Joins Steve Berry at Book Festival Gala
Amelia Island, Fla. (January 4, 2012)
How does an author who has been writing action-packed books for over 40 years stay motivated? Where does he find the ideas, plots and characters? Inquiring minds want to know. Well, they can find out personally from David Morrell, the creator of Rambo, who followed that work First Blood, with thirty more published novels of fiction. He obviously has found a way, and will be sharing some of his writing experiences and techniques to an expected crowd of developing writers in just a few weeks.
Morrell will be the featured author at the Friday, February 17th Writers Workshop at FSCJ, Yulee campus, which kicks off the 2012 Amelia Island Book Festival. This day will be full of seminars featuring Morrell and several other writing teachers and featured authors. It starts at 9am, runs until 5pm, includes lunch and the cost per person is $65. Students with ID attend free of charge.
As a teenager growing up in Canada, David loved the television show “Route 66” and made the decision at that early stage in life to become a writer and develop his own stories of adventure. Today he is considered the “Father of Modern Action Novels.”
He published the first of his Rambo series in 1972 while he was a professor in the English department at the University of Iowa. In order to give real validity to his stories, Morrell was trained in firearms, hostage negotiation, assuming identities and anti-terrorist methods. Sylvester Stallone starred in this American iconic movie series about John Rambo, the very troubled Vietnam war veteran and former Green Beret.
Later he wrote the six part comic book series, Captain America: The Chosen, another American classic.
David Morrell received the celebrated Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel of 2005 for his dark-suspense thriller, Creepers (CDS Books). This was Morrell’s first Stoker Award for Best Novel. He received two prior Stoker Awards, both in the Long Fiction category, for The Beautiful Uncut Hair of Graves (1992) and Orange is for Anguish, Blue for Insanity (1989), as well as numerous nominations. Past winners of the Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel include Stephen King, Peter Straub, Joyce Carol Oates, and Thomas Harris, for The Silence of the Lambs. A book reviewer has referred to Morrell as “the mild-mannered professor with bloody minded visions.”
If you miss the Writers Workshop, not to worry. Morrell will be joining Headliner Steve Berry, another prolific mystery writer, at the Friday night, February 17th Festival Gala – Once Upon a Book Island, the second act of this year’s Amelia Island Book Festival. The gala is a ticketed event to be held at the Omni Amelia Island Plantation (see the festival website for ticket information and reservations.) David and Steve aren’t just fellow authors, they are good friends who were delighted that they both were asked to the festival at the same time. Several other featured authors will also be attending this laid back evening of dining, (catered by Horizons), dance (featuring Pili Pili), and light literary banter.
Interacting personally with successful authors is just another advantage of participating in Amelia Island Book Festival events. Saturday, February 18, is the FREE day for the general public, lovers of literature of all ages, to meet and greet the more than thirty nationally known, regional and local authors who will be at the Market Place and Kidz Zone. Located along North Fifth Street, in Historic Downtown Fernandina Beach, between First Presbyterian Church and La Tierra Prometida, you’ll find books, food, seminars and fun. And admission is free.
Tickets are still available for the Writers Workshop ($65) and Festival Gala ($75 per person, $700 table for 10), both to be held on Friday, February 17. Go to ameliaislandbookfestival.com to get yours before they sellout!
The Festival is grateful for the annual support of the Amelia Island Tourist Development Council, our corporate partners and all of our dedicated members.
