Don't missThe Literary Hour with host writers Carol Lynn Jones, Kanute Rarey, and Rosemary Rhodes Royston, Wednesday, May 15, 2019, 7:00 PM, at John C. Campbell Folk School, Brasstown, NC

On Wednesday, May 15, 2019, at 7:00 PM, John C. Campbell Folk School (JCCFS) and NC Writers' Network-West (NCWN-West) will sponsor The Literary Hour. At this event, NCWN-West members will read at the Keith House on the JCCFS campus, in Brasstown, NC. The Literary Hour is held on the third Thursday of the month unless otherwise indicated. This reading is free of charge and open to the public. This month's featured readers will be Carol Lynn Jones, Kanute Rarey, and Rosemary Rhodes Royston. For more information about event, please contact Mary Ricketson at: maryricketson311@hotmail.com.

Carol Lynn Jones received a full scholarship to study art and illustration at Syracuse University and worked in New York City illustrating books and magazines. Later, she started a greeting card business and sold cards to stores throughout the country. Her travels have taken her across Europe where she lived for two summers with her extended family in communist Czechoslovakia. She also lived with a family in St. Petersburg, Russia as part of a friendship force exchange program for professionals. This experience triggered an interest in Russian culture, language and history, resulting in her first novel, Danya. Organic gardening and photography give her much contentment. She lives with her husband in Murphy.

Kanute Rarey is a local storyteller. He told his first "official" story in 2015 at John C. Campbell Folk School in Brasstown, North Carolina, and later at the Swapping Ground at the International Storytelling Festival in Jonesborough, Tennessee. Since then he has also told stories at the Georgia Mountain Storytelling Festival, the Big Fibbers Festival, the Texas Storytelling Festival, the Moth Story Slam in Asheville, and the Stone Soup Festival. Born on a family farm in Ohio, Rarey began visiting the North Georgia mountains regularly about forty years ago and fell in love with the people, their stories, the wild rivers, beautiful lakes, and mountains. He moved to Hayesville in 1990 and lived here for ten years. Work then took him away. Four years ago, he retired back to Hayesville full-time. 

Rarey is a traveler, teacher, grandfather, and lifelong learner. Stories are from his personal life, from growing up on a farm in the Western Carolina mountains, from listening to family tales at breakfast gatherings and holiday meals, from the "characters" that make up his family, and from living with children and grandchildren. Some of his stories are established fables that hold life lessons that have been told over and over for many years. Other stories are works of his imagination.

Rosemary Rhodes Royston holds an MFA in Writing from Spalding University and is a lecturer at Young Harris College, Georgia. She is the author of Splitting the Soil (Finishing Line Press). Her poetry has been published in journals such as Appalachian Heritage, Split Rock Review, Southern Poetry Review, KUDZU, Town Creek Review, and *82 Review. She’s the VP for Planning and Special Projects at Young Harris College, where she teaches the occasional creative writing course. Her poetry has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, she was the recipient of the 2010 Literal Latte Food Verse Award, received Honorable Mention in a George Scarborough Poetry Contest, at the Mountain Heritage Literary Festival, and her short fiction being selected as Honorable Mention in the Porter Fleming Literary Awards, 2012. Royston is treasurer for the North Carolina Writers’ Network-West.