Ishmael Beah will speak at the Sanibel Island Writers Conference at BIG Arts on Tuesday, Nov. 5 from 6 to 7:30 p.m. Author William Giraldi will also speak.

Born in Sierra Leone, West Africa, Beah is the New York Times bestselling author of “A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier.”

The Center for Environmental and Sustainability Education is a major sponsor of the Conference. Islanders interested in FGCU and the Center are invited to a pre-reading reception and cocktail hour from 4:45 to 6 p.m. The Sanibel Island Writers Conference will feature readings and performances by well-known authors on Nov. 6-7 as well.

Beah’s work has appeared in the New York Times Magazine, Vespertine Press and LIT magazine. He is a UNICEF advocate for Children Affected by War, a member of the Human Rights Watch Children’s Advisory Committee, and has spoken before the United Nations, the Council on Foreign Relations, and many other panels on war and children.

In “A Long Way Gone,” a chronicle of his experience as a child soldier in Sierra Leone, Beah uses words to create a powerful message of hope in extreme adversity. Incoming Florida Gulf Coast University freshmen read “A Long Way Gone” in 2008 as part of the First Year Experience Readership Project. Beah was also the special guest speaker for the 2008 Convocation.

Beah’s participation at the Writers Conference will follow an evening at FGCU as a panelist in the Center’s Terry Tempest Williams Student Dialogue on Wednesday, Nov. 4 at 7 p.m. in the Student Union Ballroom.

The Terry Tempest Williams Student Dialogue, a signature event of the Center, focuses on sustainability and education. Intended to spark youth activism and inspire the intellectual climate among the FGCU and Southwest Florida communities, the initiative fosters an open space for dialogue and student ownership of that dialogue.

For more information on the Sanibel Island Writers Conference, contact Tom DeMarchi by phone at 239-590-7421 or via e-mail at tdemarch@fgcu.edu

For additional details on the Terry Tempest Williams Student Dialogue, contact The Center for Environmental and Sustainability Education by phone at 239-590-7166 or via e-mail at pcorcora@fgcu.edu.