Clay Stafford
On a dark and (possibly) stormy night in August, a group of eccentric authors with an intertwined past will gather at the Embassy Suites Hotel and Convention Center in Franklin. Little do they know: None of their manuscripts will be leaving the 20th annual Killer Nashville International Writers’ Conference intact.
That’s because the literary conference — which focuses on genre fare of the horror, crime, mystery and romance varieties — has enough resources that even the most hardened veteran author would find it difficult to leave town without having gleaned an idea or two to throw into their next project. Many literary conferences and festivals are geared toward readers or the general literary landscape, but Killer Nashville’s emphasis on the down-and-dirty world of genre fiction (and nonfiction) makes it stand out among its peers.
Another unique attribute of Killer Nashville: Everyone from aspiring writers to New York Times bestselling authors intermingles at the various panels, presentations, networking soirees and meet-and-greets.
“We don’t recognize superstars,” says author and filmmaker Clay Stafford, the founder of Killer Nashville.
“We aren’t interested in whether it’s a hardcover book or a paperback,” Stafford tells the Scene from his home in Franklin. “We’re not interested in if it’s published by the Big Five [book publishers] or if it’s independently self-published. What we’re after is a good story. It is a symbiotic relationship where people at all levels can benefit, and no one should feel intimidated because we’re all there to learn and share.”
After starting the locally focused Council for the Written Word in Williamson County, Stafford was looking for a way to convene writers from across the globe here in Middle Tennessee. What started out as a group of writers “sitting around talking about what was working, what they wanted to do, and if anybody had any ideas on how to achieve this” morphed into the networking and educational conference that Killer Nashville is today.
At each year’s edition, attendees can pick and choose from a lineup of publishing workshops, forensic and law enforcement presentations, agent and editor roundtable sessions, manuscript critiques, pitch coaching sessions, author panels and more. It’s a veritable one-stop shop for writers of all levels, and can be especially helpful for budding authors in need of an industry breakthrough.
“We want to encourage everybody, and it’s so important these days for all perspectives to get out in literature and that we maintain a position where we have freedom of expression, freedom of speech,” Stafford says.
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One of the event’s annual honors, the John Seigenthaler Legends Award (named for one of Nashville’s — and the world’s — journalism titans), is given to a publishing industry figure “who has championed First Amendment rights to ensure that all opinions are given a voice, has exemplified mentorship and example to authors, [is] supporting the new voices of tomorrow, and/or has written an influential canon of work that will continue to influence authors for many years to come,” according to the Killer Nashville website. The 2025 recipient is longtime Midwest detective fiction author Sara Paretsky, while past winners include such literary luminaries as Walter Mosley, Joyce Carol Oates and Otto Penzler.
Stafford, who grew up in the Appalachian Mountains in East Tennessee, has a long-held reverence for the importance of storytelling both locally and worldwide.
“Storytelling has been a really, really integral part of my Southern roots, because I grew up in an environment where there were a lot of oral storytellers,” he says.
“Nashville, it has a long history, a very long history, of being a literary center, and I couldn’t be more proud than to live in the Nashville community, because I’m certainly, if I’m standing on anything, I’m standing on those shoulders of the giants who’ve come before.”
Despite a decades-long career as a writer, Stafford finds himself learning just as much as the attendees at the event each year.
“I’m in the same boat as everybody who comes to Killer Nashville,” Stafford says. “I’m just a guy who knows a little bit and is trying to learn a little more, has done a little bit and is trying to do a little more, so we’re all equal on that front.”
