Laura Lane Bush is an American educator who was the first lady of the United States from 2001 to 2009 as the wife of George W. Bush, the 43rd president of the United States. Bush was previously the first lady of Texas from 1995 to 2000 when her husband was governor.
Margaret Eleanor Atwood is a Canadian novelist, poet, and literary critic. Since 1961, she has published 18 books of poetry, 18 novels, 11 books of nonfiction, nine collections of short fiction, eight children's books, two graphic novels, and a number of small press editions of both poetry and fiction. Her best-known work is the 1985 dystopian novel The Handmaid's Tale. Atwood has won numerous awards and honors for her writing, including two Booker Prizes, the Arthur C. Clarke Award, the Governor General's Award, the Franz Kafka Prize, Princess of Asturias Awards, and the National Book Critics and PEN Center USA Lifetime Achievement Awards. A number of her works have been adapted for film and television.
The Writers' Trust of Canada is a registered charity which provides financial support to Canadian writers.
PEN America, founded in 1922, and headquartered in New York City, is a nonprofit organization whose goal is to raise awareness for the protection of free expression in the United States and worldwide through the advancement of literature and human rights. PEN America is the largest of the more than 100 PEN centers worldwide that together compose PEN International. PEN America has offices in New York City, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., and since late 2023 also in Florida.
Ann Patchett is an American author. She received the 2002 PEN/Faulkner Award and the Orange Prize for Fiction in the same year, for her novel Bel Canto. Patchett's other novels include The Patron Saint of Liars (1992), Taft (1994), The Magician's Assistant (1997), Run (2007), State of Wonder (2011), Commonwealth (2016), The Dutch House (2019), and Tom Lake (2023). The Dutch House was a finalist for the 2020 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
The National Book Festival is an annual literary festival held in Washington, D.C. in the United States; it is organized and sponsored by the Library of Congress, and was founded by Laura Bush and James H. Billington in 2001.
Sara Hickman is an American singer, songwriter, and artist.
The Association of Writers & Writing Programs (AWP) is a nonprofit literary organization that provides support, advocacy, resources, and community to nearly 50,000 writers, 500 college and university creative writing programs, and 125 writers' conferences and centers. It was founded in 1967 by R. V. Cassill and George Garrett.
Bel Canto is the fourth novel by American author Ann Patchett, published in 2001 by Perennial, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers. It was awarded both the Orange Prize for Fiction and PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. It was placed on several top book lists, including Amazon's Best Books of the Year (2001). It was also adapted into an opera in 2015.
Carmen Agra Deedy is an author of children’s literature, storyteller and radio contributor.
The National Book Foundation (NBF) is an American nonprofit organization established with the goal "to raise the cultural appreciation of great writing in America." Established in 1989 by National Book Awards, Inc., the foundation is the administrator and sponsor of the National Book Awards, a set of literary awards inaugurated in 1936 and continuous from 1950. It also organizes and sponsors public and educational programs.
Jacqueline Woodson is an American writer of books for children and adolescents. She is best known for Miracle's Boys, and her Newbery Honor-winning titles Brown Girl Dreaming, After Tupac and D Foster, Feathers, and Show Way. After serving as the Young People's Poet Laureate from 2015 to 2017, she was named the National Ambassador for Young People's Literature, by the Library of Congress, for 2018 to 2019. Her novel Another Brooklyn was shortlisted for the 2016 National Book Award for Fiction. She won the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award in 2018. She was named a MacArthur Fellow in 2020.
Gwendolyn Zepeda is an American author and poet of Mexican American descent. Zepeda is Houston's first Poet Laureate, serving a two-year term from 2013 to 2015. She was succeeded by Leslie Contreras Schwartz.
Jenna Welch Bush Hager is an American news personality, author, and journalist. She is the co-host of Today with Hoda & Jenna, the fourth hour of NBC's morning news program, Today. Hager and her fraternal twin sister, Barbara, are the daughters of the 43rd U.S. President, George W. Bush, and former First Lady Laura Bush. Hager is also a granddaughter of the 41st U.S. President George H. W. Bush and former First Lady Barbara Bush, great-granddaughter of former U.S. Senator Prescott Bush, niece of former Florida Governor Jeb Bush and first cousin of former Land Commissioner of Texas, George P. Bush.
The Tulsa City-County Library (TCCL) is the major public library system in Tulsa County, Oklahoma.
The Texas Institute of Letters is a non-profit Honor Society founded by William Harvey Vann in 1936 to celebrate Texas literature and to recognize distinctive literary achievement. The TIL’s elected membership consists of the state’s most respected writers of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, journalism, and scholarship. Induction into the TIL is based on literary accomplishments. Application for membership is not accepted. The rules governing the selection of members and officers are contained in the TIL By-Laws. The TIL annually elects new members, gives awards to recognize outstanding literary works, and awards the Jesse H. Jones Fellowship for writers. The TIL offers awards to outstanding books written by Texas authors, or dealing with Texas subjects.
The Toronto International Festival of Authors (TIFA), previously known as the International Festival of Authors (IFOA), is an annual festival presented in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
Mark K. Updegrove is an American author, historian, journalist, and Presidential Historian for ABC News. He is the president and CEO of the LBJ Foundation in Austin, Texas. Previously, he served as the director of the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum for eight years.
Don Tate is an American author and illustrator of books for children. Tate creates both fiction and nonfiction picture books, with a focus on the biographies of little-known historical figures. He is also a strong advocate for more literature that reflects and honors the lives of all young people. He notes that as a child he had to read the encyclopedia to discover a multicultural world; based on the children's books of his day he "thought the world was white". He co-founded the Brown Bookshelf, a blog designed to push the awareness of African Americans writing and illustrating books for young people. Tate also assisted in the #WeNeedDiverseBooks campaign to help put more books featuring diverse characters into the hands of readers.
José B. Cisneros was a Mexican–born American artist. He is known for his historical illustrations and drawings of early Texas, specifically of horsemen including charro, vaquero, Texas rangers, and Texas cowboys. He illustrated over 300 books.
