Today, we are pleased to welcome Kathleen Dultmeier of Topeka to the Kansas Authors Club.

As we've been doing lately, we ask new members to share a little bit about themselves and their writing. Kathleen is eager to jump into creative writing and is looking forward to connecting with other writers. So, D-1 members, keep an eye out for Kathleen and give her a warm welcome. 

Here's what Kathleen's been up to: 

I don't have anything to share unless you want to see the corporate brochures and releases I write. Nothing too terribly exciting.  Since 1994, I've been writing for various businesses and corporations.

My goal is to meet other writers to discover how to write stories. I have so many stories in my mind but no idea how to translate from my brain to paper. In 2000, I had a supervisor tell me I'm not a very good writer so I stopped... but twenty years is long enough to hold onto what someone else thinks so I'm breaking free! It doesn't matter if I'm a bad writer, I'm not writing for her anyway.

Hopefully, I can find a mentor who will edit my work, and help me improve. I would rather eat glass than edit - there, their, they're - affect/effect - which/that - among/between - dangling participles, misplaced modifiers, and split infinitives - these rules make me nuts. 

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Another new member today! We welcome Mark Esping of Merriam, Kansas to District 2 and the Kansas Authors Club. 

Here's a little about Mark: 

Mark O. J. Esping lives in Merriam KS. Originally from Los Angeles, he graduated from a Midwestern Swedish-Lutheran College.

He reprinted NEQUA, a feminist sci-fi novel first published in Topeka KS in 1900. Mark directed a nonprofit www.folklifeinstitute.com. and two N.E.A. Folk Art grants. His work has appeared in The Clarion Folk Art, Country Living, Scandinavian Review and Hemslöjden. 

Mark is at present re-editing 100 stories/memoirs for publication. Mark is married, an Eagle Scout and a veteran.

He is liquidating his collection of books through KC Metro Books, found on line at www.Biblio.com

Today we are pleased to welcome new KAC member Ky Shorb who lives in District 1. 

We'll let Ky introduce himself...

My name is Ky Shorb and I have been a police officer for the last 20 years (8 left in the tank).

I wanted to start writing now before I retired to get my feet wet in the process and to get some experience. I have just finished my first novel, Into the Gray. 

As it currently stands, I intend to put down 3-5 in this series. Right now I am working through edits and getting a cover design.

Born and raised in Kansas, I really wanted to make as much of my book as 'local' as I could. Thank you so very much for the membership opportunity. I am so very excited to start plugging myself into this community. 
www.facebook.com/ksshorb

Lindsey Bartlett reading at the book launch of Arterial Ink. 

Today, we have the honor of welcoming Lindsey Bartlett of Emporia (D-2) to the KAC fold. She has served KAC in the past as a judge in our literary contests. 

Here's some of Lindsey's background: 

Lindsey Bartlett teaches Composition to first-year writing students at her alma mater, Emporia State University. When not grading papers, she is also a voracious reader and amateur photographer. Bartlett grew up on a dilapidated farmstead in west-central Kansas before moving to Emporia at 18 for college. She has lived in Emporia for almost half her life – it has been the better half.

Though she told her professor in an undergraduate introductory creative writing class that she hated poetry, her first book is just that, a collection of poetry and photos centered around the abandonment of her childhood home. It is also about childhood, rural life, and nostalgia for a time that cannot come again. Bartlett’s true writing love, however, is creative nonfiction. She has had two essays published in 105 Meadowlark Reader, a journal focusing on true Kansas stories. She was also honored to have an essay published in the inaugural anthology of writings inspired by renowned Emporia journalist William Allen White, Arterial Ink. Her poetry and photos have also appeared in Flint Hills Review, MidAmerican Fiction and Photography, and The Wyandotte Window.

Bartlett believes that through words and ideas we can change the world and is looking forward to sharing words and ideas with other members of KAC.

