BOOKINGS
If your book club, school, business, agency, professional association, or other group is interested in hosting me virtually (e.g. online via skype or zoom) or in person, for a talk, reading, or other presentation, please don’t hesitate to contact me. Please note, that a minimum purchase of my books and/or appearance fee plus expenses (e.g. travel) will be required. I am also experienced in leading workshops for children, teens, and adults on creative writing, creating/creativity as a tool in education, media/communications, and written communication. A facilitation fee is required for workshops/courses. Contact me to discuss.
See also: My Antiguan Writer YouTube channel (which includes playlists for CREATIVE SPACE, my art and culture column; content related to my BOOKS; and The Writing Life; also, here on the blog, Media page, Cooking Magic, Televised Book Club Discussion, Writers’ Gallery (or writers I’ve met along the way), Writer’s Gallery (or Writer’s Life in Images) & BOOK LAUNCHES (click titles below)
The Boy from Willow Bend, launched 2003. re-issued 2009.
Dancing Nude in the Moonlight, launched 2004. re-issued 2014. Currently out of print.
Oh Gad!, launched 2012. Mass market edition 2014. Currently out of print.
Musical Youth, launched 2014. Second edition published 2019.
With Grace, launched 2016. Also has a 2017 edition stamped as an official pick of the USVI Governor’s Summer Read Challenge.
Lost! A Caribbean Sea Adventure, launched 2017. Previous edition published, as Fish Outta Water, in 2013. Spanish language edition Perdida! Una Aventura en el Mar Caribe was launched in 2018.
The Jungle Outside, debuted in 2021 with no official launch; but on April 23rd illustrator Danielle Boodoo Fortune and I had a YouTube live chat that served as the first unofficial public event featuring the book. (above is a screengrab from that event featuring one of our favourite image panels).
STILL TO COME
Nothing pending.
To book me, see note re Bookings at the top of this post.
EARLIER HIGHLIGHTS
November 18th 2022 – Genre Day @ Sir Novelle Richards Academy reading.
October 13th 2022 – 2:30 p.m. – 4:30 p.m. – Antigua and Barbuda annual conference (virtual) on “The Current State of the Global Black Struggle” – Participant in panel entitled “The Black Struggle in Antiguan and Barbudan Literature and Music”, presenting on “The New [Caribbean] Daughters of Africa: A Review Focussed on Caribbean Women’s Voices in New Daughters of Africa
My powerpoint: Presentation final My full conference paper: JCH Paper 2022
April 8th 2022 –
Presented virtually on ‘Writing Dialogue as a Storyteller‘ during the first day of the United States Virgin Islands Literary Festival and Book Fair.
February 27th 2022 –
Caribbean Fiction Book Club – discussion of Oh Gad! with author appearance.
You were simply amazing & I loved your book. What a great discussion! (CFBC-er via instagram)
February 3rd 2022 –
A Different Booklist Cultural Centre, Canada – sharing primarily The Jungle Outside with children and educators from two schools (the Africentric Alternative School and the Hume Wood Community School) in The Greater Toronto Area.
The session was brilliant and the students were inspired. (February 3rd event organizer)
December 2021 –
Reading of The Jungle Outside for ABS TV Book Club Feature
November 18th 2021 –
City College of New York Langston Hughes Festival (virtual) – LHF 2021 Celebrates Jamaica Kincaid – Watch the entire ceremony; my excerpt below –
Read about it in my post-event CREATIVE SPACE column
October 15th 2021 –
(Virtual) panel on Antiguan and Barbudan Fiction and Its Interpretations – presenting a paper on ‘About a Girl: a Close Read of Jamaica Kincaid’s ‘Girl’, its stylistic devices and & aesthetic intersection with literature in the Antiguan oral (specifically, calypso) tradition‘ @ the Antigua Barbuda Conference See Program: 15 AVCC Program (1)
October 7th 2021 –
Aspiring Authors and Writers Virtual Literary Event–
October 2nd 2021 –
Bocas Workshop on Writing for Children – 
This is just one of several workshops offered – see Jhohadli Writing Project & Performance Reviews
August 23rd 2021 – (posting date; interview done a week or so earlier) –
Diaspora KidsLit –
August 17th 2021 – (posting date; interview was actually done April 14th 2021) –
Badass Black Girl Season 5/Ep. 2 –
August 10th 2021 –
Reading at the Medellin International Poetry Festival –
June 25th 2021 –
Abeng Book Club’s Caribbean American Heritage Month virtual event ‘Literary Conversations on the Caribbean: a Mosaic of Flavors and Textures’ – a topic inspired Pepperpot: Best New Stories from the Caribbean which includes my story “Amelia at Devil’s Bridge” (with Belizean writer Ivory Kelly, author of “This Thing We call Love”)
May 8th 2021 –
Coffee and Conversations Book Club, Grenada – discussion re Oh Gad!
