Saturday, April 20, 2019

Author A.J. Hartley/Andrew Hart


A.J. Hartley
A.J. Hartley is the award winning, New York Times bestselling author of 20 novels for children, adults and young adults in a variety of genres.

His audiobooks feature performances by celebrated actors such Noma Dumezweni (currently playing Hermione in Harry Potter and the Cursed Child) [Steeplejack, winner of International Thriller Writers Best YA book of 2017], Alan Cumming [Macbeth, a Novel] and Richard Armitage, [Hamlet Prince of Denmark, a Novel, which won Audible’s Book of the Year for 2014]. His latest audiobook is the YA ghostly thriller, Cold Bath Street, voiced by the ninth Doctor Who, Christopher Eccleston. AJ will perform the audiobook of his upcoming middle grades adventure Monsters in the Mirror himself. He also writes as Andrew Hart and his first novel under that name, Lies that Bind Us, was an international bestseller, hitting #1 on Amazon.

Born and raised in Preston, Lancashire, he lives now with his wife and son in the United States where he is the Robinson Professor of Shakespeare at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte, specializing in performance work. He is also an Honorary Fellow of the University of Central Lancashire. You can learn more than you can ever possibly want to know about him at www.ajhartley.net.

Dr. Andrew Hartley is effectively two people.

At Amazon
As Andrew James Hartley he is UNC Charlotte’s Russell Robinson Distinguished Professor of Shakespeare studies, specializing in performance theory and practice. He is the author of various scholarly books including The Shakespearean Dramaturg, Shakespeare and Political Theatre, a performance history of Julius Caesar, essay collections on Shakespeare on the University stage and Shakespeare in Millennial fiction for Cambridge University Press, and numerous articles and book chapters on staging Renaissance drama. Dr. Hartley is currently working with Peter Holland of Notre Dame on a book on Shakespeare and geek culture, and has recently committed to editing Julius Caesar for the Arden 4th series. He was the editor of the performance journal Shakespeare Bulletin for Johns Hopkins UP for a decade, was resident dramaturg for Georgia Shakespeare, and is an honorary fellow of the University of Central Lancashire, UK. In the UNCC theatre department he regularly works as a director and dramaturg on Shakespeare productions, and heads up the Shakespeare in Action initiative which brings guest speakers to campus and helps fund visiting theatre companies and student scholarships for the annual study abroad trip to London and Stratford Upon Avon. In addition to teaching Shakespeare related classes, he also teaches occasional creative writing courses for the English department.

As A.J. Hartley he is the international and NY Times bestselling author of 22 novels in various genres for adults and younger readers.

STEEPLEJACK was released by Tor Teen in June 2016, won several awards including the Manly Wade Wellman Award and the International Thriller Writer’s YA (young adult) Award, and was named to Kirkus’s Best Teen Reads list and the ALA’s best YA books list. It was followed by FIREBRAND in 2017 which, like its predecessor, was nominated for a Dragon award. His other YA series, CATHEDRALS OF GLASS, is part of a special partnership with Tom DeLonge of Blink 182 and Angels and Airwaves, with whom he is also writing the adult scifi series Sekret Machines. 2018 will see the publication of the 2nd book in that series (A Fire Within), the 2nd Cathedrals of Glass book (Valkrys Wakes), the 3rd Steeplejack book (Guardian), a YA stand alone novel grounded in the ghost stories of his childhood called Cold Bath Street, and an adult thriller called Lies That Bind Us (published under the pseudonym Andrew Hart, and to be followed by The Woman in Our House in 2019).

His early novels include the mystery/thrillers The Mask of Atreus, On the Fifth Day, What Time Devours and Tears of the Jaguar and the young adult fantasy adventures Act of Will and Will Power. The first of his Darwen Arkwright children’s fantasy trilogy (Darwen Arkwright and the Peregrine Pact) came out from Penguin/Razorbill in 2011 and won SIBA’s best YA novel of 2012. With David Hewson he has co-written two adaptations of Shakespeare plays as epic thrillers: Macbeth, a Novel (audio edition voiced by Alan Cumming) and Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, a Novel (the audio book, performed by Richard Armitage, was named Audible’s book of the year for 2014).

Talk:

AJ will discuss the joys and terrors of writing for multiple publishers in different genres and for various age groups, discussing, among other things, the issues of identifying what kind of book you are writing and for whom (both in terms of audience and publishing system) and how you then determine what does and doesn't belong in it. He'll talk about the business implications of being an agent's nightmare and the unsung importance of creative whimsy.

MEETING DETAILS
Our monthly meeting will take place on Thursday, May 2, at The Runway CafĂ©, 21 Airport Rd, Greenville, SC.  Be there at 6:15 p.m. to meet A.J. Hartley and enjoy chapter fellowship. Supper should be served at 6:30. Our speaker will begin after new and old business at about 7 p.m. Both dinner and the meeting are open to the public.

Please e-mail your dinner and drink order before noon on Thursday to Ellis Vidler (click on link).This speeds service and helps us plan. The link for our special menu is located on the right-hand column listing.

If you place an order and do not attend or fail to cancel by noon, you will be charged for the meal. And like always, we'll enjoy it. Look forward to seeing you.

JOIN US FOR COMING EVENTS
June 6—Jacki Molnar, former detective who worked for a District Attorney’s Office
July 10 (Wednesday)—Sharon Baker, Giggies Bonding

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