Welcome, Lindsey! It's great to have you with us. 
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Today, we welcome new members Warren Ashworth and Susan Kander! While they live in New York City, they have Harvey County connections and will be members of District 5. 

They offered this information about themselves: 

This is all rather new to us. Susan is a widely published classical music composer and Warren is an architect and an architectural historian. Our first historical novel, We, the House, is based on Warren's great-grandfather's 1878 house in Newton. In fact, the house itself - an Italianate gem - is the narrator and one of the two protagonists. The other is an early-American portrait that hangs on its dining room wall. We are both enamored of the landscape of the Flint Hills. The Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve is a favorite destination.

Warren lectures regularly on the 1833 invention of balloon framing and how it was subsequently essential to the settlement of the prairie. The lecture is filled with his photographs of houses around the Flint Hills, in particular.

Our publisher is Blue Cedar Press in Wichita and I believe Gretchen Eick there is a member of your group. 

We are working on a new historical novel that is set in another historic house in Chicago called Glessner House. In that book the narrator is the renowned architect Henry Hobson Richardson who happens to have been six years deceased when the action takes place, in 1893.

Susan was born and raised in Kansas City and Warren has rather strayed from his family's Kansas roots. Both now live in New York City. We will be in various parts of Kansas for readings of We, the House in January then again in April of 2022. 

Some of our websites are:
www.SusanKander.net
www.WarrenAshworthArchitect.com
www.WetheHouseBook.com
​

Today we welcome Leonard Krishtalka of Lawrence to D-2 and to the Kansas Authors Club. 

He shares this with us: 

My novels are murder mysteries. Three of them involve science intrigues––paleontology, anthropology, archeology––wrapped inside human ones. The Bone Field (June 2019), Death Spoke (November 2019), and The Camel Driver (November 2020) feature private investigator Harry Przewalski (pronounced Je-vahl-skey), who excavates the dirty underbelly of people's lives, unearthing love, loss, betrayals, treachery, fraud and murder buried beneath the science of petrified shards, skin and bones.

My fourth novel, The Body on the Bed (September, 2021), is historical fiction about an alleged murder and sensational trial in 1871 in Lawrence, Kansas amid the social upheaval after the Civil War. Anamcara Press is my publisher. I'm currently working on the fourth novel in the Harry Przewalski series, Native Blood. 

My career includes paleontological research and worldwide expeditions at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History, Pittsburgh, PA, and science administration at the Biodiversity Institute & Natural History Museum at KU.

I have an author’s presentation of The Body on the Bed on Friday, Dec. 10, at 6:30p at the Watkins Museum, 1047 Massachusettes in Lawrence, open to the public, with food and drink. Please come if you can.


Links:
Amazon author page: 
https://amazon.com/author/leonardkrishtalka

Kirkus Reviews: 
​https://www.kirkusreviews.com/author/leonard-krishtalka/preview/

Joining us as a member of District 5 is Kat Struckley of Cheney. 

As a kid, I enjoyed reading and telling all kinds of stories. It was a fun pastime on the hour-long bus ride to school, fully endorsed by my teachers and family, and more often than not, the short stories I wrote seemed to wind up on the desks of said teachers (sorry, Mrs. Mark!). With all of the encouragement and support I received from the adults in my life, it was only natural that I continue the venture on with schooling and careers. Right?

Nope. It took me a couple of decades to realize I should continue on my love for creating with words, no matter how hard it is sometimes to find those words to fit into the story I'm trying to tell. And it's taken me just about as long to gain the courage to publish these writings. Even though most of what I write gets squirreled away from prying eyes, a few things do end up meeting the light of day, in the form of fanfiction, podcast script or honest to goodness novella.

