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2010 Writers' Conference Presenters
Keynote Speaker:
Brian Haig
 Brian Haig graduated from West
Point in 1975 and spent 22 years on
active duty before retiring as a lieu-
tenant colonel in 1997 and going
into private business. The Army
sent him to Harvard for a master’s
degree and a specialty in military
strategy. For the next three years he
was the global strategist on the
Army staff. His military awards
include Airborne wings and the Ranger tab, two Legions of Merit,
and the Distinguished Service
Medal.
Haig retired into civilian life in
1997 to become a director and later
president of Erickson Air-Crane and
then spent a year as president of
International Business
Communications. He has written
articles for the New York Times,
USA Today and Vanity Fair. He is
now a full-time author and works as
a Fox News military contributor.
His first novel, Secret Sanction (published 2001), was a national
and Washington Post bestseller.
Secret Sanction has been optioned
by Nicholas Cage and his production company for a future motion
picture.
Haig’s most recent novel, The
Hunted, was published in August 2009. Based on a true story, this
absorbing thriller charts the incredi-
ble rise and fall of a Russian multi-
millionaire.
Haig is the son of General
(4-Star) Alexander Haig who was
President Richard Nixon’s White
House chief of staff, served briefly
as President Gerald Ford’s chief
of staff, and ultimately became
President Ronald Reagan’s
secretary of state.
Author of:
- A six-book series with
Major/Lieutenant Colonel Sean
Drummond, Army JAG and former
special forces officer:
- Secret Sanction
- Mortal Allies
- The Kingmaker
- Private Sector
- The President’s Assassin
- Man in the Middle
- The Hunted
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Virnell Bruce is the author of a one-woman play, Shells - A
Cameo of Anne Morrow Lindbergh. She spent 36 years in the aero-
space industry, and she currently serves as a trustee of the National
Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington, D.C.
Temple Cone is an associate professor of English at the U.S. Naval
Academy. His first book of poems, No Loneliness, received the first
annual Future Cycle Poetry Book Award in 2009. Other awards
include two Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Prizes and the John
Lehman Award for Poetry.
Gretchen Gillen and Katharine Schultz, former English majors,
began Reading to Go, through which they facilitate reading discus-
sions in the Hampton Roads area, including local retirement communities and CNU’s LifeLong Learning Society. They participated
in the 2009 Book Expo America in New York and continue to hunt
down authors whose books will keep their readers on their toes.
Patti Hinson is an information specialist at The Mariners’ Museum
Library and teaches poetry and memoir classes at The Muse Writers
Center in Norfolk. She holds an M.F.A. in creative writing from
American University. Her prose and poetry have been featured in a
variety of venues, literary and otherwise, including past photography exhibits at area museums.
Jennifer Mattson is an associate agent at the Andrea Brown
Literary Agency. She loves picture books that are real, story-time-
ready stories and easy-reader manuscripts in the tradition of Arnold
Lobel. For the older set, she is drawn to richly imagined fantasies
and dystopian fiction as well as sprawling, atmospheric tales with
Dickensian twists and satisfying puzzles.
Julia Mcguire is an editorial assistant at Simon and Schuster Books
for Young Readers. She has worked on Chains by Laurie Halse
Anderson; Beyond the Spiderwick Chronicles by Tony DiTerlizzi
and Holly Black; The Summer I Turned Pretty by Jenny Han; Hush,
Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick; and Jump! by Scott Fischer (due out in
Spring 2010).
Meg Medina, a Cuban American writer, is the author of Milagros:
Girl From Away, which was nominated for the American Library
Association’s Best Books for Young Adults in 2009. She is also the
author of two forthcoming books: Tia Isa Wants a Car, a picture
book, and Sonia, a young adult novel.
Michael Pearson teaches creative writing and American literature
at Old Dominion University. He is the author of nonfiction books,
which include: Innocents Abroad Too and Imagined Places: Journey
Into Literary America and a novel, Shohola Falls.
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