Southern Sass Publishing Alliances
  • Just Released: Wild, Wonderful 'n Wacky, South Cacklacky
  • SSPA Books
    • His Mother!
    • Prison Grits
    • The Girl Who Ate Chicken Feet
  • SSPA Authors
  • About Sandy
  • Blog: Writing, Reading, and Wandering Thoughts
  • Blog: It's What I Do: I Read, and I Know Things
  • SSPA Events
  • To Schedule Authors for Appearances
    • Resources for Writers
  • Favorite Writing Quotes


The home of great stories written from the heart.

ABOUT  SSPA  AUTHORS
Picture

 The picture to the left is of a face cast of artist and writer Bobbi Adams. The cast was created in paper made from cotton and a paper wasp nest. It is embellished with a bird beak and Spanish moss for hair. Bobbi .is a magna cum laude graduate of Wheaton College in zoology. She earned a graduate degree in studio art at NYU. Adams is a Clemson trained Master Gardener and Master Naturalist. Her column, “The Peripatetic Gardener,” appears weekly (since 1998) in the Lee County Observer. Her first book, Gatherings from the Garden, was published in 2013, and a second book, Gatherings from the Garden, Volume 2 will include her essay published in His Mother! . Visit her at www.bobbiadams.com. or contact her at art_spirit@hotmail.com   



Buy Bobbi's Books
Picture
 ​
Dale Barwick is a graduate of Clemson University and now owns Summerton Primary Care where she practices medicine as a Nurse Practitioner.
     She has published in medical journals and in His Mother! Women Write about Their Mothers-in-Law with Humor, Frustration, and Love and is currently working on two novels. She lives with her husband, two college-age children, and two spoiled black labs.

​



Picture


Lillian McCarter Batarseh’s poem “Apostrophe to Catherine” won third place in the 2010 Sidney Lanier Award Poetry Competition, and her memoir True Grits was published online in January 2011 by Southern Women’s Review. She participated in The Swamp Fox Writing Project and The Advanced Institute at Francis Marion University and continues to practice her craft as a member and current facilitator of FloWriters a South Carolina writers’ group.









Picture
John Beckham was born in Greer, South Carolina, but moved two hours later to Charleston (actually it was 4 years, later). He has worked in sales for over 20 years.
       The Beckhams have been in SC since pre-Revolutionary War. In fact, John’s father wrote five books about growing up in SC. John, himself, golfs a lot, enjoys bourbon, loves all things SC, and hate all things Ohio (maybe not hate). He is also a big fan of UGA.
       He is currently at work on a couple books. 

Purchase Prison Grits
Picture

Margaret Jean Bell worked for forty years in multiple prisons, several psych hospitals, and one heroin clinic before finally retired. She now writes full time drawing on her experiences and interest in personal dynamics.
​      She is published in His Mother! Women Write about Their Mothers-in-Law and is an award-winning author for her essays. Her first novel, Prison Grits, was published in 2015, and she is presently at work on her second novel, Prison Haze.



.


Krista Bowes first met her mother-in-law when she began dating her son in ninth grade. Eight years and a few rocky bumps later, they made it official. After twelve years of moving in the Air Force, Krista and her mother-in-law are thrilled to be only two and half hours apart and see each other about every three weeks—or whenever Gigi needs a granddaughter fix. Krista and her family live in South Carolina with a much loved twelve year old lab named Bailey.



Picture
Kathy China lives in South Carolina with her loving husband, a Siamese cat, and two horses. No longer in law enforcement, she is self-employed as a licensed massage therapist, certified fitness trainer, and registered yoga teacher, 500 – hour level. Her publishing credits include the Southern Sampler anthologies and Wee Wisdom in the fifth grade. To see her poem in print at a young age was a significant factor in her writing interest.






