Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Tom Hallman, Jr., will be the featured reader at this year’s “Authors at the Playhouse” fundraising event, taking place this Sunday, June 3, at the River City Playhouse in Ilwaco, beginning at 7 p.m.
Hallman is considered one of the nation’s top narrative writers. His Pulitzer Prize was awarded for a series of articles about a boy named Sam whose face was severely disfigured. His book, “Sam: The Boy Behind the Mask,” was published in 2002. On Sunday he will be reading from his 2012 release, “Amazing Grace: True Stories of the Power of Faith.”
Some of his recent articles have made the rounds on Facebook, most recently the story of how one man, after 42 years, tracked down his former teacher to apologize for his poor behavior in high school. It was called “The Apology,” and quickly gleaned over 25,000 hits.
Hallman will be joined Sunday evening by local authors Karen Bertroch, Jan Bono, Patty Hardin, Kevin Heimbigner, and Mandy Metzger.
Karen Bertroch is the Director of the Appelo Archives Center in Naselle. She is one of the four authors of “When Logging was Logging: One Hundred Years of Big Timber in Southwest Washington,” released last November.
Bertroch has written grants professionally for many years, and has published magazine articles and edited numerous historic documents for publishing.
Emcee for this event, Jan Bono is no stranger to the River City Playhouse. Last December, “A Christmas Trilogy: Three Holiday One-Acts” was performed there. To date, she has written 12 one-act plays, five volumes of humorous personal experience stories, and two poetry collections.
A frequent contributor to the “Chicken Soup for the Soul” series, Bono has had 17 stories accepted in the last 2 ½ years. She has written over 650 entries for her eclectic blog, and just completed a 14-post “Travel Log” of her recent adventures in Italy and Austria. Visit her blog at: JanBonoBooks.com/blog.
“Welcome Home” is Patty Hardin’s 2012 labor of love. She collected 20 stories from Viet Nam veterans as a tribute to those who served in an unpopular war. She says she was humbled by working on this project, and selected the title as her way of saying “Thanks.”
Hardin has also written for Hunting & Fishing Collectibles, Decoy Magazine, The Daily Astorian, the Chinook Observer and The Daily News. Later this year her haiku poetry will appear in a haiku anthology, a publication of the Haiku Society of America.
Kevin Heimbigner is a retired business teacher and hall of fame high school coach. He now writes state award-winning sports, news, and feature stories and is a photographer for the Chinook Observer newspaper in Long Beach, Wash.
Heimbigner has won 18 first place awards for his news, sports, and feature writing and he has won first place awards in black and white and color action photography. In 2011, Heimbigner was the state’s top investigative reporter for any size newspaper.
“No Fish Story,” is a compilation of his personal Pacific Northwest fishing stories, dating back 35 years. “The Magical State Championship Season: Ilwaco Fishermen 1958-59” has been very well-received by high school basketball fans throughout the region.
Well-known to avid peninsula coffee drinkers, Mandy Metzger, co-owner of Long Beach Coffee Roasters, became a visual artist at a very young age and began writing seriously in high school.
She loves the language and prose of 19th century England as well as strong female characters. Jane Austen and the Bronte sisters provide much of her inspiration. Metzger’s first novel, “The Devoted,” is written in the style of Jane Austen.
Doors will open at 6:30 Sunday evening at the River City Playhouse, 127 Lake Street, Ilwaco, for this entertaining event. Admission is a $5 donation for the Playhouse fundraising event, but “we’ll gladly accept more,” says Bono. Authors will be on hand to sell their books, with 20% going to the Playhouse. Refreshments will also be available for purchase.