My tastes range far and wide, but I always seem to find myself drawn back to the outrageous and the silly. This can be seen rather clearly in the horror comedy podcast Small Town Absurd, where I co-write about a group of friends in 1980s rural Oklahoma, and my book What To Do When Your Bro Is Possessed, a short, simple story about a group of friends and a not-so-friendly ghost living in present-day Wichita (soon to have a sequel!). Fanfiction has been the basis of my writing since youth, a jumping-off point into a larger pool of world building and character development I wouldn't have noticed otherwise. That being said, most of my writing nowadays is full of geekery and pop cultural references, a call-back to a time when I had the mental capacity to store something other than school schedules and grocery lists in my noggin.

When I'm not in front of a computer, I spend time reading to my kids in funny voices,  helping my partner with his business, and lifting heavy things at the gym. I'm an all-around cheerful nuisance with too much time on their hands and a penchant for befriending potted plants. I have yet to make friends with any of the neighborhood cats, but that doesn't mean I'm not trying.

Social media, in order of most to least activity
Twitter: @itsamooocow
Ao3: MotleyMoose
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/smalltownabsurdpod
Blog (long hiatus): https://inthemindofakat.wordpress.com/

A long-distance member for District 6 is Janet Kelley. Welcome, Janet! 


​Janet Kelley is a high school teacher, reader, writer, and feminist. Janet grew up in Hutchinson, Kansas and graduated from Trinity High School. She studied Humanistic Studies and Religious Studies at Saint Mary’s College, Notre Dame, Indiana. She studied Historical Theology at the University of Notre Dame. She earned her teaching credentials from Indiana University at South Bend. Ms. Kelley currently lives in Boston and Budapest, returning to visit her mother, Lovella Kelley, and siblings in Kansas.

Ms. Kelley believes that books are the cornerstone of freedom and justice. Her debut novel deals with the aftermath of a sexual assault at a Kansas high school. Her work to support survivors of sexual assault was inspired by the writer V and The Vagina Monologues. A portion of the proceeds from the sale of this novel will be donated to The Trevor Project. Please consider a donation to The Trevor Project to support their crisis intervention and suicide prevention services for LGBTQ youth.

You can read more about Janet and her debut novel, as well as email her through her website at: https://writenowjanetkelley.com/

Today we welcome Michael Stewart of Topeka, District 1. 

Here's what Michael has been working on: 

I’ve been writing for a long time, but I’ve only recently published my first novel, The Arch Emulator and the Seven Keys. It went up on Amazon in October. I enjoy writing fun adventure stories, like Goonies and Indiana Jones that I grew up watching. This book is a global conspiracy thriller about a murderous cult that hunts down innocent people known as emulators while they’re in search for a powerful artifact known as the seventh key!

​My next novel that I’m working on will be more of a domestic terrorism thriller that takes place in The Little Apple.

​www.amazon.com/author/stew

Today, I am honored to introduce Cat Webling, a new member to the KAC and District 6. She lives in Russell. 

​I’m a Georgia-born writer who moved to Kansas post-pandemic to be with my family – my partner, son, and cute cats! So far, I’ve had six major publications: a science fiction novel (with a second on the way!), two short story collections, and three poetry collections. You can find my work on my website. I’m a regular writer and editor for SUPERJUMP Magazine, and have contributed posts for Nymeria Publishing, The Gamer, and FanFare. I write science fiction and fantasy, as well as poetry and articles about literature, theater, gaming (especially Dungeons and Dragons), and fan culture. I like to write things that make people think, or smile, or feel something; it’s what I think writing can and should do!
 
I look forward to learning more about the KAC and my district, and I’m excited to join this vibrant community. 

Welcome, Cat! We look forward to meeting you. 
​
[Cheryl Unruh]

Books by Cat Webling: 

Today, we are happy to welcome Kimber Silver to the Kansas Authors Club. 

My love of reading began early, cultivated by my grandmother. I cut my teeth on the works of Louis L'Amour. Then my curiosity for other genres blossomed, and I spent any free time I had in the library. The stories took me away from the farm, and the small town I lived in, to a world so vast, that I felt I could achieve anything.

My imagination has always been vivid, and my grandparents encouraged me to write down the stories I regaled them with.  I have never felt more alive than when I'm immersed in a new tale, as it takes form.