April 23rd 2021 –
World Book Day AntiguanWriter YouTube Live with Danielle Boodoo Fortune (illustrator of my children’s picture books Lost! A Caribbean Sea Adventure and The Jungle Outside) –
January 20th 2021 –
National Public Library of Antigua and Barbuda Author of the Month series –
November 2020 –
This is the video I did in fulfillment of my Catapult Caribbean Creative Arts Online Grant. Please click, view, like, and share – and subscribe to my YouTube channel while you’re there.
October 31st 2020 –
Promo event outside of The Best of Books Bookstore in Antigua 
August 2020 –
Gender advocacy group Intersect excerpts my story “Carnival Hangover” on their Instagram page.
July 18th 2020 –
June 25th 2020 –
Reading from Musical Youth as part of the St. Lucia Tourist Board CaribCation (online) Caribbean Author Reading Series –
2020 –
Lost! A Caribbean Sea Adventure was very charmingly read by two guest readers in the Read to me TT (pandemic inspired) nightly bedtime virtual reading series. This is part 1.
March 7th 2020 –
The Boy from Willow Bend was the official read at the Rotary Club of Antigua reading competition
Friday 28th February 2020 –
Reading – Black History Day programme – Christ the King High School (my alma mater!) – 
(me waiting to go on – I’ve uploaded video of the actual presentation to the #thewritinglife list on my youtube channel (look for BHM CKHS clips 1 – 3) – plus I’ve done a post on the school visit, linked here. p.s. love this skirt – the fabric was a Christmas gift from a friend and the skirt was made by my designer niece Nicoya, of Nicoya Henry Designs, whom I wrote about in CREATIVE SPACE after she won the fashion design show during our 2019 Independence)
November 2019 –
Trinidad and Tobago writer (author of Home Home, the US edition of which is to be published in 2020) Lisa Allen-Agostini read from Lost! A Caribbean Sea Adventure (thanks, Lisa) at TnT’s Bishop Anstey Junior School’s book fair and shared vid to instagram. Check it out.
November 5th, 6th, and 7th 2019 –
The Sharjah International Book Fair – participated in two discussion forums, one on Young Adult Literature (w/Noura Al Noman; moderated by Dr. Lamya Tawfik) and one on Writing by Women – African Literature (w/Margaret Busby and Ellah Wakatama Allfrey; moderated by Abdul Karim); plus visited the Gulf Model School in Dubai. For pictures, see link above and for video see my You Tube channel.
Here’s my bio from the SIBF guest author listing: 
September 5th 2019 –
Interview and reading (from Musical Youth) on ABS TV morning programme –
– other media appearances can be found on the Media page
August 2019 –
Danielle Boodoo Fortune (illustrator of Lost! A Caribbean Sea Adventure) presented the book at CARIFESTA in Trinidad. She said: “These little ones loved it, and they had lots of great questions!” (via social media)’
May 2019 –
Danielle Boodoo Fortune (illustrator of Lost! A Caribbean Sea Adventure) was at the Bocas Literary Festival in Trinidad and shared the book during a children’s workshop she facilitated at the festival. 
Thanks, Danielle for being both talented and gracious.
March 2019 –
Found out about this one after the fact – A reading of With Grace was part of a Black History Month event at the Barnes Hill Reservoir Park
February 28th 2019 –
Co-facilitated a workshop with poet Joy Lawrence during Antigua and Barbuda’s Ministry of Education’s Literacy Festival. Please note, all workshops won’t be listed here as many fall less under author appearances and more under professional services, this was a hybrid; but you can read related performance reviews here.
December 15th 2018 –
Author Meet and Greet at the Best of Books bookstore with Antiguan and Barbudan authors Kimolisa Mings and Brenda Lee Browne, and (not pictured) Michelle Toussaint. 
See post at Wadadli Pen.
November 17th 2018 – 4:00 p.m. –
ReadCaribbean (the official Caribbean literature programme for the Miami Book Fair) Presents Adventures for Kids – Miami Book Fair– with Marjuan Canady, Paula-Anne Porter-Jones, and Francie Latour. Read about the experience here.
