A Writer's Guide to Mobile, Alabama

Ben May is the main library of the Mobile Public Library system, with Wi-Fi and interlibrary loan. A writer planning a reading or a launch can reserve its theater. It seats about 230 and has a stage and a piano.

The library's Local History & Genealogy division keeps Mobile city directories back to 1837 and Mobile newspapers on microfilm from 1819. Its digital archive holds Mobile histories and photographs. Look here, too, for works by local authors.

West Regional is the library system's branch on Grelot Road in west Mobile. Like every branch, it has Wi-Fi.

The McCall Library's special collections center on Mobile and the Alabama Black Belt, with about 6,500 linear feet of paper collections and more than 4.2 million photographs. Oral histories add to the holdings. Visits are by appointment. Ask Library Administration for a parking pass, since the lot requires one.

The Municipal Archives hold the official records of the City of Mobile from 1814, about 12,000 cubic feet of them. Historical researchers can work here on weekdays. Everyone registers at the door, and records are used under staff supervision.

The Haunted Book Shop revives a downtown Mobile bookstore first opened in 1941. It sells mostly new books. Romance and fantasy sell best, followed by local history. Expect signings and author conversations along with midnight release parties. The store works with the Mobile Writers Guild.

Mobile Bookseller stocks thousands of used books, most of them customer trade-ins, alongside new books bought from publishers. Look for the Local Authors section. The store hosts events for readers and local authors and is closed Sundays through Tuesdays.

Carpe Diem roasts its coffee in-house and serves it in a Victorian house across from the main entrance of Spring Hill College. Take a covered table outside or a quiet corner indoors. It is open daily.

Soul Caffeine roasts its own coffee, and its Dauphin Street café sells the house blends and single origins. The other two cafés are across the bay in Daphne and Spanish Fort.

Yellowhammer, founded in 2016, has six locations in and around Mobile. The downtown café opens early on weekdays and is closed Sundays.

Callaghan's has been a neighborhood bar and kitchen since 1946. Local and touring bands fill its live-music calendar. It is open daily, and the kitchen is known for its burger.

J. Oliver Wintzell opened Wintzell's in 1938 as a six-stool oyster bar, and the Dauphin Street restaurant is the original. It is open daily.

The Stokes Center, in USA's English department, runs a free public reading series of visiting novelists, poets, and songwriters. Its Southern Writers' Workshop pairs a free one-hour writing class with a public reading. Some classes led by visiting writers are open to the public.

Page & Palette is a third-generation, family-owned bookstore in Fairhope, across Mobile Bay, and has been a local landmark for more than 40 years. It hosts author events, some of them ticketed, and runs the Book Talk club. The Book Cellar music venue and the Latte Da coffee shop share the building.

The Alabama Writers' Cooperative has supported the state's writers since 1923. It holds an annual conference and workshops and puts out the AWC Journal.

The Alabama Humanities Alliance is the state's humanities council, a Birmingham nonprofit founded in 1974 and affiliated with the National Endowment for the Humanities. It funds public humanities programs and publishes Mosaic magazine. It also produces the Encyclopedia of Alabama.

Spirituality in Clinical Practice, an American Psychological Association journal, publishes practice-focused articles in which clinicians discuss their work with psychospiritual and other spiritually oriented interventions. Its editor is in the Department of Psychology at the University of South Alabama. Preparing an article for Spirituality in Clinical Practice

The State Council on the Arts gives fellowships to Alabama writers of poetry or prose. Applicants must be legal residents who have lived in the state for at least two years. The council puts particular weight on the quality of the writing samples.

This lifetime-achievement award goes to a writer born in Alabama or whose career developed in the state. A committee named by festival leadership chooses the recipient, and Harper Lee LLC funds the award.

The Capote Prize honors distinguished work in the short story or literary nonfiction by an Alabama writer. A selection committee chooses it.

The Alabama Humanities Alliance gives Major Grants and Mini Grants for public humanities programs in the state, from lecture series to oral history projects. Applicants are organizations, such as Alabama nonprofits and colleges.

The Cooperative runs writing contests every year and publishes an Awarded Writers' Collection.

Print King binds and finishes manuals and booklets. It also collates and laminates, and it can add tabs and clear covers.

Calagaz is a Mobile printer that does both digital and offset work, and about 90 percent of what it produces is done in its own shop. Its booklet work includes workbooks and training manuals as well as event programs and playbills.