Picture
​

​L. Thomas-Cook, originally from upstate New York, along with her husband and their best friend, a shorkie named Sonny, moved to the Murrells Inlet community a few years ago. It didn’t take long after moving south for the area’s history and setting to reignite a desire to be a writer and photographer.
Added inspiration was to serve as a former board member for the South Carolina Writers Association (formerly Writers Workshop) and the 2014 conference chairperson. That experience motivated the start of the Writers and Authors Assistance Group (WAAG), a group of equally dedicated authors who critique, support, and help writers further develop their craft.
     “I have an interest in the paranormal and history. Creating stories based on true events is also a passion for my work. I especially love to write about strong characters dealing with inner conflict, and to develop plots with lots of twists and turns. As long as I can do that and toss in a bit of humor, I’m happy.”
     Published works include In Your Eyes, a series about undercover detectives living an alternate lifestyle during the 1980’s in Florida. Volume 1 is available on Kindle and Amazon.  Coming soon in spring 2018 is a novel published by Deer Hawk Publishing entitled Forgiveness, a supernatural, murder suspense. 

Purchase In Your Eyes
Picture


Brian Cope has a B.A. in English Literature with a concentration in writing from the University of South Carolina. He’s a fishing columnist and feature writer for Carolina Sportsman Magazine and the editor of CarolinaSportsman.com. He’s a proud native of wonderful, wild ‘n wacky South Cackalacky. 






Picture
Barbara Covington was born and raised in rural South Carolina, but lived in several other states before returning to her home town in Florence, South Carolina, to enjoy her "golden years." She thinks there is nowhere better to live and enjoys writing of her wonderful experiences of living in South Carolina.
     Her two religious published books, Peter's Walk With Jesus and Mary's Ponderings, can be found on Amazon. Barbara states that as she was studying and feeling what they must have felt, she found herself actually feeling their feelings more and more. “I became immersed in their lives to the extent I felt their pain and joy.” 



Peter's Walk with Jesus
Mary's Ponderings
Picture

​Ryan Crawford was born in Honea Path, SC, and attended Clemson University
before joining the Peace Corps. While traveling with his wife, he published poetry
​and fiction in 
New York  Quarterly, Torpedo, Borderlands, Anon, and other journals.
     He has an MFA from Southern Illinois University where he is currently a Ph.D. student studying the neuroscience of insight in the rhetoric and composition program.

Picture
​
​Gloria Dahl is a multi-genre writer and musician who began her writing career in the greeting card field. Since then, she has written and published dozens of human interest features about people and places in South Carolina.
     Gloria is also a poet. Some of her earlier writings can be seen at wordpress.com and she is working
on a book titled, In My Mother's Shadow.
     What she loves best is family, sweet tea, homemade ice cream, and bluegrass music.
     Gloria lives in Upstate South Carolina.

Picture



Noa Daniels’ first book of contemporary poetry The Common Ground was published in Spring 2014.  She is currently working on her second of three books, Tear drops and Heart beats.  Noa’s poetry is a journey through girlhood to adulthood, painting pictures with words and capturing the emotions of moments in time. Her poems, Edisto, and Caution, have been featured in Wake Magazine.  She frequently blogs on Good Reads and is a supporter of the Writers, Agents, and Editor’s Network.
She may be contacted at noadanielsemail@gmail.com.


Purchase The Commmon Ground
Picture
​

​Sherry Fasano lives in a small town in South Carolina with her husband and their hound dog, Lizzie. Her favorite hobbies include porch sitting and spinning tall tales for her grandchildren, often enjoyed simultaneously.
      She's been writing family stories and fiction for several years. Her short story, “The Gift of Understanding,” was published in the anthology, The Old Weird South (QW Publishers 2013).

The Old Weird South
Picture

​​
​A Professor Emerita of English at Coker College in Hartsville, SC, 
Lois Rauch Gibson has been living in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, in East Africa for part of each year since 2012. She continues to write, edit, tutor, and serve on community and professional boards on both continents, and to be involved in the international Children’s Literature Association.

