A letter of thanks

There are many people to thank for making the 4th Atlanta Queer Literary Festival so worthwhile. I am deeply grateful to co-directors Megan Volpert and Collin Kelley for the hours and hours of planning they put in to bring the festival program together and to our Media Director Cleo Creech who held the camera that recorded most of the festival as well as the subsequent art exhibits and dance festival as well as coordinating all of our social media.

Over the next few months Cleo will be posting videos on our website, Facebook page and YouTube channel. Many thanks to Morris Gardner, Kerrie Cotten Williams and Wesley Chenault of the Auburn Avenue Research Library for their many contributions including the live streaming of our keynote speakers. Our keynote speakers Cary Alan Johnson and Ana Bozicevic gave inspiring talks, our broadside contest winner Ed Madden read his poem "Jubilate" and I highly recommend watching them at this link.

We had had over 40 individuals who participated as panelist, speakers or gave readings -- our thanks to them all especially to Alice Teeter and Freddie Styles who gave the closing talks on "Queer Creativity." In addition to the folks at Auburn Avenue we want to thank our other venue hosts: Michael Shutt and Danielle Steele of the Emory University Office of LGBT Life, Sara Look, Angela Brown, Elizabeth Anderson, Angela Gabriel and the women of Charis Books and More and Charis Circle, Philip Rafshoon and his staff at Outwrite Books and Coffeehouse, Joe Davich at the Decatur Library and the Georgia Center for the Book, the good folks at Java Monkey (special thanks to our slam performers Blair, Joanna Hoffman and Gabe Moses) and Carol Sandiford, D.Patton White, Marsha Mitchner and the members of the First Existentialist Congregation of Atlanta.

 We want to thank Charis Books again for selling books at our keynotes and Jef Blocker and Jeff McCord of Bound to Be Read Books for selling books on Saturday. For our fabulous sweets and bagels we want to thank Aleta and Alex Aaron of Goldberg's Deli. Without the generous help of our sponsors we would not be able to produce this totally free event. We owe a huge debt of gratitude to P.D. Publishing for their generous help, to Strange Apples, Inc for their organizational support and to the following for their gifts: Daniel Terry, Jessica Handler, Robert Wood, Karen Head, Mike Crandall, Libby Ware, Don Perryman, Roger Bailey and David Pratt. Our media sponsors, Mike Fleming of Project Q and Laura Douglas Brown, Dyana Bagby and Tim Boyd of The Georgia Voice were essential in getting the word our and we thank them.

A final thanks to DJ Get'um Gurl for the good music at the after party. Please check in with us on the website for updates on next year's festival and attendant activities and please consider making a tax deductible donation to AQLF via PayPal in the sidebar. We need your support to keep the ball rolling.

Franklin Abbott, AQLF co-founder and Chairperson