Charles Connor, EdD
Director of the Harriette Austin Writing Program, and Program Director of the Harriette Austin Writers Conference (since 1993).

After fumbling through life and wasting a good part of it, I've finally done the one thing I believe I will be completely successful at -- On March 18, 2004, I retired from full time work on the Faculty of the University of Georgia in order to devote myself full time to living and writing.

I've lived with my wife Beverly on 36 wooded acres in Oglethorpe County, Georgia, for over a quarter of a century. That's 16 miles from Athens where I was a faculty member at the University of Georgia for more years than I care to remember. We have two cats and a yellow lab. We had three horses that we loved, but we outlived them.

Beverly is a full time writer. She is author of five novels in her Lindsay Chamberlain archaeological mystery series. The first two novels -- One Grave Too Many (December 2003), and Dead Guilty (September 2004) -- in her new Diane Fallon Forensic Investigation series from Penguin-Putnam / Onyx reached the Top 10 in sales on national Mystery Bestseller lists in the U.S. and Canada. Her third book in the Diane Fallon series, Dead Secret is will be in bookstores internationally in December of 2005.

I've had an interest in creative writing all my life and finally did something about it twelve years ago. I founded the Harriette Austin Writing Program at the University of Georgia. We put on the annual Harriette Austin Writers Conference at UGA, celebrating its 12th anniversary this year in 2005. And we teach a series of creative writing workshops over the Internet to students all across the country.

One reason I've been looking forward to retirement is so that I can devote more time to these writing activities. I carried them with me when I quit going in to the office. (He says, as he breaks into song and dance.)

I've spent a lot of time teaching, tutoring and editing other people's writing. I plan to spend a lot more time on my own writing in the coming months and years. My years growing up in Alabama, the many people I knew there, the things I saw and the many experiences I had filled my mind and my heart with stories to tell.

When I go back now and drive through the communities that I grew up in, I have a hard time finding very much that I recognize. Here and there is the home of a childhood friend still looking very much as it did, but what was once farms, woods and fields is now highways, strip malls, parking lots, and subdivisions in more places and larger than seems possible. The roads don't go the way they once did. There are new things everywhere. I don't know if it's better or not -- perhaps so. But it is different. The only thing that's really left of those days is my thoughts and memories the stories I have to tell.

I would enjoy hearing from any of you. If you have stories to tell, I would like to hear them.

-Charles Connor

If you're interested in the details of some of the things I've done throught the years, you can take a look at the Employment Memoir I put together for you.