​

Picture


​Martha Dabbs Greenway is a seventh generation South Carolinian and lives at Dabbs Crossroads in a rambling country farm house built by her grandaddy.
​     Co-founder of Southern Sampler Artists’ Colony and retired Director of the Sumter County Cultural Commission, Martha lives contentedly with her two cats: Sonoma, rescued on the Northern California coast, and Salem, an orange tabby who showed up on her porch while Martha was reading a book about an orange cat dropped at a library in Iowa.
            Her work is published in A Southern Sampler, Charleston and The South, Serving Up Memory ,and What I Wish I Could Tell You.
​

A Southern Sampler
Charleston and the South
Serving Up Memory
What I Wish I Could Tell You

​
​Before Kirsten Guenther turned playwright, she lived in Paris where she worked as a Paris Correspondent for BonjourParis.com and wrote the City Guide for USA TODAY.com. While in Paris, she penned the popular weekly column, “The Sexy Expat,” about an American journalist trying to navigate the French.  Current theatre commissions include the book for MGM’s upcoming Benny & Joon and the new musical Measure of Success (Rockefeller Fellowship). She wrote the book and lyrics for Little Miss Fix-it (as seen on NBC); and book for Mrs. Sharp (Richard Rodgers Award, starred Jane Krakowski); Out of My Head (licensed by Steelespring Stage Rights); and The Cable Car Nymphomaniac (Bay Area Theatre Award Nom). She wrote the lyrics for the hit cabaret song, “Accident Prone” with music by Laurence O’Keefe, which has sold thousands of copies and is published by Samuel French. Additionally, she has written sketches and songs for celebrities such as James Franco, Jared Leto, Christopher Walken, Michael Douglas, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Kathie Lee & Hoda, Steve Buscemi, Deion Sanders, Arianna Huffington, Cyndi Lauper, and Queen Latifah, among others. Kirsten was a Dramatist Guild Fellow, and her work has been heard in venues throughout New York City including Joe’s Pub, 54 Below, The Public, and Lincoln Center. She holds a BFA from USC and an MFA in Musical Theatre Writing from NYU.



Picture
​Johnny Hilton is a graduate of the University of South Carolina where he earned a B.A. in Political Science, an M.ED.in Secondary Social Studies, and a Ph.D. in Education Administration. He lives in Sumter, South Carolina, where he served as a teacher and principal in the public schools of Sumter for 35 years and is currently a member of the Sumter School District Board of Trustees.
     His family includes his son John, an attorney and real estate entrepreneur, daughter-in-law Page, an attorney, daughter Margaret, a graduate student studying to become a psychologist, and Daisy, a rescued Golden Retriever.
     Johnny loves making music, writing songs, and spending time with family and friends. He also enjoys being outdoors, writing stories, interacting with young people, and swimming. He can be contacted at www.johnnyhilton.com   www.johnbhiltonjr.blogspot.com and www.thefootnotes.com



​Roxie Ann Hunter  is a writer, career counselor, and doting cat mother. She lives in a beautiful brownstone in Brooklyn and is proud to have survived life with a mother-in-law.

Author Colette Inez has authored ten poetry collections, most recently Horseplay from Word Press. She is widely anthologized and received fellowships from the Guggenheim and Rockefeller Foundations, twice from the NEA, and won two Pushcart prizes. Formerly a visiting professor at Cornell, Ohio, Bucknell, and Colgate Universities, she long taught at Columbia University and appeared on public radio and TV. The University of Wisconsin Press published her memoir The Secret of M. Dulong, and her poetry has been set to music by Pulitzer Prize Composer David Del Tredici in Miz Inez Sez, a song cycle performed in New York’s Symphony Space, Miller Theater, and elsewhere. An eleventh collection The Luba Poems from Red Hen Press was released in early 2015. The poem “After Mameleh Flew Four Floors Down out the Window” was previously published in The Antioch Review, Summer 1991, Vol.49, Number 3.

Picture
.


