Posts From Author: Month: April 2020

WRITERS AND STORYTELLING: Torrey Maldonado

New York City’s current and former Chancellors have praised Torrey Maldonado as a top teacher and author. He has taught for over twenty years in his Brooklyn childhood hometown. His middle-grade titles include Tight, which won a Christopher Award and was named a Washington Post and NPR best book of the year, Secret Saturdays, and, most recently, What Lane?. Growing up, Torrey hated books because “they were boring or seemed to hate or dismiss people where I’m from.” Culturally responsive books and educators inspired him to teach and write. Voted a Top Latino Author and best Middle Grade and Young Adult novelist for African Americans, his work reflects his and students’ experiences and is praised for its current feel, realness, and universal themes. How has the current state of things impacted your writing life? Listen, this pandemic has had a HUGE impact on my writing. Before, if an interviewer asked, “Where do you write?” I’d answer, “Anywhere”. Now? Now I write in an underground quarantined bunker with a mask on and . . . I’m joking. I don’t write in a mask. I just write in quarantine. And another real fact? The pandemic DID change my writing-life. People appreciate my […]
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Writers and Storytelling: Adam Begley

Adam Begley is the author of Houdini: The Elusive American (2020); The Great Nadar, The Man Behind the Camera (2017); and Updike (2014). For many years the books editor of The New York Observer, he has been a Guggenheim fellow and a fellow at the Leon Levy Center for Biography. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, London Review of Books, TLS, and Spectator. He lives with his wife in Cambridgeshire, England. How has the current state of things impacted your writing life? Writers practice a form of quarantine whether it’s required or not. The difference right now is that most of the world has joined us. What are the ways you’ve been connecting to your community? Like most people, I’ve spent more time on video calls and messaging platforms. How do you stay focused? With great difficulty. It’s one thing to retreat to your writing desk when all around you everyday life is busy and noisy and relentless – you try to shut it out. These days, in the countryside where I live, there’s very little to shut out. On the other side of my front door the quiet and the empty calm […]
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WRITERS AND STORYTELLING: DAVID KILCULLEN

Dr. David Kilcullen is the author of five prize-winning books on terrorism, insurgency, urbanization and future warfare, including The Dragons and the Snakes: How the Rest Learned to Fight the West, as well as numerous scholarly papers on urbanization, conflict and the evolution of warfare. He won the Walkley Award (Australia’s equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize) for long-form journalism in 2015, for his reporting on the rise of Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. He is contributing editor for military affairs of The Australian, Australia’s national daily newspaper, Professor of International and Political Studies at the University of New South Wales, Canberra, Professor of Practice at Arizona State University, and CEO and President of the global research firm Cordillera Applications Group. Dave is a theorist and practitioner of guerrilla and unconventional warfare, with extensive war zone experience over a 25-year career with the Australian and U.S. governments as an Army officer, intelligence analyst, policy adviser and diplomat. He served in Iraq as senior counterinsurgency advisor to U.S. General David Petraeus, then as senior advisor to U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. He worked for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) in Afghanistan, and continues to work with advanced research […]
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Writers and Storytelling: Anne Nelson

Anne Nelson is the author of Shadow Network: Media, Money, and the Secret Hub of the Radical Right a ground-breaking exploration of the coalition of fundamentalists and oil who helped bring Trump to power. Nelson began her professional career on the editorial staff of The New Yorker. In 1995 she became the director of the International Program of the Columbia School of Journalism. She has taught and conducted research on digital media and development at Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs since 2002. Nelson is the recipient of the Livingston Award, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and a Bellagio Fellowship. Her 2001 play The Guys, dealing with the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, has been produced in 50 states and 15 countries, and as a feature film starring Sigourney Weaver. Nelson is a member of the New York Council for the Humanities and the Council on Foreign Relations. How has the current state of things impacted your writing life? I was scheduled for a national book tour for Shadow Network in March and April (including House of Speakeasy*). All ten events were cancelled –including the Virginia, Arizona, and Los Angeles Book Festivals. I’ve continued to do radio and podcast interviews for […]
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Writers and Storytelling: Mahogany L. Browne

Mahogany L. Browne is a writer, organizer & educator. Interim Executive Director of Urban Word NYC & Poetry Coordinator at St. Francis College. Browne has received fellowships from Agnes Gund, Air Serenbe, Cave Canem, Poets House, Mellon Research & Rauschenberg. She is the author of Woke: A Young Poets Call to Justice, Woke Baby & Black Girl Magic, Kissing Caskets, & Dear Twitter. She is also the founder of Woke Baby Book Fair (a nationwide diversity literature campaign) & as an Arts for Justice grantee, is completing her first book of essays on mass incarceration, investigating its impact on women and children. How has the current state of things impacted your writing life? I’ve cancelled 90 days of touring and performance opportunities. I also had to cancel my book launch for my newest YA book: WOKE: A Young Poet’s Call to Justice What are the ways you’ve been connecting to your community? IG Live, Zoom Meetings & Happy Hour via ZOOM with friends. How do you stay focused? I’m reading and writing in a small group. When that doesn’t work I bake a cake. When that doesn’t work I binge on a Netflix series. When that still doesn’t work, I sleep. […]
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