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About LVW Board Members

Board Members

President: Deb Fennell

DDeb Fennell joined the League in 2005 to explore her life-long passion for writing. Some of Deb’s other passions have included teaching and coaching skiing, swimming and soccer and directing children’s camps. These passions bestowed upon Deb a wonderful sense of belonging to communities drawn together by shared interests. Deb finds an equally wonderful writing community in the League.

Deb’s first professional submission, a short piece for Ski magazine in the 70’s, paid $50 which may have been used to buy drinks at a local watering hole in Mammoth Lakes (CA) where she was then teaching skiing. Deb has written free-lance articles for papers from Lamoille County, VT to Vail, CO and for the Champlain Business Journal. She supports her passion for writing with a day job in public service for the State of Vermont. Deb is at work on a non-fiction book proposal, writes poetry and pens the President’s Letter for League Lines.

Vice-President: Joanne Palmisano

Joanne is the author of The Vermont Wedding Resource Guide (sold rights in 2005), Kidding Around Burlington (sold rights in 2008) and Camps, Cottages and Cabins. She is also a freelance writer, marketing consultant and a part-time designer for a design/build firm.

Past-President and Secretary: Pat Goudey O'Brien

Pat started out in publishing working in the college book editorial department of Prentice-Hall, Inc., full-time and freelance from 1971 to 1978. She has been writing professionally for newspapers and book publishers since 1981, has written magazine articles and profiles for the All American Crafts group of publications, and has been managing editor of community newspapers in Massachusetts and Vermont. She is the author of The Unofficial Guide to Beating Stress, published by John Wiley & Sons, and she is co-author with Marie Tedford of The Official Price Guide to Collecting Books (currently working on the sixth edition), published by Random House. Pat edited and published The Carnie Kid Tells All, by Ilan Fisher, released through her own imprint, The Tamarac Press.

Pat is now a full-time freelance writer and book consultant.

Treasurer: Dan Close

Dan serves on several non-profit boards and is the author of What The Abenaki Say About Dogs and A Year on the Bus from The Tamarac Press.

Director-at-Large: Marketing and Public Relations: Karen Boushie

Karen is in the public relations department at one of Vermont's finest ski resorts.

Director-at-Large: Strategy and Marketing: Paula Diaco

Paula owns and runs Sign-A-Rama Vermont with her husband. Books and food are her passion and she's currently writing her first children's book.

Director-at-Large: Programming: Katherine Quimby Johnson

Kathy, who writes for children as Katherine M. Quimby, is a freelance writer and editor. Her areas of interest include the arts, the environment, and education. Her work has appeared in Edible Green Mountains, Vermont Magazine, Vermont Life, and Vermont Quarterly, several local newspapers, and in the publications of non-profit organizations.

A poet and novelist, with one video documentary to her credit, Kathy also teaches copyediting and writing about food at Champlain College.

Kathy is past League board secretary and chaired the League's 2010 Conference, "Timeless Craft, Timely Skills."

Director-at-Large: William McKone

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Director-at-Large: Kerry Skiffington

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Director-at-Large: Branding and Public Relations: Lo Thamm

Lo owns and runs North 100 Design, a web development and design company in Moretown with her husband, Tom. In the early 90s, she was approached to author technology books for Peach Pit Press and Adobe®. She has since written articles on Computer-To-Plate technology, Desktop Publishing, and Computer Graphic Arts. Current articles and blog posts include her passion on Adoption, Social Networking, and Vegetable Gardening. She is also a mentor for International adoption.

Committees and Ongoing Volunteers

The board is always grateful for extra hands. If you can help with one of the four yearly member meetings, the Burlington Book Festival each fall, and occasional publishing projects, we'd love to hear from you!

The board would like to thank the following League members, who have stepped down from the board, but continue to serve the League of Vermont Writers:

  • Newsletter Editor: Pat Goudey O'Brien
  • Membership: Tommy Walz
  • Critique Service: Sharon Putnam
  • Burlington Book Festival Liaison: Kathy Johnson

Please contact a board member if you can donate your time and/or expertise. An active membership makes LVW a better organization.

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THE VERMONT TRADITION grapples energetically with the basic problem of human conduct...how to reconcile the needs of the group, of which every man or woman is a member,..with the craving for individual freedom to be what he really is.

—Dorothy Canfield Fisher, 1953