Secrets of Publishing Panel

Are you curious about how to get your work published? Come learn from this fantastic panel of authors who will be sharing tips and tricks that they learned from their personal publishing experiences.

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About the Panelists:

Frances Kai-Hwa Wang is a poet, essayist, and activist chronicling issues of Asian Americans, race and justice. She’s written for PBS NewsHour, NBC AsianAmerica, The Emancipator, PRI GlobalNation, AngryAsianMan, Cha Asian Literary Journal and Drunken Boat. She teaches Asian/Pacific Islander American Studies at University of Michigan and creative writing at Washtenaw Community College. She co-created a multimedia artwork for Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center. She’s author of three chapbooks and a new book of poetry, “You Cannot Resist Me When My Hair Is in Braids,” at Wayne State University Press. Franceskaihwawang.com

Detroit native Aaron Robertson is a writer, editor, and translator. His debut, The Black Utopians: Searching for Paradise and the Promised Land in America (FSG, 2024), was a finalist for the 2024 Los Angeles Times Book Prize in History and best book of the year by The New York Times, The Washington Post, The New Yorker and TIME. His Italian translation of Beyond Babylon by Igiaba Scego was shortlisted for the 2020 PEN Translation Prize and the National Translation Award. A recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts grant, he's written for The New York Times, Foreign Policy and The Nation.

Joe Grimm teaches journalism at Michigan State University and was an editor a Detroit Free Press editor for 25 years. His books include "Coney Detroit" and "The Faygo Book," a Michigan Notable Books selection. His classes have published 25 books available on Amazon, most in a series of 100-question cultural competence guides. He’s an adviser for the Great Lakes Books Series at Wayne State University Press and has taught classes in book publishing at Birmingham's Community House.

Aquilino Gonell is a former DC Capitol Police Sergeant who defended Democracy on January 6, 2021, the subject of his bestselling debut book AMERICAN SHIELD: The Immigrant Sergeant Who Defended Democracy. He left the Dominican Republic as a child, moved to NY, joined the US Army to pay for college, served overseas honorably and had a decorated career as a Staff Sergeant. He was awarded the Presidential Citizenship Medal, the Congressional Gold Medal, and the Carnegie Immigrant Award. He’s been featured in The New York Times, Washington Post, NPR, CBS Mornings, NBC News, Fox-TV, MSNBC, Rolling Stone, Telemundo and Univision.

Susan Shapiro grew up in West Bloomfield Michigan. After graduating U of M, she moved to New York where she's an award-winning writing professor who freelances for the NY Times, Washington Post, WSJ, LA Times, NY Magazine, Oprah, Wired & New Yorker online. She's the bestselling author of memoirs her family hates like Five Men Who Broke My Heart and The Forgiveness Tour coauthor of the book American Shield. She uses her writing/publishing guides The Book Bible and Byline Bible to teach her popular "instant gratification takes too long" courses at NYU and in private classes & seminars online. Follow her on Instagram at @Profsue123.

Christina Wyman is a USA Today bestselling writer and teacher living in Michigan. Her middle grade debut Jawbreaker, a Publishers Weekly Best Book, follows a seventh-grader with a craniofacial anomaly that’s caught the attention of school bullies—including her own sister. Her sophomore novel, Slouch, is about a tall girl navigating friends, family, self-esteem, and boundaries. She grew up in a tiny apartment with her family in Brooklyn, New York, where she dreamed of becoming a writer. She’d written for New York Magazine, The Washington Post, Elle, Ms. Magazine and The Independent.