Mountain of Authors

Pikes Peak Library District will host its seventh annual Mountain of Authors event on Saturday, April 13 to showcase authors of the Pikes Peak region. The keynote speaker, Stephen Coonts, is the author of innumerable New York Times bestsellers, the first of which was the classic flying tale, Flight of the Intruder.

Coonts’ first novel, Flight of the Intruder, published in September 1986 by the Naval Institute Press, spent 28 weeks on the New York Times bestseller lists in hardcover. A motion picture… Show more based on this novel, with the same title, was released nationwide in January 1991. The success of his first novel allowed Mr. Coonts to devote himself full time to writing; he has been at it ever since.

The free program will be held on Saturday, April 13 from 12:30 - 6 p.m. at East Library, 5550 N. Union Blvd. No registration is required and complete information is available at ppld.org/MOA.

New and established writers will be inspired, and book fans will have a chance to meet and discuss their favorite titles with local authors. Come enjoy the panel discussions on Love & War and Publishing Advice from the Pros, the Author Showcase Spotlight featuring more than 20 local authors, and a talk by acclaimed thriller and suspense novelist Stephen Coonts, followed by a book signing and reception with this renowned local writer.

Program Schedule:

Panel 1: Love & War
12:30 - 1:30 p.m.
Panelists: Nick Arvin, Kerstin Lieff, Kathleen Morgan

Author Showcase Spotlight
1:30 - 2:15 p.m.
Break
2:15 - 2:30 p.m.

Panel 2: Publishing Advice from the Pros
2:30 - 3:30 p.m.
Panelists: Judith Briles, Marilyn Largent, Anita Mumm

Break
3:30 - 4 p.m.

Keynote Speaker: Stephen Coonts
4 - 5 p.m.

Book Signing and Reception
5 - 6 p.m.


Panel author bios

Panel 1: Love & War

Nick Arvin
Nick Arvin grew up in Clio, Michigan. He earned degrees in mechanical engineering from the University of Michigan and Stanford, and he has worked in automotive engineering, forensic engineering, and the design of power plants and oil and gas facilities. Arvin is also the author of three books: In the Electric Eden, Articles of War, and The Reconstructionist. His work has appeared in the New Yorker, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Salon, and Rocky Mountain News and has been honored with numerous awards, including the Rosenthal Foundation Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Boyd Award from the American Library Association, the Colorado Book Award, and fellowships from the Michener-Copernicus Society, the Isherwood Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Arts. He lives in Denver, Colorado, where he is on the faculty of the Lighthouse Writers Workshop.

Kerstin Lieff
Kerstin Lieff came to the United States with her parents as an immigrant from Germany in 1952. She grew up in Minnesota and now calls Boulder, Colorado her home. She is a recent graduate from Fairleigh Dickinson University where she received her Master’s Degree in creative writing. Her first book, Letters from Berlin, is her mother’s memoir, the story of a young woman caught in the devastation of Hitler’s Germany and Stalin’s Russia. Kerstin will be teaching secondary school English as a Teach For America teacher, starting in the fall of 2013. She has two children, three grandchildren, and a dog.

Kathleen Morgan
Kathleen was born in sunny Long Beach, California, one of four daughters of a career Army officer. As a former Army nurse with a master's degree in counseling, she has lived in Germany, Korea, Maryland, Texas, Virginia, Louisiana, Florida, Washington, D.C., Alabama, California, and Colorado.

She is married to a retired Army helicopter pilot and is the mother of two sons-one deceased- and stepmother to another son and a daughter, both of whom have been very busy making her a grandmother. In her free time, Kathleen likes to quilt, play the Celtic harp, and grow a sizeable vegetable garden.

Kathleen began her career writing contemporary romances and soon moved to historical and futuristic romances. She sold her first book, a futuristic romance, in April 1990 while stationed in Korea as an Army nurse. Additional romances soon followed, until she had sold a total of 15 books in the general market, establishing a loyal readership along the way.