. U.S. speaker, cultural trainer, and lifestyle editor Barbara Pasquet James writes about food, fashion, travel, and culture from Paris. As one of the editors who launched, wrote, and updated USA Today’s City Guide To Paris, her writing and comments have appeared in publications as diverse as The Robb Report, The Georgetowner, luxury lifestyle magazine Boulevard France, prize-winning The American LLC, and National Review Online.



Picture
 Dianne Johnson (Dinah Johnson) is the author of several picture books including All Around Town: The Photographs of Richard Samuel Roberts, Black Magic (illustrated by Gregory Christie) and Quinnie Blue (illustrated by James Ransome), all published by Henry Holt Books for Young Readers. As an essayist, she contributed to State of the Heart: South Carolina Writers on the Places They Love and to Literary Dogs and Their South Carolina Writers.
            The child of an Army colonel and a teacher, Dianne grew up all around the world, but will always call South Carolina home. So it means a lot to her to have another life as a professor of English at the University of South Carolina. She is a pioneering scholar who was instrumental in uncovering the history of African American children’s literature. Dianne’s greatest joy is visiting schools and getting letters from children. One of her favorite comments reads: “You had made my heart sing.” Visit her at www.dinahjohnsonbooks.com



Purchase Dianne's Books
Picture

Kathryn Etters Lovatt earned her M.A. in Creative Writing and English from Hollins University. She continued her studies at Hong Kong University, where she taught American Studies.
     A former winner of the Doris Betts Prize, Kathryn also won Press 53’s short story prize. A Virginia Center of the Arts Fellow, her work has most recently appeared in North Carolina Literary Review on line and moonShine Review as well as in the anthologies Serving Up Memory, What I Wish I could Tell You and His Mother.
     Kathryn received a SC Arts Commission individual artist grant for prose in 2013. She lives and writes in Camden, South Carolina.


What I Wish I Could Tell You
Serving Up Memory
Picture
​

​
​David Fairley McInnis was born in Timmonsville, SC and attended schools there as well as in Sumter, SC. After graduating from Edmunds High School in Sumter, he attended the University of North Carolina on a partial diving scholarship. While there, David became the Atlantic Coast Conference diving champion two years in a row. As a tribute to him, UNC now awards the David F. McInnis Award to both male and female diving champions.
            After serving in both the Air Force and Air Force Reserves, achieving the rank of Captain, David entered law school at the University of South Carolina while working three jobs: he served as the Assistant Manager of the Sumter Chamber of Commerce and as the manager of the Chambers in both Conway and Lancaster. He also coached the diving team during this time. He graduated law school in 1964, went into private practice for a few years, and later became City Judge for the City of Sumter in 1966.
            In 1975, David was elected to the South Carolina State Legislature and served on the Ways and Means Committee and as Chairman of the Rules Committee and Joint Appropriations Review Committee. David became a circuit court judge in 1985 and retired happily in 1995.
            He is a recipient of the Order of the Palmetto and a charter inductee in the Sumter Athletic Hall of Fame. But in his words the best thing that ever happened to him occurred in 1958 when he married his “forever” sweetheart, the late Barbara Lee Bruce. Together they have three children, four grandchildren, and three greatgrandchildren.

Picture
​Susan Doherty Osteen is an Honors Graduate of Journalism from TCU in Fort Worth, Texas, and has worked for a variety of newspapers and non-profit organizations.
     In 2010 after more than a decade of collaborative research, she published Tracing a Legacy, a 950 page tomb chronicling her family’s ranching empire from County Donegal, Ireland, to the American Wild West. Her essay about her mother-in-law is published in His Mother.
     Susan lives in South Carolina with her husband and two children. She continues to write for regional publications and is working on a three-part novel, as well as attending graduate school at USC Columbia in the MFA program. 

