Herbert Shippey Visiting Writers Series

Jeff Weddle, poet

Tuesday, November 24, 2026, 7:00 PM
Bowen Hall Room 100, Tifton Site

Jeff Weddle is a poet and writer living in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. The most recent of his twenty books are the poetry collections, High on Rose (Keeping the Flame Alive Press, 2026), The Things We Do to Protect Our Own (Meat for Tea Press, 2025), and Letter to Xhevdet Bajraj (Uncollected Press, 2025). He won the Eudora Welty Prize for interpretive scholarship in the humanities for Bohemian New Orleans: The Story of the Outsider and Loujon Press (University Press of Mississippi, 2007) and has also received honors for his fiction and poetry. These include a Pushcart nomination, multiple President’s Book Awards from the Florida Authors and Publishers Association, and a Feathered Quill Book Award. In 2024, the National Beat Poetry Foundation appointed him to a two-year term as the inaugural State of Alabama Beat Poet Laureate. Jeff’s work has appeared in Albanian and Spanish translation and been read on Albanian national television. He is an Associate Professor at the University of Alabama, where he teaches in the School of Library and Information Studies.

Dana Ridenour, author

Tuesday, February 16, 2027, 7:00 PM
Bowen Hall Room 100, Tifton Site

Dana Ridenour is a distinguished retired FBI agent and celebrated author based in Beaufort, South Carolina. Known for her gripping FBI undercover novels, she has captivated readers with titles such as Behind the Mask, Beyond the Cabin, and Below the Radar. Her latest work, All the Hidden Pieces, is eagerly anticipated and set for release on August 26, 2026.

Dana's diverse career includes roles as a first mate on a tour boat—her favorite job—lawyer, and Special Agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Joining the FBI in November 1995, she dedicated over twenty years to service, tackling complex narcotics cases, domestic sex trafficking, and violent crime investigations.

As a proud member of the FBI's Evidence Response Team, Dana responded to critical events such as the 9/11 World Trade Center attack. Her career highlight came in 2003 with her certification as an undercover FBI agent, leading to profound experiences alongside her husband, also an FBI agent.

Dana's passion for writing stems from her mother's encouragement and her own experiences. Her mother's love for books inspired Dana from a young age, fostering a desire to journal her FBI experiences, which eventually formed the basis for her novels. Influenced by southern literary greats like Pat Conroy and Dorothea Benton Frank, Dana's work reflects her rich life experiences and admiration for her favorite novel, The Prince of Tides.

Gianna Russo, poet

Monday, October 27, 2025, 7:00 PM

Gianna Russo is the inaugural Wordsmith of The City of Tampa (2020-22) appointed by Mayor Jane Castor. She wrote and performed “Glorious,” a new poem for the mayor’s second inauguration in 2023 and “How We Rose is How We Rise” for the Mayor’s State of the City address in 2025. She is the author of the poetry collections, All I See is Your Glinting: 90 Days in the Pandemic, with photographer Jenny Carey (Madville Publishing, 2022); One House Down (Madville Publishing, 2019) and Moonflower, winner of a Florida Book Award. She is the editor of the anthology Chasing Light which pairs poems by Florida poets with vintage photographs of Tampa. She has published poems in Green Mountains Review, Gulf Stream, The Sun, Poet Lore, Florida Review, Karamu, and Calyx, among others.

Russo is Associate Professor of English and Creative Writing at Saint Leo University where she teaches in the graduate and undergraduate creative writing programs and serves as editor-inchief of the literary magazine, Sandhill Review. A third-generation Tampa native, a mother and grandmother, Gianna lives in an almost 100-year-old bungalow with her husband Jeff Karon and their cat Gingko.

Skip Horack

Monday, March 30, 2026 7:00 PM

Skip Horack is the author of the story collection The Southern Cross (2009), winner of the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference 2008 Bakeless Fiction Prize; and the novel The Eden Hunter (2010), a New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice. His work has also appeared in Oxford American, the Saturday Evening Post, Epoch, The Southern Review, Narrative Magazine, and elsewhere. Horack is a former Jones Lecturer at Stanford University, where he was also a Wallace Stegner Fellow. His novel The Other Joseph was published by Ecco/HarperCollins in 2015, and he is currently director of the Creative Writing Program at Florida State University.