Author: chanti

  • Spotlight on Nicole Persun – Award Winning and Bestselling Author and Creative Writing Instructor

    Spotlight on Nicole Persun – Award Winning and Bestselling Author and Creative Writing Instructor

    NICOLE J. PERSUN – Award Winning and Bestselling Author and Creative Writing Instructor

    Nicole J. Persun is an award-winning and internationally bestselling author with a master’s degree in Creative Writing & Instruction. Nicole has written and published in multiple genres, most recently book club fiction under the pen name Jennifer Gold. Her most recent novel, Halfway to You, was an Amazon First Reads selection in March 2023. Learn more at nicolejpersun.com. Discover her recent novels at jennifergoldauthor.com.


    Still thinking about Registering for the Chanticleer Authors Conference?

    Register Today!

    We have a stellar line up of speakers for CAC24, with multiple options to attend.

    Find out why The Writer Magazine (founded in 1887) has repeatedly recognized the Chanticleer Authors Conference as one of the best conferences to attend and participate in for North America.

     

  • Spotlight on Christine Fairchild- Author and Book Doctor

    Spotlight on Christine Fairchild- Author and Book Doctor

    CHRISTINE FAIRCHILD – Author & Book Doctor

    Christine Fairchild offers 35+ years experience as a writer, editor, and book doctor. She’s conducted celebrity interviews (XFiles, SciFiMall.com), edited for technical giants (Microsoft, Hitachi), and served as a marketing/readability specialist for consumer products (DHL, Cingular, AT&T). She now specializes in Suspense fiction and helps authors take their work, and their career, to the next level through her online workshops, classes at conferences and one-on-one book-doctoring of clients’ novels. She also writes suspense and historical fiction, so she understands the challenges authors face in their craft and the publishing industry.

    Find more of her tips & tricks at: EditorDevil.blogspot.com

    Christine will be leading sessions on:

    Power Moves to Make Your Story UNDENIABLE
    Look Out! He’s Behind You!  Effectively Using Suspense to Insure a Page-Turner Story
    • And more to be announced! 


    Still thinking about Registering for the Chanticleer Authors Conference?

    Register Today!

    We have a stellar line up of speakers for CAC24, with multiple options to attend.

    Find out why The Writer Magazine (founded in 1887) has repeatedly recognized the Chanticleer Authors Conference as one of the best conferences to attend and participate in for North America.

     

  • Spotlight on Mark Berridge, Award Winning Author of A Fraction Stronger and Motivational Speaker

    Spotlight on Mark Berridge, Award Winning Author of A Fraction Stronger and Motivational Speaker

    MARK BERRIDGE – Author, Leader, and Motivational Speaker

    Mark Berridge in a superman style pose for TEDx Brisbane

    By melding his professional background with the lived experience of his personal recovery journey, Mark brings his unique insights, perspective and practical tips and strategies to every custom-curated presentation he delivers.

    Mark’s authenticity, openness, expertise and practicality profoundly impact the individuals, teams and organisations he presents to, helping them build the resilience they need to succeed in today’s challenging business environment.

    His book, A Fraction Stronger was the Grand Prize Winner for the 2022 Journey Award.

    Most recently, Mark presented at TedEx Brisbane.

    We’re excited to have him back for CAC24! Mark will be presenting two sessions for us that will focus on:

    1. Success comes in many shapes and sizes. Explore his 3 tips for amplifying it.
      • Notice how / when your goals creep.
      • Reward yourself for achieving your original goals and for re-calibrating new goals
      • Embrace and celebrate all the other gains / outcomes from your action that seem ancillary to your goals.
    2. Plan well, adapt better. Why he is firm on purpose but flexible on pathway.
      • Good preparation is a valuable foundation, but we can never see all the possibilities.
      • Action (especially when embracing uncertainty) liberates possibilities.
      • Things work, things fail. Own where you are at and make plans, take action to keep going.

    Still thinking about Registering for the Chanticleer Authors Conference?

    Register Today!

    We have a stellar line up of speakers for CAC24, with multiple options to attend.

    Find out why The Writer Magazine (founded in 1887) has repeatedly recognized the Chanticleer Authors Conference as one of the best conferences to attend and participate in for North America.

  • Spotlight on Susan V. Meyers – Creative Writing Program Director, Non-Fiction Writer, and Pushcart Prize Nominee

    Spotlight on Susan V. Meyers – Creative Writing Program Director, Non-Fiction Writer, and Pushcart Prize Nominee

    SUSAN V. MEYERS – Creative Writing Program Director Non-Fiction Writer and Pushcart Prize Nominee

    After growing up on a carnival route, Susan V. Meyers, PhD.,  is a professor and Director of the Creative Writing Program at Seattle University.