Since that time, she has received numerous awards for her work, including a Romantic Times Reviewer's Choice award and Career Achievement award, and The Literary Times award for Literary Excellence in the Field of Romantic Fiction. She was also a Romance Writers of America RITA finalist.

Kathleen now focuses her writing talents in the area of inspirational fiction, offering readers characters who struggle to redefine their growing faith in everyday life.

Kirk Farber (Moderator)
Kirk Farber is the author of the novel Postcards from a Dead Girl, which was published by Harper Perennial. Postcards was a Colorado Book Award winner, Indie Next pick, and Denver Post bestseller. Kirk's short stories have been published in Hobart and Wisconsin People & Ideas, and his essay about life in the Midwest appeared in The Great Lakes Reader (Delphinium Books). Aside from writing, Kirk is an avid drummer, hiker, and of course reader. He works at Pikes Peak Library District and lives in Colorado Springs with his wife, Kelly.


Panel 2: Publishing Advice from the Pros

Judith Briles – Author U
Judith Briles is known as The Book Shepherd. She’s an author and book publishing expert and the Founder and Chief Visionary Officer of Author U, a membership organization created for the author who wants to be seriously successful. Every Thursday, she hosts Your Guide to Book Publishing that now generates in excess of 18,000 downloads a month. She’s been writing about and conducting workshops on authoring and publishing since the 80s with her first book published in 1981 by St. Martin’s Press.

Judith is the author of 30 books including Show Me About Book Publishing, The Confidence Factor and Stabotage! Sixteen have been published in foreign countries. Many have won book awards, including the Colorado Center for the Book’s nonfiction award for10 Smart Money Moves for Women. Her latest, Author YOU: Creating and Building Your Author and Book Platforms is just being released.

Her books have landed her on over 1,000 radio and television shows including repeat appearances on CNN, CNBC, and Oprah. She has been featured in Newsweek, People, Time, The Wall Street Journal, and … The National Enquirer!

Marilyn Largent – David C. Cook, Vice President Sales
Marilyn Largent relocated to Colorado Springs six years ago from San Luis Obispo, CA where she was Vice President of Sales and Marketing for The Parable Group. Marilyn is now the Vice President of David C Cook and has enjoyed the opportunity to see the team at Cook grow and expand their Christian publishing business. Cook publishes adult and children’s books as well as DVD, church resource materials and Sunday School curriculum. Currently we are enjoying the success of Crazy Love and Multiply by Francis Chan — both on the New York Times Best Sellers Lists. Crazy Love has been on the best sellers list for nearly 100 weeks straight. Two and half million copies of Crazy Love have sold for this first time author. One of the things Marilyn enjoys about her job is collaborating with authors, agents and the editorial and marketing teams at Cook as we work together to launch new books.

Anita Mumm – Nelson Literary Agency
Anita Mumm joined Nelson Literary Agency in early 2010. As NLA’s talent scout, she screens all incoming submissions and presents and takes pitches at conferences across the country. Mumm has picked a number of exciting new authors for the company, including Stefan Bachmann, whose international bestseller The Peculiar (September 2012) sold in a major auction to Greenwillow/HarperCollins; Jennifer Shaw Wolf, author of the edgy young adult novels Breaking Beautiful (Walker, April 2012) and Shards of Glass(Walker, 2013); and Monica Trasandes, author of the debut literary novel Broken Like This (Thomas Dunne, November 2012). In addition to her role as submissions manager, Anita is NLA’s foreign rights manager for the Asian territories. She taught English and creative writing to international students in the U.S., China, and France before joining the publishing industry, and she is thrilled to bring her love of language, books, and cultures to her work at NLA.

Tim Blevins (Moderator)
Tim Blevins has been the Special Collections Manager for Pikes Peak Library District since September 2001, where he is responsible for the Regional History and Genealogy Collections, housed in the historic 1905 Carnegie Library, which preserves and provides access to published and unpublished documentary resources important for the study of the Pikes Peak region and for the study of one’s ancestry. Tim is also a co-editor for PPLD’s Regional History Series of books.

Show less