Picture

​
​Brenda Remmes is the author of the bestselling novel The Quaker Café and two other Quaker Café novels titled Home to Cedar Branch and her most recent release, Mama Sadie. Her stories and articles have appeared in Newsweek as well as southern publications and journals.
     She currently lives with her husband in an old family home near the Black River Swamp in South Carolina. Contact Brenda at  www.brendaremmes.com  

The Quaker Cafe
Home to Cedar Branch
Mama Sadie
Picture
​​

​Annette Reynolds is a mother of one son now 50, grandmother of eight, two of which are bonus grands, and great-grandmother of six.  She is both a divorcee and a widow.
     Annette graduated Limestone College with a B.S. degree in Home Economics back when it was called that. She is a member of the Baha’i Faith, the second largest religious tradition in South Carolina.  She published the book Trudy and the Baha’is Spiritual Path in South Carolina.”     
     She retired from the Clemson University Extension Service after 30 years.  She began her career in Colleton County as a 4-H agent and then transferred to Orangeburg County where she received a Masters of Ed. at S.C. State University.  After 24 years in Orangeburg County, she finished her career as a Cluster Director in Beaufort, Colleton, and Jasper Counties.
     A survivor of domestic violence, Annette calls herself a thriver and published a book about the Battered Women’s Movement titled Survivors Thrive.  She started volunteer work with abused women shortly after arriving in Orangeburg County and continues that work today.
     In addition, Annette serves on the Pee Dee Coalition Shelter Advisory Council and as Vice President is liaison to the Pee Dee Coalition’s Florence Chapter Board. She is also a contributor to the “Faith and Values” section of the Florence Morning News. 

Trudy and the Baha’is Spiritual Path in South Carolina
Picture
​Sam Rhodes was born and raised in Mayesville, S.C. He attended Clemson University and then USC where he graduated with a major in History and a minor in English. He later returned to the USC Graduate School of History, but eventually chose joining his Dad in the family’s cotton farming operation where he remained for almost twenty years until 1994.
     Moving to Greenville, SC, Sam began a sixteen-year career in printing and publishing, and then spent seven years teaching English and History at Horizons School in Atlanta, GA.
Sam’s collection of poems I Saw You Sitting on the Moon was published in 1997. His essays and articles have also appeared in The Greenville Journal, Greenville Magazine, Pee Dee Magazine, as well as a series of essays entitled “The Color of Testosterone” in Wake Magazine. More of his poems were also published in Wake.
     He is the proud father of four children: Samuel McBride Rhodes II, Elizabeth Caroline Rhodes, Skylar Sumter Rhodes, and Savannah DeLage Rhodes. As the custodial parent of his two youngest daughters, Sam raised Skylar and Savannah to mature young ladies.
He is now the owner of a Signarama franchise

Picture
                                              


​Sandy Richardson is an Honors Graduate from USC Columbia where she majored in Creative Writing and English. Her first novel, The Girl Who Ate Chicken Feet, was published by Dial Books for Young Readers (1998) and received a nomination for the South Carolina Junior Book Award and a listing on Bank Street College’s Best Children’s Books 1998.   
            Her other works have appeared in several magazines and anthologies. Her nonfiction piece, “Nana's Basket” was published in The Pettigru Review and received a Pushcart Nomination. Sandy also compiled and edited an anthology His Mother! Women Write about Their Mothers-in-law with Humor, Frustration, and Love, published by Southern Sass Publishing Alliances (2016), where she serves as editor-in-chief. His Mother was a finalist in the nonfiction anthology category for American BookFest Awards for Best Books of 2017. For more information visit: www.SouthernSassPublishingAlliances.com
             Sandy is a South Carolinian through and through and never wants to leave. She lives with her husband and two obnoxiously spoiled cats at the edge of a pond filled with bream, bass, geese, and an occasional alligator. The couple has two grown children, a much-loved daughter-in-law, and accepts most wandering animals into their family.
             Favorite Writing Advice: “The bigger the issue, the smaller you write….You don’t write about the horrors of war. No. You write about a kid’s burnt socks lying on the road. You pick the smallest manageable part of the big thing, and you work off the resonance.” From Reynolds Price.
www.SouthernSassPublishingAlliances.com and www.SandyRichardson.wordpress.com.

