For the first time in 28 years, the Festival of Faith & Writing (FFW) is presenting author previews, a student-hosted presentation series where members of the FFW student committee introduce the community to the speakers they will each host at the Festival in April.

Each of the preview nights is held in the Bunker Interpretive Center and is themed around a particular genre, from children’s literature to journalism.

Over interim, students on the festival student committee were assigned an author who is coming to Festival. In April, they will assist in the logistics of putting on the Festival in addition to providing hospitality for their assigned writers. Students on the committee also had several assignments:

“To prepare, we were encouraged to read two to three books of our author, if possible, and we had to submit a bibliography with as many sources as we could compile including things like interviews, book reviews, articles, scholarly articles and the author’s writing,” explained senior and Center for Faith & Writing student fellow Isabelle Selles. “From that research, we developed what we called our ‘author pitch’ — our five-minute presentation about why our author should be at the Festival.”

On Tuesday, Feb. 13, the author preview featured poetry. A modest crowd gathered to hear what these authorial experts had to say. Each audience member was given a packet of information designed by the students detailing names of poetry collections, as well as offering a small biography and a sample of the author’s work.

The evening’s featured authors included Anya Silver, Robin Coste Lewis, Scott Cairns and Afaa M. Weaver. Each student introduced their author, showed why their work is significant and explained why people should go see them speak come Festival time.

“The festival interim class gives the students more practical training,” said professor Jennifer Holberg of the English department. “Having students host authors is another thing that makes this festival distinctive, and all of the students have done really well connecting with the materials.”

“My favorite part of the process was reading my author’s works,” said Selles. “It’s very exciting to think that I am going to meet her in person in just a couple months, especially after I’ve spent so much time researching, reading and preparing!”

At 7 p.m. every Tuesday leading up the festival, FFW volunteers will be presenting authors according to that night’s genre. Feb. 6 started with young adult authors, and Feb. 13 was poetry night. Upcoming genres — in order — are journalism, science writing and technology, film and music, fiction and memoir.

These presentations will continue to take place in the Bunker Interpretive Center until the Festival, which will take place April 12-14. There will be 60 featured authors and 150 panelists discussing matters of faith and writing.