the reader. Popular subjects in the 20th century are Narrative poems by Auden and Williams about paintings by Breughel and Edward Hopper. Surrealist ekphrastic poems by Sexton and Plath became more abstract by modern art movements like Post-Impressionism and Surrealism. Richard Howard's ekphrastic poem about a Morris Louis color field painting (1994) was probably the first and extended with abstract poems about paintings by Joan Mitchell (2004), Richard Serra, Jack Whitten, Frank Bowling and Leon Polk Smith in the present. The poems now inform the original object rather than the reverse.

MICHAEL SALCMAN, M.D. Former chairman of neurosurgery at the University of Maryland, a child of the Holocaust and survivor of polio. Poems in Barrow Street, Blue Unicorn, Hopkins Review, Hudson Review and Smartish Pace. Books include The Clock Made of Confetti, Poetry in Medicine, classic and contemporary poems about medicine, A Prague Spring (Sinclair Poetry Prize), Shades & Graces, Daniel Hoffman Book Prize winner, Necessary Speech: New & Selected Poems and Crossing the Tape (2024).

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