Fall for the Book: Our Literary Future Gathers in Old Town

Literary lovers got a glimpse of future authors and poets, as students from local grammar, middle and high schools gathered at theSpace Courtyard at Old Town Plaza on Sunday. They read aloud from selected works as part of the Northern Virginia Writing Project's annual collection of exemplary student work.

For eight years, the non-profit NVWP has run the event with help from their teacher consultants and Fall for the Book organizers. The kids are all students of teachers who have gone through Northern Virginia Writing Project's training program.

Teachers chose the best work of their students and submitted them to the program to be judged by other consultants, with the highest scoring pieces published in the book, "Falling for the Story."

"The children each get copies of the book and some of them were selected to read today," said Melissa Mack, who works for the NVWP. "It's a great thing for the students and we had a really good audience supporting them today."

It's up to Charlotte Foster and Hilarie Jennings to edit the work; Foster working with the younger children and Jennings in charge of the high school students.

"The fact that they are published is pretty amazing," Foster said. "The students are very excited."

Jennings believes that many who are represented also will go on to continue writing and find a greater love for it.

"I think it builds a lot of confidence for the writer," Jennings said. "The difference between just someone who writes and a writer is that a writer has the guts to put it out there."

Although the book is mostly comprised of poetry, it also features fiction and non-fiction short stories and a play.

"There was some high caliber writing there, and if I didn't know that students wrote them, I never would have guessed some of the poetry wasn't done by more seasoned poets," said Vincent Hickland, one of those supporting the readers. "These kids should all be really proud and they have bright futures in front of them."

As the event went on, the children each went up to the stage to read their selection from the book to the parents and friends who were in attendance.  

"When I was little, my cousin, brother and I made a clubhouse," Asmussvn said. "We had to write a narrative in English class last year and I thought that would be a fun story to write about, so that's what my story was based on."

Kyla Carney, a sixth grader at Westminster School, wrote a touching tale about her grandfather and his experiences in the Vietnam War.

"It's called 'Silver Star' because he was awarded one," she said. "I was talking about ideas for my story and I knew he had fought in the war, so he drew out some diagrams of things he did and gave me some notes, and I put it all together."

Other students found inspiration in their families, friends and experiences from their lives.

"I kind of got some inspiration from my favorite author—Erin Hunter—who writes books about cats in the wild," said 9-year-old Alyssa Nagle, who wrote a humorous tale entitled, "How the Tiger got his Stripes" when she went to Westminster last year. "I kind of enjoy writing, but it's not my favorite thing in the world to do, but this was fun."