I am active on Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, and I have a website.
Twitter: @kimber_silver21 
Facebook: @AuthorKimberSilver  
Website: kimbersilver.com 
Goodreads: Kimber Silver 

Carey sent her bio as her introduction. She's in District 2, from Overland Park. Welcome, Carey! 

Carey Gillam is a veteran investigative journalist with more than 25 years of experience covering corporate news, including 17 years as a senior correspondent for Reuters international news service. At Reuters, she specialized in covering industrial agriculture, including the products and practices of the world’s largest agrochemical companies and the related health and environmental impacts. Gillam joined the non-profit research group US Right to Know in 2016 where she researches and writes about pesticide issues. In addition to her work a research director for US Right to Know, Gillam works as a contributing writer for The Guardian and freelances for other publications. She is also a member of the Freedom of Information Task Force within the Society of Environmental Journalists.

Gillam’s ongoing reporting and writing have led her to become recognized as an international expert on corporate agriculture and the health and environmental impacts of a pesticide-dependent food system. She is the author of “Whitewash- The Story of a Weed Killer, Cancer and the Corruption of Science,” an expose of corporate corruption in agriculture. The book won the coveted Rachel Carson Book Award from the Society of Environmental Journalists in 2018 as well as two other literary awards. 
​
Her second book, a narrative legal thriller titled The Monsanto Papers, was released March 2. 2021. The book is described by one reviewer as blending “science and human tragedy with courtroom drama in the style of John Grisham.” Another said “Gillam has "written what I can only describe as a blockbuster, right up there with page-turning thrillers by John Grisham.”

Carey's website: CareyGillam.com. 
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CareyGillamAuthor
Twitter: @careygillam

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Today, we are pleased to welcome Charlotte Crawford to the Kansas Authors Club. 

Here's a little bit about her, in her own words: 

​I am Charlotte Anderson Crawford, a native Kansan, currently from Farragut, Tennessee (near Knoxville). After graduating from K-State, I moved to New Jersey to teach mathematics and got a degree from Rutgers while writing and analyzing science achievement tests. I have lived in several other states since that time. The Crawford family still has a  farm in Russell County.

I never thought of myself as a writer--I'm an organizer. I fell into writing through my advocacy of several causes, primarily focusing on women's rights. I found myself writing essays, brochures, flyers, speeches, how-to manuals, and press releases for the charitable organizations I supported. Inevitably, I was asked to collaboratively write sexual harassment curricula for public schools and a Title IX guide for the Illinois State Board of Education. Along the way, I interviewed women and girls about their experiences and opinions and published them in books in collaboration with other activists.  I co-edited the highly successful Tennessee Women of Vision and Courage, an anthology of outstanding Tennessee women. Book sale proceeds have gone toward donation of a copy of the book to every public high school library in Tennessee and have supported over a dozen scholarships for TN college women leaders to a national leadership conference (NCCWSL).

During the pandemic, my husband wrote about a trip his Kansas ancestors took in 1922 to the west coast. I edited Ruts, Guts, and a Model T Truck: Cruising the West at 15 Miles per Hour  through Post Rock Press. It was published  this year. That book got me thinking about my Kansas roots so I decided to solicit Kansas stories for an anthology. I received stories, poems, and photographs from some folks I hadn't had contact with for decades. Plains Speaking: Voices from the Heartland will be published this fall (in color--my first attempt at color) as both an ebook and in paperback. My website is postrockpress.org and I can be reached at postrockpress.crawford@gmail.com.

KAC seems to have a wealth of resources. I look forward to exploring those and reading the work of members.

Attached is the cover of my latest project that will be published soon.

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Today I have the pleasure of introducing Alisa Branham of Lawrence to the group. 

Name: Alisa Branham
Town: Lawrence, KS
 
What kind of writing do you do?