    Having received grants from Fulbright, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and several arts residencies, she has been nominated for The Best American Series and several Pushcart Prizes. Her novel Failing the Trapeze won the Nilsen Award, and other work has appeared in Creative NonfictionHuffington PostThe Rumpus, Hippocampus, So to Speak, New Orleans Review, and The Minnesota Review. You can find her at susanvmeyers.com.

    Susan will present a session on Dynamic Dialogue: The Art of Subtext and Grabbing Your Reader and Not Letting Go


    Still thinking about Registering for the Chanticleer Authors Conference?

    Register Today!

    We have a stellar line up of speakers for CAC24, with multiple options to attend.

    Find out why The Writer Magazine (founded in 1887) has repeatedly recognized the Chanticleer Authors Conference as one of the best conferences to attend and participate in for North America.

  • Spotlight on Lucas Southworth – Award Winning Short Story Author

    Spotlight on Lucas Southworth – Award Winning Short Story Author

    LUCAS SOUTHWORTH – Award Winning Short Story Author

     

    Lucas Southworth’s book of short stories, Everyone Here Has a Gun, won the Association of Writers and Writing Program’s Grace Paley Prize. He has published stories in magazines such as the Pushcart Prize AnthologyConjunctionsThe Iowa ReviewAGNICopper Nickel, and many others. He has also received Grants, fellowships, and residencies from The Maryland State Arts Council, The Truman Capote Trust, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, the Jentel Artist Residency Program, Monson Arts, and Arteles Creative Center in Finland. Usually, he divides his time between Baltimore and Washington, where teaches fiction and screenwriting at Loyola University Maryland and at Seattle U.

    Lucas will have sessions on:

    • How to Design a Smashing Screenplay: The importance of planning and outlining a story before you write
    • Key Elements of Writing the Short Story

    Still thinking about Registering for the Chanticleer Authors Conference?

    Register Today!

    We have a stellar line up of speakers for CAC24, with multiple options to attend.

    Find out why The Writer Magazine (founded in 1887) has repeatedly recognized the Chanticleer Authors Conference as one of the best conferences to attend and participate in for North America.

  • Spotlight on Michelle Cox – Overall Grand Prize Winner

    Spotlight on Michelle Cox – Overall Grand Prize Winner

    MICHELLE COX – 2022 OVERALL GRAND PRIZE AUTHOR

    Michelle Cox is the author of the multiple award-winning Henrietta and Inspector Howard series as well as “Novel Notes of Local Lore,” a weekly blog dedicated to Chicago’s forgotten residents.  She suspects she may have once lived in the 1930s and, having yet to discover a handy time machine lying around, has resorted to writing about the era as a way of getting herself back there.

    Her work has received multiple Mystery & Mayhem and Clue Awards from Chanticleer as well as the Overall Grand Prize Award for Best Book for her book A Spying Eye, in addition to several top-rated reviews, plus many other accolades, so she might be on to something.  Unbeknownst to most, Michelle hoards board games she doesn’t have time to play and is, not surprisingly, addicted to period dramas and big band music.  Also marmalade.


    Still thinking about Registering for the Chanticleer Authors Conference?

    Register Today!

    We have a stellar line up of speakers for CAC24, with multiple options to attend.

    Find out why The Writer Magazine (founded in 1887) has repeatedly recognized the Chanticleer Authors Conference as one of the best conferences to attend and participate in for North America.

     

  • Spotlight on Reenita Malhotra Hora – Grand Prize Author, Podcaster, and Broadcast Journalist

    Spotlight on Reenita Malhotra Hora – Grand Prize Author, Podcaster, and Broadcast Journalist

    REENITA MALHOTRA HORA – Podcaster & Broadcast Journalist & Contributor

    Reenita Malhotra Hora is the CEO of Chapter by Episode Productions. She has years of experience growing organizations from startups to medium-sized businesses through storytelling, creative marketing and business strategy. Hora has also written seven books.

    She has contributed to Reuters, the South China Morning Post family section, the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, CNN, Asian Investor, Times of India, Business Line, Bloomberg on-air news reporter, writer, and producer, Rolling Stone, and the Economic Times.


    Still thinking about Registering for the Chanticleer Authors Conference?

    Register Today!

    We have a stellar line up of speakers for CAC24, with multiple options to attend.

    Find out why The Writer Magazine (founded in 1887) has repeatedly recognized the Chanticleer Authors Conference as one of the best conferences to attend and participate in for North America.

