BOONE—”Freakonomics” co-author Stephen Dubner and N.C. Poet Laureate Kathryn Stripling Byer headline this fall’s Hughlene Bostian Frank Visiting Writers Series at Appalachian State University.

All programs begin at 7:30 p.m. in Plemmons Student Union’s Table Rock Room unless otherwise noted. Book sales and signing will follow each reading. Admission is free. For further information on Appalachian’s Visiting Writers Series or Creative Writing Program, call (828) 262-2871.

The series presents five writers this fall.

Dubner will read from a variety of works that focus on memoir, hero worship and sports Thursday, Sept. 7. The Richard T. Barker Friends of the University Library will sponsor refreshments following the reading.

Dubner is a former writer/editor of the New York Times Magazine, to which he still contributes. He also wrote the memoir “Turbulent Souls: A Catholic Son’s Return to His Jewish Family.”

Dubner received an M.F.A. in writing from Columbia University, where he also taught in the English Department. He graduated from Appalachian’s College of Fine and Applied Arts as a communications major in 1984.

Fiction writer and essayist W.S. Penn will talk Thursday, Sept. 21. Penn also will give the craft talk “Who Needs Talent When We’ve Got Hard Work?” from 12:30-1:45 p.m. in the Table Rock Room.

Penn is the author of the novels “Killing Time with Strangers,” winner of the Before Columbus Foundation’s American Book Award, and “The Absence of Angels”; the essay collections “Feathering Custer” and “All My Sins Are Relatives”; and a story collection, “This is the World,” for which he won an American Book Award for Literary Merit, A Critics’ Choice Award, and the North American Indian Prose Award.

Penn directs the creative writing program at Michigan State University.

Fiction writer Nancy Hudson Packer reads from her work Thursday, Sept. 28, in the Linville Falls Room. She will give a craft talk on the techniques of fiction from 3:30-4:45 p.m. in the Linville Falls Room.

Packer taught for more than 30 years in the creative writing program at Stanford University. Her publications include “Small Moments,” which received the California Commonwealth Club Silver Medal, “In My Father’s House,” “The Women Who Walk,” “Jealous-Hearted Me,” which received the Alabama Library Association Award and several textbooks on writing. Her stories have been anthologized in collections such as “O. Henry Prize Stories” and “Best American Stories.”

Byer presents a poetry reading Thursday, Oct. 5. In addition, the Department of English will host a pre-reading reception from 6-7:15 p.m. in the student union’s Multicultural Center.

Byer was named the state’s poet laureate in 2005. In that capacity, she promotes the works of numerous other state poets through web exposure and programs.

Byer is the author of five poetry collections: “The Girl in the Midst of the Harvest,” “Wildwood Flower,” “Black Shawl,” “Catching the Light” and “Coming to Rest.” She also has written several chapbooks, including “The Evelyn Poems” and “Wake.”

Byer has worked as an instructor at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and has served as the poet-in-residence at Western Carolina and Lenoir-Rhyne universities.

She will be the 2006-07 Rachel Rivers-Coffey Distinguished Professor of Creative Writing in the Department of English in this fall.

Graphic novelist James Sturm will present a reading Thursday, Nov. 30. He will present the craft talk “Creating the Graphic Novel” Nov. 29 from 2-3:15 p.m. in the Table Rock Room.

Sturm is the director of The Center for Cartoon Studies, a two-year cartooning school located in White River Junction, Vt. His writings and illustrations have appeared in many national and regional publications including “The Chronicle of Higher Education,” “The Onion,” “The New York Times” and on the cover of “The New Yorker.”

Sturm attended the University of Wisconsin, where he drew the comic strip “Down and Out Dawg” for the campus newspaper. He co-founded and contributed to the alternative weekly “The Stranger” while writing and drawing the eight-issue comic book “The Cereal Killings” for Fantagraphics.

Sturm also started his own imprint, Bear Bones Press, and published “Savage Love,” an anthology of comics written by Dan Savage and drawn by various cartoonists.

After completing “The Cereal Killings,” Sturm created “James Sturm’s America,” a trilogy of historical graphic novels that highlight the role of greed in American culture. One of the graphic novels, “The Golem’s Mighty Swing,” was named the best graphic novel of 2001 by Time.com.

Parking for Visiting Writers Series events is available for non-university community members after 5 p.m. in the parking lot below Raley Hall. Also suggested is the lot across from the First Presbyterian Church, behind the campus Post Office.

Visit www.parking.appstate.edu for a map of on- and off-campus parking.

The Fall 2006 Visiting Writers Series is supported by the North Carolina Arts Council, with funding from the State of North Carolina and the National Endowment for the Arts, which believes that a great nation deserves great art.

The series is also supported by the Appalachian State University Foundation; Appalachian’s Offices of Academic Affairs, Multicultural Student Development and Cultural Affairs; the College of Arts and Sciences, the Department of English; the Summer Reading Program; the University Bookstore; The Appalachian Journal; and The Richard T. Barker Friends of the University Library.

Business sponsors are The Gideon Ridge Inn and The Red Onion Restaurant. Community sponsors include John and Marjorie Idol and The High Country Writers.

The Visiting Writers Series is named in honor of Hughlene Bostian Frank, class of 1968, a member of Appalachian’s Board of Trustees and generous supporter of the university.

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Photo No. 1: Stephen Dubner photo courtesy of the William Morris Agency

Photo No. 2: W.S. Penn

Photo No. 3: Nancy Hudson Packer photo courtesy of Linda A. Cicero/Stanford News Service

Photo No. 4: Kathryn Stripling Byer photo by Chris English

Photo No. 5: James Sturm self portrait courtesy of the author