Neil White Keynote Speaker

Best-selling memoirist
Award-winning journalist
Publisher and editor

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Neil White's Biography

Neil White Speaker Profile:

Neil White has been a newspaper editor, magazine publisher, advertising executive, and federal prisoner. He operates a small publishing company, writes plays and essays, and teaches memoir writing. His best-selling memoir, “In the Sanctuary of Outcasts“(2010), chronicles the year he was imprisoned for fraud in the last leprosarium in the continental United States, where he met people he would never have engaged with on the outside.

White has been a keynote speaker all over the country at venues ranging from universities, churches, historical societies, libraries, and various community organizations.White was an ordinary guy who weighed the measure of his worth by appearance. He desired nice cars, homes, and clothing. He loaned money to family and friends. He was active and generous in his church, but his bank account couldn’t keep up with his addiction to an appearance of perfection, so he began moving money from one account to another to avoid bouncing checks. Soon, what started out as moving money from one account to another to cover expenses became something bigger, something illegal: kiting checks. Eventually, he was caught, convicted of fraud, and sent to prison, which was also a leprosarium.

Of all the lessons he learned in that unusual place, the one that resonates deepest is that the most valuable friends – the ones worth knowing best and keeping – are those covered with scars. He discovered the secret to happiness, leading a fulfilling life, and the importance of fatherhood in the most unlikely of places. White’s experiences in and out of prison have granted him no small measure of perspective that make his tale truly inspiring as well as important and educational.In the Sanctuary of Outcasts was a finalist in the 2010 Books for a Better Life program, as well as the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance “Book of the Year” award. In 2010, White won the Outstanding Author of the Year from the Southern Library Association. Barnes & Noble honored White as one of the top three emerging nonfiction authors in America through their “Discover Great New Writers” program. Foreign language translations of In the Sanctuary of Outcasts have been published in Germany, Croatia, and the Netherlands. Sanctuary has been on the Southern Independent best-seller list for nearly three years. The book was selected for Baton Rouge’s One Book, One Community program. It was also selected for the common reading experience at Davidson College and St. Bonaventure University.White’s essays have appeared in dozens of literary journals. He is the founder of Theatre Oxford’s National Ten Minute Play Contest and editor of the anthology, “Ten Minute Plays from Oxford.” His scripts have received national awards from Chesterfield Film Corporation and the Edward Albee Last Frontier Play Lab.White serves as editor of the books,”Mississippians and Mississippi’s 100 Greatest Football Players of All Time” and “The A Game.” He is editor and publisher of the periodicals Life 101, College People, the Going to College series, as well as several textbooks for first-year college students.

For availability and speaker fees, please contact Neil White’s speaking agent at Chartwell here, or call +1 972 385 1021 for U.S. inquiries or +44 207 293 0864 for international inquiries.

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