Events
Buxton Books to Host “Our Prince of Scribes” Panel Discussion with Notable Local Writers
On Sunday, December 16th, Buxton Books invites the community to attend a panel discussion for Our Prince of Scribes: Writers Remember Pat Conroy. The event features contributing writers Mary Alice Monroe, Nathalie Dupree, Marjory Wentworth, and Sean Scapellato in conversation with co-editors Nicole Seitz and Jonathan Haupt.
This event is free and open to the public. Plus, hot cider and light refreshments will be provided.
A book signing will follow the panel. All sales of Our Prince of Scribes benefit the educational mission of the nonprofit Conroy Center: www.patconroyliterarycenter.org.
To learn more about the event, click here.
About the panelists
Nathalie Dupree is the best-selling author with fifteen cookbooks and appeared in more than 300 television shows for The Food Network, PBS, and The Learning Channel. She won James Beard Awards for Southern Memories and Comfortable Entertaining as well as her most recent book, Nathalie Dupree’s Mastering the Art of Southern Cooking. The Founding Chairman of the Charleston Food and Wine Festival, she also was a founder of Southern Foodways, the Atlanta and Charleston Chapters of Les Dames d’ Escoffier, the American Institute of Wine and Food and the International Association of Culinary Professionals, of which she was two-time president. She was awarded the prestigious “Grand Dame” of Les Dames d’Escoffier, an international organization of top women in the culinary field. In 2018, she was inducted into the SC Academy of Authors, the Palmetto State’s literary hall of fame.
Jonathan Haupt is the executive director of the Pat Conroy Literary Center, the founding director of the annual Pat Conroy Literary Festival, and the former director of the University of South Carolina Press. He serves on the boards of the South Carolina Academy of Authors and the Friends of South Carolina Libraries and on the advisory board of the South Carolina Humanities and the affiliates steering committee of the American Writers Museum.
Mary Alice Monroe is the bestselling author of twenty novels and two children’s books. Her novels have achieved several bestseller lists including The New York Times, SIBA, and USA Today. Her awards include the SC Book Festival Award for Excellence in Writing, the SW Florida Book Festival Distinguished Author Award, South Carolina Center for the Book Award for Writing, The RT Lifetime Achievement Award, and the International Book Award for Green Fiction. Monroe’s novel, The Beach House, was made into a Hallmark film starring Andie MacDowell. In 2018, she was inducted into the SC Academy of Authors, the Palmetto State’s literary hall of fame.
Sean A. Scapellato is a writer of fiction and essays, a former creative writing teacher at Charleston County School of the Arts, and now a lawyer in Charleston.
Nicole Seitz is the author of seven novels and the editor of When You Pass through Waters: Words of Hope and Healing from Your Favorite Authors. Her novels, including The Spirit of Sweetgrass, Trouble the Water, A Hundred Years of Happiness, Saving Cicadas, The Inheritance of Beauty, Beyond Molasses Creek, and most recently The Cage-maker, have received starred reviews, been chosen as books of the month, and been put on “best of” lists for Books-a-Million, the Pulpwood Queens Book Club, IndieNEXT List, Southern Living, Deep South Magazine, Romantic Times, and Library Journal. Her novels have been nominated for the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance Award. Seitz’s short fiction, essays, and articles have appeared in numerous publications and anthologies.
South Carolina Poet Laureate Marjory Wentworth’s poems have been nominated for The Pushcart Prize five times. Her books of poetry include Noticing Eden, Despite Gravity, and The Endless Repetition of an Ordinary Miracle and New and Selected Poems. She is the co-writer with Juan Mendez of Taking a Stand, The Evolution of Human Rights, co-editor with Kwame Dawes of Seeking, Poetry and Prose inspired by the Art of Jonathan Green, and the author of the prizewinning children’s story Shackles. Her most recent collaborations include We Are Charleston, Tragedy and Triumph at Mother Emanuel, with Herb Frazier and Bernard Powers and Out of Wonder, Poems Celebrating Poets with Kwame Alexander and Chris Colderly.