I write a lot in my position at KU and both of my degrees are in Art History, a writing discipline. I write every day and look forward to having more time to focus on personal projects after I retire in 2022. I have a massive library at home and I’m interested in a wide range of topics, particularly history, design, genealogy and travel.
 
What writing projects have you completed or are currently working on?

Right now I’m working on a cookbook for inexperienced cooks of all ages.

For years I’ve been gathering ideas for historical fiction based on genealogy research. Both of my grandmothers were fascinating women - not stereotypical "grandmothers” - and a recent discovery through Ancestry DNA has added a surprising twist to one story.

Eventually, I want to write the immigration story of my Scots-Irish Irvine family, not in the form of a traditional genealogy but as an engaging story of daily life and how culture travels over time.
 
Do you have a website or a facebook page that you'd like us to share with other KAC members? 

No. I just have personal pages on social media, but they aren’t aimed at writing.
 
Is there anything else you’d like other KAC members to know about you?

My husband, a longtime KU Professor, died 3 weeks before COVID hit, so it’s been a long year of isolation and reflection. Words have been pouring out of me in a form I’m calling “poetry” – I suspect the poets in this group would not agree! But I’m interested in learning about poetry too.
 
What would you like to gain from your membership with the Kansas Authors Club?


I hope to meet other writers and learn from you! I’m a good editor and would be happy to read or edit the writing of other members as I have time. I hope to contribute to the 2022 conference; I’m outgoing, well-organized and experienced with large events.  

[Posted by Cheryl Unruh]

Today, we are delighted to welcome another new member: Krystal Yegon of Topeka. 

Name: Krystal Yegon

Town: Topeka, Kansas 

What kind of writing do you do? Fiction

​
What writing projects have you completed or are currently working on?

Currently working on what I think is a noir that I've been working on for some years. Trying to finish it finally.


Is there anything else you’d like other KAC members to know about you? 

I'm not a professional writer and I'm unpublished, but I've enjoyed the craft since adolescence, and try to get better at it in time.


What would you like to gain from your membership with the Kansas Authors Club?  

A writing community that can help me improve and I can eventually serve them at some point.

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Today we have the joy of welcoming a new member from Woodson County (D-3) to the Kansas Authors Club: Chari Bauman (penname: Adelaide Bauman).


Name:  Chari Bauman (pen name Adelaide Bauman)
Town:  Woodson County
 
What kind of writing do you do? 

I write children's books, as well as poetry and sometimes short stories.
 
What writing projects have you completed or are currently working on?

I recently self-published Zara the Zebu, a children's book about a girl and her new miniature zebu calf. I have pet miniature zebu (a type of miniature cattle), so this project was a way for me to give something back to everyone who loves zebu, and to help others learn about them, too. The book is also meant to share the beauty of the Flint Hills with others. We live on the edge of this magnificent area of Kansas, and the illustrations within the book showcase a little of the beauty we see every day. I have more book ideas waiting for attention, but I'm not sure when I'll begin work on them.
 
Do you have a website or a facebook page that you'd like us to share with other KAC members? 

You can find information about miniature zebu, my book, and my photography at the following website: https://cabigailphotography.com/adelaide-bauman-author - I also have a Facebook page and Instagram account under my pen name Adelaide Bauman.
 
Is there anything else you’d like other KAC members to know about you? 

I have been through the whole self-publishing process - from storyboarding my book, to finding an illustrator and working with her, to creating the PDF files for publishing and working through the proofing process. If anyone in KAC is looking for advice or a discussion about what it was like, I'm happy to discuss it.
 
What would you like to gain from your membership with the Kansas Authors Club?

​I hope to make some new connections with others who enjoy writing - it's fun to connect with people and you never know what good might come from those connections. I would also love the opportunity to sell my book at local Kansas bookstores - it's only available through me or Cornerstone Bakery in Yates Center currently, but I would love to see it in other places, too! If this group or anyone in it can help with that, I would be so grateful.

Thank you for taking the time to learn a bit about me!