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Islanders Write thanks our host, Featherstone |
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For people interested in writing and the writing life on Martha's Vineyard. |
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It’s August, and we’re getting ready for Islanders Write 2025. Please join us for this year’s event at Featherstone Center for the Arts on Sunday, August 17, at 7:30pm and Monday, August 18, from 7:30 am - 5:00 pm.
The timing of this year’s Islanders Write feels like a kick-off to the Vineyard’s grand-finale week of summer. The week that brings us Illumination Night, the Agricultural Fair, the Oak Bluff’s fireworks, and the fierce competition for ferry reservations off the Island.
We are going to focus this issue previewing the eleventh Islanders Write, a MV Times initiative. Below, you will find links to the schedule of events, this year’s speakers, our vin-lit quiz, and several essays, including Perry Garfinkel’s piece about working through his writer’s block. Read the full essay here.
Write on!
Kate Feiffer, Director – Islanders Write |
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All events are FREE to attend.
First come, first seated. |
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On bad days of writing, days when I achieve little to no writing or, worse, days when the writing is so bad that I am ready to throw in the proverbial towel, I try to delete that day from my memory and start over the next day, as though that previous day never happened. I look at things I’d written previously that had been published to convince myself that I am indeed capable of writing cogent prose.
Read the full essay here.
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Writing Prompt Selections from July |
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Last month’s writing prompt was “What I didn’t realize about the Vineyard.”
Last month’s writing prompt was “What I didn’t realize about the Vineyard.”
We are delighted to share an essay submitted by Joani LaMachia, which begins: As I am writing, it is a rainy wet day, one of those days when literally everything is damp, except for one thing - my spirit. Why? I’m just happy to be here.
Read the full essay here.
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Leaving the Vineyard.
Please share your essay with us. We will choose one to highlight in our next newsletter. 500 words or fewer please.
Deadline: September 4, 2025. |
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In 2017, the mother/daughter team Kathy and Beth Usher stood up in front of a rapt audience and pitched their book project to the Islanders Write Pitch Panel. Last November, Beth passed away. Our hearts go out to the Usher family. I have been in touch with Kathy, and she has given us permission to share the powerful story that they pitched that day.
Read Beth Usher’s pitch here. |
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The answer to last month's quiz question – One of these cartoonists spent summers in Menemsha, the other three in West Tisbury. All of them have published in The New Yorker and all have illustrated books, but only one of them has turned a novel written by another author into a graphic novel. Which one?
In April 2025, Paul Karasik, along with Lorenzo Mattotti, & David Mazzucchelli, published a graphic novel adaptation of Paul Auster’s “New York Trilogy.” The book, published by Pantheon, has gotten rave reviews. |
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Cartoon by Kate Feiffer |
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Recent publications by Islanders Write authors. |
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Writing and Reading Around the Rock |
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August 12, 6 pm
VH Library @ Katharine Cornell Theatre
Author talk: Nicole Galland, “Boy”
August 13, 2 - 4 pm
Edgartown Books
Book signing: Mike Bernard “Concert Dates”
August 13, 4 - 5:30 pm
Chilmark Library
Author talk: Peter Benson Miller, “American Artists in Postwar Rome.”
August 14, 21, 28, 8 - 9 am
West Tisbury Library
Morning Pages writing workshop with Kate Feiffer
August 14, 10:30 am
VH LIbrary @ Tisbury EMS
VHPL Book Club: “Rental House: A Novel” by Weike Wang
August 14, 2 - 4 pm
Edgartown Books
Book signing: Norman Birnbach and Tilia Klebenov Jacobs “Stealing Time”
August 15, 2 - 4 pm
Edgartown Books
Book signing: Lois Cahall, ‘“The Many Lives of Hazel Lavery”
August 15, 5:30 - 8:30 pm
Johnson Guest Residence
Book talk: Kevin Wayne Johnson, “Leadership with a Servant's Heart “ series
August 16, 2 - 4 pm
Edgartown Books
Book signing:Heather Clark, “The Scrapbook”
August 17, 7:30 pm
Featherstone Center for the Arts
Islanders Write: Politics and the Press, Censorship and Coverage
E.J. Dionne Jr., Mara Liasson, Richard North Patterson, Patricia J. Williams, Charles Sennott
August 18, 7:30 am - 5:00 pm
Featherstone Center for the Arts
Panel discussions and writing workshops
August 19, 12 - 1 pm
Oak Bluffs LIbrary
Author talk and coloring: Maryam Myika Day and 10-year old Ayodélé Olayinka, “This is My Story”
August 19, 2 - 4 pm
Edgartown Books
Book Signing: Dr. Ala Stanford, “Take Care of Them Like My Own”
August 19, 4 - 5 pm
Bunch of Grapes Bookstore
Author talk: Jonathan Capehart and Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr., discuss Capehart's new memoir, “Yet Here I Am: Lessons from a Black Man's Search for Home” |
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August 21, 2 - 4 pm
Edgartown Books
Book signing: Dan Martino “The Oyster Book”
August 22, 2 - 4 pm
Edgartown Books
Book signing: Phoebe Lapine, “Carbivore”
August 23, 2 - 4 pm
Edgartown Books
Book signing: Lauren Wesley Wilson, “What Do You Need?”
July 17, 4 pm
Edgartown Books @ The Carnegie
Author talk: Dr. Daphne Palmer Geanacopoulos, “The Pirate’s Wife”
August 23, 4:30pm
Featherstone Center for the Arts
Poetry Reading and book signing: Ellen Story, “Corner Pocket”
August 26, 11 am -1 pm
Edgartown Books
Book signing: Dr. Christopher Willard, “Feelings are Like Farts”
August 26, 2025 , 3 - 4 pm
Edgartown Library
12 Months 12 Books Book Club
A book with a protagonist who is a teenager or senior citizen
August 26, 6 pm
VH Library @ Katherine Cornell TheaterAuthor talk: Prof. Philip Weinstein, “Time’s Bounty: Rethinking Aging”
August 28, 2 - 4 pm
Edgartown Books
Book signing: Julia Spiro, “Such a Good Mom”
August 29, 2 - 4 pm
Edgartown Books
Book signing: Maryanne Petrone, “Jungle Up and Breathe”
August 30, 2:30 - 3:30 pm
Aquinnah Library
Book group: Joseph Lee, “Nothing More of This Land”
August 31, 2 - 4 pm
Edgartown Books
Author signing: Maria Anne Lenihan, “‘Morning Glory Girl”
September 3, 3 pm
VH Library @ Tisbury EMS
Science & Nature Book Club: “A World on the Wing” by Scott Weidensaul
September 8, 4:30 pm
Featherstone Center for the Arts
Author talk: Judith Newcomb Stiles, “Hush Little Fire” |
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Thank you to our Sponsors |
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If you would like to share some ideas, or advertise in this newsletter, please contact Kate Feiffer, Director – Islanders Write at islanderswrite@mvtimes.com |
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Stay Connected |
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THE ISLANDERS WRITE NEWSLETTER IS A NEW MONTHLY DIGITAL PUBLICATION OF THE MV TIMES
By subscribing to the Islanders Write Newsletter, you will receive a newsletter with information about writing and the writing life on Martha’s Vineyard once a month. If you received this email and are not interested in getting additional Islanders Write newsletters, click here: UNSUBSCRIBE
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