October 25th 2018 – 6-7 p.m. –
Antigua and Barbuda’s Crusader Radio’s Literary Hour. 107.3 FM. – reading poems “Ah Write!” and “The Arrival” which can be found in Dancing Nude in the Moonlight 10th Anniversary Edition and Other Writings, and excerpt of story “The Night the World Ended” published in Volume 32 of The Caribbean Writer – other media appearances can be found on the Media page
October 22nd 2018 –
Read poem “Ode to the Pan Man” from The Caribbean Writer – Volume 27 2013 and an excerpt from Musical Youth at the Independence Programme Fu Arwe Ting! (which included presentations by Joy Lawrence, Kimolisa Mings, Honey Bee Theatre, Spilling Ink’s Olsfred James, and others). See clip from the Musical Youth reading below and go to my AntiguanWriter YouTube channel to see “Ode to the Pan Man” and other things.
June 10th 2018 –
Barbados – Commonwealth Writers reading headlined by Jacob Ross and Karen Lord, Commonwealth short story winner Ingrid Persaud, and including participant-writers (in the Commonwealth sponsored workshop) from the Bahamas (Alexia Tolas), Bermuda (Yesha Townsend, Regina Fergusen), St. Lucia (Katherine Atkinson), Grenada (Richie Maitland), Barbados (Shakirah Bourne, Carlie Pipe), Jamaica (Sharma Taylor), and Antigua and Barbuda (Tammi Browne-Bannister).
June 2nd 2018 –
Celebrating Ourselves at The Shed at Sugar Ridge, Antigua. A reading with Kimolisa Mings and Brenda Lee Browne
March 25th 2018 –
Lost! A Caribbean Sea Adventure at the New Fire Festival in Trinidad (thanks to illustrator Danielle Boodoo Fortune)
December 2017 –
Book signing at the Best of Books, Lost! A Caribbean Sea Adventure (also With Grace and Musical Youth)
October 27th 2017 –
Visit to Kids Unlimited school (Antigua) for a reading of With Grace
August 7th and 8th 2017 –
(not technically an appearance but) the tree faerie from my book With Grace made an appearance during Antigua’s Carnival (as part of a small troupe with friends, Grace’s Merrymakers):
May 13th 2017 –
Wadadli Stories Book Fair (Antigua) – scheduled events included readings, panels, workshops, and the announcement of the winners from the 2017 Wadadli Youth Pen Prize Challenge:
April 26th 2017 –
Antigua and Barbuda Intellectual Property and Commerce Office World Intellectual Property Day Open House and Mini Fair:
December 2016 –
With Grace launched:
October 2016 –
Participated with Dr. Natasha Lightfoot in Independence literary event –
Me (left) and Natasha Lightfoot (2nd from right) with a couple of the students who came out to the Independence literary arts event. They’re holding copies of my books Dancing Nude in the Moonlight and The Boy from willow Bend, and Natasha’s Troubling Freedom. (Picture not mine; lifted from the Antigua and Barbuda Student Association – USA’s facebook)
May 12th – 15th 2016 –
BIM Lit Fest:
Guest authors included Olive Senior, A-dZiko Simba Gegele, Tanya Shirley, Mervyn Morris, Bernice McFadden, and others.
March 29th & April 7th 2016 –
Presented at the Antigua and Barbuda National Public Library Easter Camp
January 21st 2016 –
Moray House, Georgetown, Guyana: Fiction and poetry readings with Felene Cayetano (Belize), Richard Georges (British Virgin Islands), Naijah Imoja (Barbados), Jane King (St. Lucia), Shivanee Ramlochan (Trinidad and Tobago), Kim Dismont Robinson (Bermuda), Tanya Batson-Savage (Jamaica), Ruel Johnson (Guyana). This reading was timed to coincide with a weeklong fiction editing workshop. Here’s the Post-workshop blog:
Me participating, alongside other Caribbean writers, in the CaribLit editing workshop in Guyana, 2016.
Reading from The Boy from Willow Bend at Moray House.
September 20th 2015 –
Brooklyn Book Festival:
Co-panelists were from right Tanwi Nadini Islam and Matthew McGevna, and the moderator was Ian Maloney. My outfit + jewelry for the entire festival courtesy Miranda Askie Designs.
Pictured with other Caribbean Writers at the Brooklyn Book Fair 2015.
June 27th 2015 –
Government House fundraiser Sips and Verses:
Participating authors included Kimolisa Mings, Joy Lawrence, Michelle Toussaint, Claudia Elizabeth Ruth Francis, Margaret Irish, and others.
