UntitledTown Presents: Survival Strategies for Writing

Authors Nick Chiarkas and Wendy Wimmer are pairing up to give you survival strategies for making it all the way to 50,000 words in just thirty days for National Novel Writing Month.

10:00 - 11:00 am 
COPING WITH WRITER'S BLOCK: Bring your work-in-progress and be prepared to write with Wendy Wimmer's Magic Pill for Writer's Block. 

About Wendy Wimmer: 
Wendy Wimmer's debut short story collection ENTRY LEVEL: STORIES received the 2021 Autumn House Fiction Prize, positive reviews including one from Publisher's Weekly, and a starred Kirkus review. The Washington Post called it one of the short story collections worth reading for fall 2022, and People Magazine called it "gleefully subversive" in its Best New Books feature. The collection sold out on the first day of release and is currently in its third printing less than a year into release. A selection from the book was chosen for Electric Literature's short story features by Kristen Arnett and it was the most read piece on EL in 2022. The book was also recently named to Kirkus Reviews Best Indie Short Fiction for 2022 as well as an honoree for the Society of Midland Authors 2023 Book Awards. Wimmer's fiction has appeared in literary journals like The Believer, Barrelhouse, Waxwing, PaperDarts, Per Contra, ANMLY, Blackbird, Drunken Boat and more, as well as receiving nominations for AWP's Intro to Journals, Best New American Voices and two Pushcart nominations. She lives in Green Bay, Wisconsin, where she is an editor for a large tech publication and in her free time, she volunteers as the president of The Art Garage/Cedar Center Arts. She is the co-founder, along with Alex Galt, of Green Bay's UntitledTown Book and Author Festival.

11:15 am - 12:15 pm
TEN TIPS FOR SELF-EDITING: Nick Chiakras details his ten tips for self-editing that have helped him write several crime thrillers. 

About Nick Chiarkas: 
Nick Chiarkas is a Wisconsin Writers Association Board Member and the author of nine traditionally published books: two award-winning novels Weepers and Nunzio's Way, and seven nonfiction books. He grew up in the Al Smith housing projects on Manhattan's Lower East Side. When he was in the fourth grade, his mother was told by the principal of PS-1 that "Nick was unlikely ever to complete high school, so you must steer him toward a simple and secure vocation." Instead, Nick became a writer, with a few stops along the way: a U.S. Army Paratrooper; a New York City Police Officer; Deputy Chief Counsel to the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations; Deputy Chief Counsel for the President's Commission on Organized Crime; Chief Counsel for the USATBCB; and the Director of the Wisconsin State Public Defender Agency. On the way, he picked up a Doctorate from Columbia University, a Law Degree from Temple University, and was a Pickett Fellow at Harvard. How many mothers are told that their children are hopeless? How many kids with potential surrender to despair? That's why Nick wrote Weepers and Nunzio's Way — for them.

Attend one or both sessions!

Books will be available for purchase.  Book sales coordinated by Lion's Mouth Book store in downtown Green Bay.

Presented by UntitledTown, a program of the Friends of Brown County Library in partnership with Brown County Library .