Purchase His Mother!
Purchase The Girl Who Ate Chickenfeet
Picture

Michelle Ross is a folklorist whose area of interest is narrative presented in every conceivable written or spoken word genre. She received her BA in Interdisciplinary Studies through the University of South Carolina and her MA in Folk Studies through Western Kentucky University. As adjunct faculty for the University of South Carolina Sumter, Michelle teaches Introduction to Cultural Anthropology and Introduction to Folklore Studies. Because she is adamant that everybody has a story worth telling and preserving, Ross and author Sandy Richardson co-founded two writing workshops: “Leaving a Trace” and “Women’s Writing Workshop” (WWW).
      She is anticipating the 2017 publication of “Mothers of Angels: Narratives of Life, Death, and Beyond” in South Carolina Welcomes Y’all: Contemporary Folklife Traditions in South Carolina (University of South Carolina Press).
     Michelle is presently working on an historical fiction stage play titled Black Sea Sands on Carnahan which tells the epic story of her Pontian Greek grandparents.

Picture
Laura P. Valtorta holds a BA in English from St. Lawrence University, a Masters in English from Duke University, and a Juris Doctorate from the University of South Carolina. Several social work courses also compliment her studies. In her solo law practice, she specializes in employment law, family law, utility law, and Social Security Disability cases. She is also qualified as a mediator in civil cases, state and federal courts, and as an NASD arbitrator.
      Laura’s publishing credits include Social Security Disability Practice (Knowles Publishing 2008), a novel, Family Meal, (Carolina Wren Press 1993), and Start Your Own Law Practice (Entrepreneur Press 2005).
In addition, she contributed a section on Brussels to the Rough Guide to
Belgium, Holland, and the Netherlands
 (circa 1988). Several of her short
stories have been published in small publications such as Aethlon and 
The Distillery.
      Since 2013, Laura has been involved in moviemaking. She has produced and directed six films, including White Rock Boxing, which aired on South Carolina ETV several times, “Queen of the Road” about a female truck driver, and “The Art House.”
Her short film, “Disability” is available at   www.vimeo.com/ondemand/disability. 
White Rock Boxing is available at www.vimeo.com/ondemand/whiterockboxing.
Other contact may be made through: www.gattafilms.com, www.thearthousemovie.webs.com,
www.laurapv.wordpress.com


www.laurapv.wordpress.com
Picture
​

​Pat Willer is a third generation Kansan. Her work in international education took her to the University of South Carolina in Columbia where she and her husband lived for twenty four years.  She loved her family, friends, and work in the South. But upon retirement, she headed back to Lawrence, Kansas, to be closer to home.
     She is passionate about family, her two grandsons, Beckett and Addy, a golden Doodle named Mac, and politics. Back home in Kansas, she has begun a new career in politics and currently serves as secretary of the Douglas County Democrats. When not working on an impossible mission to turn Kansas blue, she continues to write fiction and hopes to complete a mystery novel.

Picture

​Jay Wright is a past president of Foothills Writers Guild and currently coordinates publicity and guild publications. He is also husband to Anne, dad to Jim and Jana, and Papa Jay to Addison and Alexa.
Jay is a Vietnam Era vet who hates war, violence, law breaking, law breakers, and freeloaders. On the other hand, he loves writers, writing, travel, old bridges, old churches, old barns, old guitars, guns, flags, confederate battlefields, old graveyards, old statues, coastal photography; & an occasional mug of Blue Moon with a big slice of orange. 



  • Just Released: Wild, Wonderful 'n Wacky, South Cacklacky
  • SSPA Books
    • His Mother!
    • Prison Grits
    • The Girl Who Ate Chicken Feet
  • SSPA Authors
  • About Sandy
  • Blog: Writing, Reading, and Wandering Thoughts
  • Blog: It's What I Do: I Read, and I Know Things
  • SSPA Events
  • To Schedule Authors for Appearances
    • Resources for Writers
  • Favorite Writing Quotes