The 36th Napa Valley Writers’ Conference is a wrap!

We hope everyone’s inspiration is soaring after a fantastic 2016 conference! View our conference photo album on Facebook and read coverage in the St. Helena Star and Napa Register.

For notifications about the 2017 conference, sign up for email updates using the form at right, and be sure to follow us on Facebook and Twitter for up-to-the-minute news.

Participant Spotlight: Catherine Abbey Hodges

We were delighted to learn Catherine Abbey Hodges accorded us the honor of an acknowledgement in her collection, Instead of Sadness, which was published last year by Gunpowder Press as the inaugural winner of the Barry Spacks Poetry Prize.

Why the conference mention in her book? In the four times Hodges attended the conference since 1999, she worked with faculty leaders Jane Hirshfield, Forrest Gander, Stephen Dunn, and Brenda Hillman. “My four weeks with you were formative, as were a number of ongoing friendships with other participants that began during those weeks,” she recalled.

Hodges’ poems have appeared in many journals, including The Southern Review, Tar River Poetry, Connotation Press and Cider Press Review, and she’s been featured on Verse Daily and The Writer’s Almanac. She teaches English and mentors student writers at Porterville College, where she was named faculty of the year in 2009.

At the upcoming AWP conference, Hodges will sign books at the conference’s table (space 105) Friday, April 1, at 10:30 – stop by for a visit! And later that day, she’ll be a featured reader at our off-site reception, Words and Wine, which is slated for 5-8 at the Sheraton. You can view event details on our Facebook events page.

Meantime, head on over to the Writer’s Almanac to read (and hear) Hodges’ poem, “January Song”:
http://writersalmanac.org/episodes/20160121/