     

  • Spotlight on Lisa Spicer- Producer, Editor and Writer

    Spotlight on Lisa Spicer- Producer, Editor and Writer

    LISA SPICER – Producer, Editor, Writer

    Lisa Spicer has worked in television, film, and video production for over 30 years as producer, writer, and editor. Starting in the documentary unit at KCTS/PBS Seattle, she worked there later on the Bill Nye the
    Science Guy show, earning 3 Emmys. As an independent documentary producer, she has worked in Kenya, Mexico’s Lacandon rainforest, Northern Cheyenne and Lummi Indian reservations, Boulder, Seattle, and Bellingham.

    Lisa has a BA in Broadcast Journalism and certificates in Filmmaking and Screenwriting (UW). Mid-career she earned an MA in Anthropology (WWU). Integrating anthropology into documentary, she
    co-produced Homeless in Bellingham, an award-winning web series and documentary, and served as Consulting Anthropologist for the feature documentary, Cheech and Chong’s Last Movie.

    Recently finishing an historical novel, Radio Smokva, she’s now writing about her back-to-the-land childhood and publishing a weekly series on Substack, Collective Effervescence: Research About the Counterculture.

    Lisa will lead a workshop called How to Read a Film, with a focus to enhance your fluency in the language of film. Rooted in the practice of mise-en-scene, learn how meaning is conveyed through elements such as camera angle, set design, motif (shapes), lighting, actors, sound, all of which work together in support of the narrative.

    Tips and Tools with the Screen in Mind – by Lisa G. Spicer
    • Writing for the screen or with the screen in mind, whether narrative or non-fiction (documentary) film.
      • Ex: From any story, what is selected to be scripted and filmed? How is it framed (what do we see)?
      • Ex: Screenplays are written in present tense
    • As related to writing, film borrows from theater by using elements of mis en scene and motif.
      • Ex: How do theater directors use props and costume to support the narrative?
      • Writing for film or with film in mind can be informed by the craft and how films are actually made.

    Ex: Basic camera terminology, used throughout entire process: writing, filming, editing.


    Still thinking about Registering for the Chanticleer Authors Conference?

    Register Today!

    We have a stellar line up of speakers for CAC24, with multiple options to attend.

    We have a stellar line up of speakers for CAC24, with multiple options to attend. Find out why The Writer Magazine (founded in 1887) has repeatedly recognized the Chanticleer Authors Conference as one of the best conferences to attend and participate in for North America. Join us April 19-21, 2024 at the Four Seasons By Sheraton in Bellingham, WA.

  • Spotlight on Diane Garland – Your WorldKeeper – Continuity Editor

    Spotlight on Diane Garland – Your WorldKeeper – Continuity Editor

    DIANE GARLAND – Your WorldKeeper – Continuity Senior Editor

     

    Diane Garland and her editorial company Your WorldKeeper, specializes in the world of continuity. Multiple USA Today best-selling and award-winning authors in various genres rely on her system of cataloging and organizing the minutiae and rules of their story worlds. Growing up as an AF Brat, Diane traveled extensively as a child, which has fueled her passion for travel and reading. She graduated from Florida State University and is a life-long learner. She, along with her husband and two cats, have recently relocated to Columbus, Ohio from the Seattle, Washington area.

    Join Diane at her sessions about the necessity, creation, and organization of a story bible along with pointers on maintaining and using it to take your author career to the next level.


    Still thinking about Registering for the Chanticleer Authors Conference?

    Register Today!

    We have a stellar line up of speakers for CAC24, with multiple options to attend.

    Find out why The Writer Magazine (founded in 1887) has repeatedly recognized the Chanticleer Authors Conference as one of the best conferences to attend and participate in for North America.

  • COMING OUT Of The METAPHYSICAL CLOSET by Lisa Rhyne – Spirituality, Metaphysics, Memoir

    COMING OUT Of The METAPHYSICAL CLOSET by Lisa Rhyne – Spirituality, Metaphysics, Memoir

     

    Lisa Rhyne offers a view into her beliefs, education, and personal experiences with the mystical and otherworldly in Coming Out of the Metaphysical Closet.

    In this autobiographical compendium of supernatural phenomenon, Coming Out of the Metaphysical Closet is a combination of multiple original manuscripts, beginning with a hefty overview of the foundational science and concepts to help frame Rhyne’s experiences, the metaphysical world, and those who claim to work in it. Rhyne explains her perspective on walking between and having to function in both the ‘normal’ and ‘mystical’ worlds and, like many visionaries, describes this reality as illusory and subjective, created by the collective consciousness of living beings through morphogenic fields and a universal repository of knowledge.

