Write Now Podcast at the Writers' Colony

A native Arkansan, Clay Turner earned a B.A. in political science with a minor in Spanish at Arkansas State University as well as a Master’s at the University of Arkansas. After studying abroad in Spain, Clay realized he wanted to write a book that captured the contrast of the gay experience between the American South and Europe. He attended the New York Write to Pitch Conference in 2024 and ThrillerFest in 2025, where American Gay was requested by multiple agents and editors. Clay lives in New York City.

Keith Kahn-Harris is a London writer and sociologist, widely published in both academic and non-academic circles. Author and co-author of eight books, Harris's work is featured in scholarly articles, essays, videos, and podcasts (see kahn-harris.org).In this podcast, Keith discusses what prompted him to write about British metal icon Ozzy Osbourne and why traditional publisher Harper North picked it up.Some other themes Harris has explored are: what it means to be an everyday Jew, what makes language, the insidiousness of denialism, extreme metal music and its influence in Israel, and contemporary youth culture.

River Valley Literary Society's President Kelly Schluterman discusses the underlying motivation in writing her second novel, Soul and Spirit, as well as her ongoing work with Ft. Smith's creative writers through RVLS.

WCDH interviews Commissioner Brandon Chase Goldsmith, PhD. about his abridgement of his stage play THE WESTERN DISTRICT: 14 MONTHS AND 20 DAYS THAT DEFINED FORT SMITH’S FUTURE. Goldsmith is a writer, producer and co-director for The Western District feature length documentary, play, book, and various other films.He is CEO of BCG Creative Solutions where he designs social media videos and television commercials for small businesses and local cities. Dr. Goldsmith serves as a commissioner on the City Advertising and Promotion Commission of Fort Smith, Sebastian County Director for Western Arkansas Mountain Frontier, was a Visiting Instructor of Media Communication at the University of Arkansas Fort Smith, and was pageant coach for Miss Worldwide 2025.He is the Co-Founder of the River Valley Film Society, CEO of MidAmerica Film Market, Executive Director for the Fort Smith International Film Festival, Border Town Live and Arkansas Cinema Society’s Director of Advocacy.

Caryn Mirriam-Goldberg, the 2009-2013 Kansas Poet Laureate, is a writer, teacher, facilitator, coach, and consultant who explores how the spoken, written, and sung word can help us live more vibrant lives. For over thirty years she has facilitated community writing workshops for many writers and special populations, including people living with serious illness. She also offers online classes privately through Writers.com, the Transformative Language Arts Network, and a bevy of annual retreats.Founder of Transformative Language Arts, Caryn is the author or editor of 26 books of poetry, memoir, anthologies, fiction, and non-fiction. A registered songwriter with BMI, her poetry and prose have been published widely. 

Esmé Weijun Wang, a New York Times-bestselling and award-winning author of The Collected Schizophrenias and The Border of Paradise, shares her personal journey after being diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder and several physical conditions like fibromyalgia. Her innovative approaches to sustain her own writing inspired her to create The Unexpected Shape Writing Academy, a program specifically designed for writers navigating limitations.

Lyndsey Ellis is a writer, editor, and teaching artist who crafts speculative fiction and longform essays that explore regional history as well as intergenerational dynamics in the Midwest. She is author of Bone Broth, a story about Justine Holmes—widow, former activist, and funeral thief, who is mourning her husband's death during the aftermath of the Ferguson unrest in St. Louis, Missouri. Lyndsey's essays appear in The New York Times, Kweli Journal, Shondaland, Narratively, Catapult, The Rumpus, Literary Hub, Electric Literature, and other anthologies.Lyndsey is a recipient of several awards, including the Friends of American Writers Literature Award, San Francisco Foundation’s Joseph Henry Jackson Literary Award, and the Barbara Deming Memorial Fund.In 2023, Lyndsey launched the workshop series PlainTalk: Intergenerational Voices of St. Louis. She’s an online instructor at Gotham Writers Workshop and the founder of Show-Me Stories, LLC., a literary consulting resource that helps new writers develop their ideas into full projects.

Lisa Braxton shares poignant moments behind writing her memoir, Dancing Between the Raindrops. She is author of The Talking Drum (set in 1971 Massachusetts), a novel that explores the profound impact gentrification has on community and cross-cultural tensions, as well as the modern immigrant experience.The Talking Drum was awarded a gold medal in the 2021 Independent Publisher Book Awards, the overall winner of Shelf Unbound magazine's 2020 Indie Awards, an outstanding literary award from the National Association of Black Journalists in 2020, and a finalist for the International Book Awards in 2020.Lisa is an Emmy-nominated former television journalist as well as an essayist and short story writer. She is on the executive board of the Writers Room of Boston, a writing instructor at Grub Street Boston, and president of the Greater Boston Section of the National Council of Negro Women. 

Celebrating Writers' Colony's 25th year at the 2025 Gala and fundraiser with Authors' Row, hosted by the Crescent Hotel in Eureka Springs, Arkansas.

Retired Navy Officer David Newcomer goes behind the scenes of his debut memoir, MAIL CALL, a remembrance of his father's war experiences and the domestic front during the Pacific Theater during WWII.

Creative nonfiction writer and storyteller Phyllis Unterschuetz discusses co-authoring Longing: Stories of Racial Healing, a collection of true narratives about the journey of awakening to the effects of racism, as well as the challenges behind her second book, a memoir about finding the courage to tell her abortion story.Phyllis was recently awarded the “Telling True Stories” Fellowship from the Writers’ Colony at Dairy Hollow, and her personal essays were long-listed for the 2023 Amy MacRae Award for Memoir. 

Dr. Cathie English, Professor of English at Missouri State University and formerly an English and language arts high school teacher, shares the inspiration and meaning behind penning her tribute memoir, Dear Ruth: A Book of Grief.Dr. English's academic work has been published in Language, Literature, and Interdisciplinary Studies, English Journal, The Rural Educator, The Journal of Literacy Innovation, Elder Mountain: A Journal of Ozarks Studies, Syracuse University Press, Routledge, and IGI Global.

WCDH interviews Tiffany Mi on site during her residency about her poetry as well as her interest in collective memory and the archive. Tiffany is currently completing her Masters at Brown University. Her work has appeared in Poetry Northwest, Nimrod, Pithead Chapel, and elsewhere.At Writers' Colony, Tiffany worked on her debut collection of lyric essays that explore memory, language, and inheritance through the lens of translation.

A ’Ja Lyons—writer, historian, poet, actress, and currently a Creative Nonfiction PhD student at Oklahoma State University—discusses her second book (to be taken from her dissertation), working title “House: A Memoir of a Home Built by Fragments.”"House" is a personal narrative about surviving incest and childhood sexual abuse that also includes the history of slave plantation homes as dens for raping enslaved Black women and how such dynamics persist for African-American women, particularly in the home.

Tulsa journalist and essayist Liz Blood talks about working as a writer’s assistant to director Sterlin Harjo's “Reservation Dogs,” as well as her first TV credit for co-writing the season finale of a new FX Network's series coming out this fall, "The Lowdown."Liz recently completed the "My Time" writer’s residency at Writers’ Colony at Dairy Hollow, where she worked on the third draft of her own feature screenplay. The fellowship was funded by author James Dean.Write Now Podcast hosted by Julie Rogers