Misty Valley Books Hosts Gathering of New Authors

l-r: John Griesemer, Faith Caitlin (John's wife), Bob Harnum, Heidi Schmidt, Bill Reed (owner), Kevin O'Donnell (innkeeper)

On January 26, Misty Valley Books in Chester, Vermont, hosted a group of newly published authors at the eighth gathering of its New Voices series. The bookstore's new owners, as of June 2001, Lynne and Bill Reed, are continuing an annual tradition, a forum for newly published writers and their publishers, established in 1995.

The six invited authors, who have written books featuring characters as disparate as Kafka's cockroach and hoop-skirted hikers in New Hampshire, began the weekend on snow, cross-country skiing together at nearby Grafton Ponds Ski Touring Center. Later, the two author reading sessions were moderated by Elinor Lipman (The Dearly Departed, Random House), winner of the 2001 New England Book Award for fiction.

Back row l-r: Bill Reed (owner), Heidi Jon Schmidt, Elizabeth Inness-Brown, Marc Estrin. Front row l-r: Lynne Reed (owner), Elinor Lipman (moderator), John Griesemer, Robert Harnum.

The six authors were: John Griesemer, No One Thinks of Greenland (Picador) [on the Book Sense 76 from July/August 2001]; Heidi Jon Schmidt, Darling? (Picador); Elizabeth Inness-Brown, Burning Marguerite (Knopf); Marc Estrin, Insect Dreams (Blue Hen Books); Nicolas Howe, Not Without Peril (AMC); and Robert Harnum, Exile in the Kingdom (University Press of New England).

New Voices 2003, likely to take place next January, is already on the Reed's drawing board.