June 3rd to 7th 2015 –
St. Martin Book Fair:
Included school visits and public readings with Oonya Kempadoo, Vladimir Lucien, Tishani Doshi, Gisele Pineau, Bankie Banx, and others.
May 21st to 24th 2015 –
The Anguilla Literary Festival – a Literary Jollification:
March 26th to 29th 2015 –
The Virgin Islands literary festival and book fair:
with featured guest Jamaica Kincaid, pictured above with Opal Palmer Adisa; panel with Sharon Millar, Tiphanie Yanique, and Gillian Royes, plus readings and school visits.
February 2015 –
Did a local schools tour throughout this month. Stops included Antigua Girls High School, Clare Hall Secondary and St. Mary’s Secondary:
2015 –
Good Morning Antigua and Barbuda Teen Edition and other media coverage can be found here: 
December 2014 –
Antigua – book club discussion – Oh Gad! and Musical Youth
November 2014 –
Antigua – launch of Musical Youth at the Best of Books:
November 2014 –
Antigua – Leonard Tim Hector Memorial lecture and award ceremony receiving the LTH Memorial Award:
July 2014 –
Public Library Street Fair for Library Week (Antigua and Barbuda):
April 2014 –
Literary Safari at the Pen World Voices Festival at the Westbeth Center for the Arts in NY. Experience blogged here. PW anthology here. PEN page here. Literary Safari Slide Show here:
Other participating Caribbean writers included Barbara Jenkins and Sharon Leach. Photograph (not this one) of Joanne C. Hillhouse from this event was selected for Beowulf Sheehan’s book Author.
April 2014 –
Bocas Literary Festival in Trinidad for the announcement of the Burt Awards Winner (placed second overall! Watch out for Musical Youth); also a panelist. Experience blogged here and here:
Read at a panel with co-finalists A-dZiko Simba Gegele and Colleen Smith-Dennis.
April 2014 –
The Commonwealth Foundation invited me to be a part of a panel entitled “The Untold Story” in Glasgow, Scotland. Experience blogged here and here; event report here and pre-interview with the British Council here:
Co-panelists were Ivory Kelly and Martin McIntyre, and Gemma Robinson was the moderator. Earrings were a gift custom made for the trip by Aisha Ralph.
2014 –
Wadadli Youth Pen Prize annual awards ceremony (every year…almost every year since 2004) – not a promotional activity but lit arts related as Wadadli Pen is a not profit project I founded to nurture and showcase the literary arts in Antigua and Barbuda – and 2014 was its 10th anniversary –
January 2014 –
Second Cooking Magic appearance – 
December 2013 –
Signing event with fellow Antiguan and Barbudan authors (Linisa George, Brenda Lee Browne, and Floree Williams) at the Best of Books:
2013 –
Spotlighted (not in person) at the Antigua and Barbuda booth in North Carolina:
August 2013 –
First Jhohadli Summer Youth Writing Project-see Jhohadli Writing Project for more workshop activity.
Summer 2013 –
Public Library summer programme (first reading of Fish Outta Water – first children’s book; later re-released as Lost! A Caribbean Sea Adventure): 
April 2013 –
The 3rd Congress of Caribbean Writers in Guadeloupe:
with Caribbean literary legend Earl Lovelace (pictured above)- and other Caribbean authors (many pictured below) like Kendel Hippolyte, Leone Ross, Lawrence Scott, Erna Brodber, Russell Banks, Velma Pollard, Marion Bethel, McDonald Dixon, Lyonel Trouillot, Esther Phillips, Elizabeth Nunez, and others. Panelist with Aurea Maria Sotomayor and Gisele Pineau presenting on memory/history and fiction. Read my paper here.
April 2013 –
Honouring promising literary talent in the awards ceremony for The Wadadli Youth Pen Prize @ the Best of Books, Antigua – The Wadadli Youth Pen Prize was launched in 2004 to nurture and showcase the literary arts in Antigua and Barbuda. Its founder and coordinator is Joanne C. Hillhouse and these challenges (not quite every year) and awards have been, along with the blog, its most consistent projects.
February 2013 –
Reading (with Sir Probyn Innis, Dr. Milton Whittaker, Clement Bouncin Williams) at Greenland Books and Things in St. Kitts
February 2013 –
Cooking and reading during Cooking Magic appearance 
View my two appearances on ABS TV’s Cooking Magic, the longest running TV show in the Eastern Caribbean.
October 2012 – Friends of Antigua Public Library discuss Oh Gad!
