JOURNAL
A literate life
Pamlico Writers Conference and Competition lures writers from near and far
First Place Winners Poetry Muriel Weinstein, Saving Al Fiction Mark Havlik, What Lies Beyond Those Hills Non-fiction Angie Mellor, Letting Blood Young Adult Tia Bach, Remembering Gold Eyes High School Anne Blythe Davis, The Terminal
Second place winners Poetry (tie) Marty Silverthorne, Spirits of the Level Angie Mellor, Put Through the Paces Fiction Jan Parker, EmLee Non-fiction David Desrochers, Bullets for Thanksgiving Young Adult Elizabeth Tankard, Untitled
32 • WASHINGTON THE MAGAZINE | MARCH/APRIL 2013
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Introduction by VAIL STEWART RUMLEY PHOTOS by WILL PRESLAR
hey live in a world of ideas. Ideas fleshed out, shaped by word and thought and skill into stories. These stories may be real, they may be imagined, they may be fragmented in poetry, but no matter the form, they are all the byproducts of a creative life. What united these creators was a conference and a competition: the first Pamlico Writers Conference and Competition held at the Washington Civic Center on March 2. Young, old, published, unpublished — they came together to learn and network, and celebrate the written word with like-minded literary lovers. Winners of the competition fell into five categories: fiction, non-fiction, young adult, poetry and high school, a category solely for young writers still in school. Submissions came from near and far: North Carolina, New York, France. Each category was judged by a blind juror who applied their own
aesthetic criteria to each work while remaining unidentified to the authors, as the authors remained anonymous to them. The collaboration between the Pamlico Writers Group and the Beaufort County Arts Council, offered words of wisdom from publishing professionals and authors during the daytime conference and cash prizes and dessert to first- and second-place winners of the competition at a reception that night. In addition to the two hosting organizations, local sponsors of the conference and competition included PotashCorp-Aurora, Lee Chevrolet/Buick, North Carolina Arts Council’s Grassroots funds, Beaufort County Government, Beaufort County Schools and Friends of the Brown Library. The following works are the winning entries in the competition. Due to space constraints samples, and not the full entries, may have been printed in some cases.