When working on important projects, I like to pull the plugs as much as possible, disengaging the social media distractions that (for me at least) tend to derail the creative process. As a result, this is my first post since November. But it’s for a good cause.
This week took me back to Greensburg for the Writing Popular Fiction residency at Seton Hill University. As always, it was an opportunity to reconnect with friends, colleagues, and fellow writers.
But the big draw this term was the thesis defense for my mentee Chris Shearer, who was there to present excerpts from his first novel, a work appropriately titled The First.
The evening got of the a terrific start with WPF alumnus Sheldon Higdon showing up in a T-shirt proclaiming him the founding member of the Chris Shearer fan club, and it progressed from there with Chris delivering the reading in his personable, understated manner that let the power of the words speak for themselves.
I have no doubt that everyone who attended Chris’s presentation joins me in the sincere hope that that The First is the first of many.
Photos:
Tim Waggoner, Chris Shearer, and the 21st-Century Scop give The-First sign at Chris’s reading of The First. Photo by Querus Abuttu.
Chris Shearer with Sheldon Higdon, the founding member of the Chris Shearer fan club. Photo by Lawrence C. Connolly.
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