October 2012 –
Brenda Lee Browne’s Just Write Retreat (for other workshop activity, see the Jhohadli Writing Project and Performance Reviews page)
October 2012 –
Reading and discussing the book during ABS TV Oh Gad! Book Club Discussion 
– watch here or read about it.
August 2012 –
Reading at the Nature Island Literary Festival in Dominica (with writers like Mervyn Morris, Adrian Augier, Roger Bonair-Agard, Elizabeth Nunez, Adrian Green, Mario Picayo, Lennox Honeychurch, and others)
(with Barbadian poet Adrian Green)
July 2012 –
NY launch of Oh Gad! with the Friends of Antigua Public Liibrary – video and text
June 2012 –
May 2012 –
The Association of Caribbean Women Writers and Scholars conference in Suriname, and live blogging the experience. Invited Artists included featured artist Kit-Ling Tjon Pian Gi, Opal Palmer Adisa, Dr. Carolyn Cooper, Annie Paul, Holly Bynoe, Nadia Huggins, Elizabeth Walcott-Hackshaw, and others. I did a couple of panels including a featured panel presentation (read the full text here) and a reading.
April 2012 –
Oh Gad! launch
October 2011 –
Telling Our Stories (University of Toronto, Canada) with Antiguan and Barbuan writers like D. Gisele Isaac, Althea Prince, Motion, Fernano Smith, and others.
Presenting Oh Gad! (pre-publication) in Canada, 2011.
2011 –
Best of Books 10th anniversary – which was also the start of its partnership with the Wadadli Youth Pen Prize in terms of hosting our annual awards ceremony and sponsoring the Challenge plaque
2008 –
Moonlight Street Fair (Antigua) –
in celebration of Dancing Nude in the Moonlight
2008 –
An international fellowship (pictured, standing right, with fellow participants in Ursula Hegi’s workshop alongside fellow/author Will Allison, stooped right) at the Breadloaf Writers Conference – 
– included a live reading
2008 –
BIM Conference Celebrating Caribbean Women Writers (Barbados)
Pictured with Dr. Carolyn Cooper, Danielle Boodoo-Fortune, Angela Barry, Esther Philips, Ramabai Espinet, Curdella Forbes, and others including in the centre George Lamming.
2007 –
First Author in Residence– Friends of Antigua Public Library (NY) – reading from Dancing Nude in the Moonlight and conversation – at The Antigua House on 12 West 122nd Street, New York NY – pictured with my interviewer at that event author Monica Matthew – 
2006, 2007, 2008, 2010 –
The Antigua and Barbuda International Literary Festival – I was a panelist and reader in this the festival’s first, second, and third years (I believe) – and manned the children’s tent in 2010 – I’m pictured in the first picture in 2006 with left to right, Althea Prince, Elizabeth Nunez, Verna Wilkins, Nalo Hopkinson, and Marie Elena John. In the second picture I am manning the children’s tent reading Ashley Bryan’s The Dancing Granny at Anchorage Inn during the 2007 festival.
2005 –
The first Antigua-Barbuda Conference (antigua_conference2005[1]) held annually by the Antigua and Barbuda Studies Association – was August 3rd – 5th – at Jolly Beach Resort – I was a part of the panel on journalism and gender – chaired by Susan Lowes and including co-panelists Milton Benjamin and Dr. Ermina Osoba – my presentation was on “Contemporary Trends in Media in Antigua and Barbuda” – it was subsequently published in the 2007 CLR James Journal
2003 –
Caribbean Canadian Literary Expo – 
2003 –
Keynote speaker at the University of Puerto Rico’s Islands In Between Conference
There have been many other appearances and school visits over the years; too many to mention. With gratitude for the opportunities.
(Image: 2015 during a local schools tour I organized after the release of Musical Youth; this is the stop at Antigua Girls High School)
…and it began here at the University of Miami’s Caribbean Fiction Writers Summer Institute, the first international workshop I participated in (facilitated in 1995 by Olive Senior); also my first international reading as participants were required to do a public reading. Here’s where you can find the reading clip (it begins at 57:15 but why not watch the whole thing). Other workshop participants included Dahlma Llanos Figueroa, Donna Aza Weir-Soley, Ifeona Fulani, Joanne Hippolyte, Eugenia O’Neal, Opal Palmer Adisa, Sarah Pemberton Strong, Cin D Quashie, Guichard Cadet, Myriam Chancey, Sheryl Byfield, Danielle Legros George, Michael Obediah Smith, Lelawattee Manoo-Rahming, Vincent Neptune, Malachi Smith, and others).
jhohadli 
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