    Within this metaphysical framework, humans reincarnate from an ‘Oversoul’ that seeks to learn through each lived experience—the good, bad and everything in between. As such, Rhyne relates that shamans such as she can step between past and present lives, and even across different planes of existence. Throughout the book, Rhyne expands on the powers, dangers, as well as unique transformative opportunities that these spiritual journeys can lead to.

    Her own path within the metaphysical community takes center stage as she shares impactful moments in her life. From a complex and abusive relationship with her mother, to a dangerous stalker, to joyous life-changing personal revelations, she insists that metaphysical forces have watched over her since before she was born.

    Rhyne maintains a strong sense of yearning and hope throughout these stories, with moments of evocative description that paint both the mundane world and her enchanting mystical visions. Emotional scenes frame otherworldly ideas with experiences that readers can easily connect to—the pain of supporting a loved one through illness, the simple love between a girl and her cat, the joy and satisfaction of feeling that you’ve helped another person.

    As she learned more about mystical practices and her relationship to them, Rhyne continuously connects with many fascinating people. Her continued studies include a wide variety of scholars, healers, and thought leaders, Hopi and other indigenous elders, fellow Metas (her term for those who share her beliefs, abilities and practices), and renowned authors such as Michael Talbot, Phillip K. Dick and shamanic practitioner Dr. Hank Wesselman, PhD. Coming Out of the Metaphysical Closet contains numerous references and links, so curious readers will find many more valuable threads of knowledge to pursue.

    Rhyne shares examples of her metaphysical experiences and powers such as manifesting desired outcomes into her life, healing herself and others by moving between dimensions, and being guided by higher beings to pursue or avoid certain relationships. The full nature of these higher beings remains elusive, with references and stories that paint them in angelic, ancestral, and even extraterrestrial light.

    Coming Out of the Metaphysical Closet seeks to inspire readers—encouraging those who not only believe in but know the mystical to utilize their powers and share their abilities and perspectives with the world to foster understanding and acceptance of all things metaphysical.

    Some readers might find some ideas difficult to grasp, as this book is oriented more towards those who already have some education and connection to various metaphysical theory and beliefs, but Rhyne grounds the more esoteric ideas with figurative language, scientific foundations, and recurring explanations. Additionally, as some ideas are often drawn from various mythologies across the world, they show interesting connections between belief systems that at first glance appear disparate but share foundational concepts.

    Coming Out of the Metaphysical Closet has over 300 images including pictures and video stills of sometimes unexplainable supernatural phenomena, and significant moments for Rhyne, with an online gallery that further expands on them, including transcripts and videos.

    Rhyne’s online gallery includes images in the book and provides readers a chance to view the photos on their computers to be able to see the details better. More significantly, she includes security camera videos of drifting motes of light. The true nature of these videos is interesting to consider, whether one believes them to be small spiritual manifestations, or physical things catching the camera’s attention. Similarly, the photos and videos, and recording of the Mysterious & Unexplained show, include significant technical issues and comments by others experiencing the phenomena, giving tangible examples of Rhyne’s claims that her energy disrupts electrical systems.

    Rhyne also provides supplemental documents like the full Dragon dictation messages (from Chapter 8) in this gallery. These messages contain some ominous and even poetic lines, though similarly to Rhyne herself, readers will find it difficult to parse meaning from this text. Much could be read into it, however, and the lack of clarity prompts one to wonder how an otherworldly entity might struggle to communicate with someone in our reality utilizing electronics.

    All these examples might encourage others with metaphysical beliefs to openly share their experiences, their own documented phenomena, and could certainly spark fascinating discussions which is one of the goals of this book—to start authentic dialogue without any fear of negative repercussions or discrimination.

    This book will resonate with those who experience—as well as seek to experience—seemingly unexplainable mystical things, and ultimately advocates for a world of understanding, love and authentic personal empowerment.

    At the core of Coming Out of the Metaphysical Closet is the idea of inclusion and universal connection—through past lives, Aka cords, soul groups, or even just the small moments of kindness that turn strangers into friends. Whether or not readers share every belief with this book, Rhyne reminds them to search for people who enrich their lives and live the ideals of empathy and equality.

    For readers on a journey of metaphysical spirituality, or for those who are merely ‘psi-curious’ (to borrow one of Rhyne’s terms), this book will spark curiosity and a sense of community. Rhyne understands there will be those who doubt and no matter how much evidence is presented by her or anyone else, some will never accept. And that’s perfectly fine with Rhyne. This book is a beacon of light for those who wish to be the masters of their lives and dreams. There are two questions that sum it up nicely. “What if she’s wrong?” and “What if she’s right?”