We’re excited to introduce this year’s awesome speakers. With a lineup like this, it’s sure to be a great conference!

With nearly a million sales, Hallee Bridgeman is a USA TODAY best-selling and Carol Award-winning Christian author who writes action-packed romantic suspense focusing on realistic characters who face real-world problems. Her work has been described as everything from refreshing to heart-stopping exciting and edgy. Hallee has served as the Director of the Kentucky Christian Writers Conference, President of the Faith-Hope-Love chapter of the Romance Writers of America, is a member of the American Christian Fiction Writers (ACFW), the American Christian Writers (ACW), and Novelists, Inc. (NINC). An accomplished speaker, Hallee has taught and inspired writers around the globe, from Sydney, Australia, to Dallas, Texas, to Portland, Oregon, to Washington, D.C., and all places in between. Hallee loves coffee, campy action movies, and regular date nights with her husband. Above all else, she loves God with all of her heart, soul, mind, and strength; has been redeemed by the blood of Christ; and relies on the presence of the Holy Spirit to guide her. Find Hallee’s website at: http://www/halleebridgeman.com

Beth Dotson Brown is the author of Rooted in Sunrise, a novel about starting over after a natural disaster. She’s also an award-winning feature writer, short story author and essayist. Beth is the author of Yes! I Am Catholic and a contributor to A Cup of Comfort for Breast Cancer Survivors and Scenes from the Common Wealth. Heartland Plays published her collection of one-act plays. Her short stories have been published in literary magazines and aired on the BBC World Service Short Story Programme. Beth lives in Lancaster, Kentucky where she enjoys gardening, cooking and spending time with family and friends.

William H. Carman is a hunting and fishing guide and award-winning outdoor writer. His stories have appeared in numerous outdoor magazines, and he won the national Outdoor Life Book Club short story contest. He has written three books of hunting and fishing essays and authored a true crime book, Saving Noah, set in a small town in Kentucky. His latest book, Fishing with Daniel Boone, takes the reader on a fly fisherman’s journey to the rivers and streams of Daniel Boone’s life.   Bill regularly conducts outdoor skills workshops, and he teaches outdoor writing at the Carnegie Center. He and his wife live in Lexington, Kentucky where he is teaching his grandchildren the ways of the woods. Bill can be reached at www.kentuckywildoutdoors.com.

Thomas Crowl is an accomplished author and historical researcher whose writing career spans more that three decades. He has written three traditionally published books: Murder of a Journalist, Opdycke’s Tigers in the Civil War and Queen of the Con. He has also written articles focusing on Ohio history, true crime, archaeology and veterinary history. Tom’s writings demonstrate a commitment to thoughtful inquiry and a belief in the importance of documenting the stories that shape culture, community and the human experience. He is currently working on a book about the assassination of Kentucky Governor William Goebel in 1900. Dr. Crowl is a graduate of The Ohio State University College of Veterinary Medicine and he has spent 45 years in veterinary practice in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Kentucky. He resides in central Kentucky.

 Award-winning poet, essayist, and teacher Kathleen Driskell has authored six poetry collections, most recently Goat-Footed Gods (Carnegie Mellon UP). Other collections include Blue Etiquette: Poems, a finalist for the Weatherford Award; Next Door to the Dead, winner of the Judy Gaines Young Book Award; and Seed Across Snow, a Poetry Foundation national bestseller. Her individual poems and essays have appeared in The New Yorker, Rattle, River Teeth, Appalachian Review, The Southern Review, Shenandoah and other magazines; and her work has been featured in Poetry Daily, Verse Daily, and American Life in Poetry. From 2019-22, she served as chair of the board of the Association of Writers and Writing Programs, the professional organization of creative writers and creative writing programs with around 75,000 members. She is professor of creative writing and Chair of the Naslund-Mann Graduate School of Writing at Spalding University in Louisville, where she lives with her husband in an old country church built before the American Civil War. On April 24, 2025, Governor Andy Beshear appointed Kathleen as the 2025-26 Kentucky Poet Laureate.

Dorian Hairston is a poet, educator, and former college athlete from Lexington, KY. Winner of the Twin Bill’s Best Baseball Poetry Book of 2024, his first collection of poetry, Pretend the Ball is Named Jim Crow explores the life and legacy of Josh Gibson, the greatest Catcher to play the game of baseball. He is an Affrilachian Poet and his work has appeared in Anthology of Appalachian Writers and Black Bone: 25 Years of the Affrilachian Poets. While he enjoys reading and writing poetry, what he loves most is cooking for his family, playing some good music, and dancing often.

Matt Jones is the owner and president of Jones House Creative, an independent design agency that delivers world-class service in custom website design, graphic design, and branding. Since its beginnings more than 15 years ago, Jones House Creative has developed a reputation for excellence, both in design and in customer service. They serve well over 200 authors and work with a wide variety of businesses and entrepreneurial websites.

Cherry Weiner grew up in Australia, lived in Europe for three and a half years and moved to America when she married her husband, Jack in1972.  She has been agenting since 1977, when she left the Robert P. Mills Agency. Mills’ famous clients (she will not drop names, but might tell you about it, if you ask her), took two years to convince her to open her own agency.  They did this by inundating her with new authors and their manuscripts. She started out by handling science fiction, fantasy, and horror. She now handles all genres of fiction and a good number of fairly well-known authors in the field of Horror, Science Fiction / Fantasy, Romance, Mystery, Westerns, Native American novels and Historical novels covering all the various sub-genres each category can break out into. Only once in a very special situation has non-fiction crept into the mix but no poetry, no children’s fiction and almost no Young Adult works.  If there is Y.A., then it is science fiction, fantasy or horror, and only by the authors she already handles in adult fiction. She sells to all formats of publishing including audio, both in the USA and foreign markets. She loves doing these workshops to help authors understand the Publishing business.

Jan Schiffer is a life-long journal writer. After retiring from her work with teens in an alternative school program, she put her passion for writing and research into her award-winning memoir, Finding the Rest of Me, the story of her adoption journey and discovery of the Quaker Friends Rescue Home where she was born. She and her husband live on a cliff above the Kentucky River, in Frankfort, Kentucky. When she’s not writing, she enjoys traveling with her husband, hiking with friends, spending time with family, walking her dog, Graycie, volunteering at the Humane Society thrift store, reading, and gardening. Learn more about Jan on her Facebook page, Finding the Rest of Me.

Kate Snyder is the owner and founder of Plaid Elephant Books, Central Kentucky’s only independent children’s bookstore. She is an artist, a mother of three, and an active member of her community, serving in leadership roles within the Danville Independent Schools and with several local nonprofits.

James B. Wells’s investigative memoir, Because: A CIA Coverup and a Son’s Odyssey to Find the Father He Never Knew, chronicles his decades-long search to uncover the truth about his father’s CIA-classified death in Vietnam in 1965. Since its June 2025 release, the memoir has received nine literary awards. Wells is a retired criminology professor at Eastern Kentucky University and recipient of the 2025 Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences John Howard Award for contributions to corrections. He holds an M.S. in Criminal Justice, a Ph.D. in Research, and an MFA in Creative Writing. He’s authored over sixty-five books, chapters, and articles, plus over a hundred and fifty research reports. His essays or poetry appear in Collateral Journal, About Place Journal, Wild Roof Journal, Military Experience and the Arts, The Wrath-Bearing Tree, Shift, Proud to be: Writing by American Warriors, Trajectory Journal, and From Pen to Page III: More Writings from the Bluegrass Writers Coalition. More information at https://jamesbwells.com