10/17/2026
Thank you Judy Salamacha at Estero Bay News for this wonderful article. Thank you also to Teri Bayus of Central Coast Writer’s Conference for honoring our Carroll Leslie with the Lillian Dean Inspiration Award.
𝐋𝐨𝐬 𝐎𝐬𝐨𝐬 𝐁𝐨𝐨𝐤𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐎𝐰𝐧𝐞𝐫 𝐇𝐨𝐧𝐨𝐫𝐞𝐝 𝐚𝐭 𝐖𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬 𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐟𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞
By Judy Salamacha
Each year the Cuesta College Central Coast Writers Conference presents the Lillian Dean Inspiration Award to an individual who has gone the distance to encourage writers to write and authors to produce their books. At the 42ndannual conference the 2025 honoree Teri Bayus, a past director of CCWC and the published author of “The Greatest of Ease, a Circus Story” introduced the 2026 honoree, Carroll Leslie, the owner/operator of Volumes of Pleasure Book Shoppe in Los Osos.
As a longtime attendee of CCWC, I’ve learned “words matter” and when I heard Teri Bayus’ perfectly crafted words to introduce this year’s honoree, I knew they needed to be documented, shared to a broader audience and celebrated. She mastered the perfect words to describe that unique transitional moment when a writer officially becomes an author.
“The Lillian Dean Inspiration Award is named for the Cuesta College instructor who founded the Central Coast Writers Conference more than four decades ago,” Teri began. “Lillian believed writers should be encouraged, educated and given every possible opportunity to succeed.
Read more at https://esterobaynews.com/featured-stories/los-osos-bookstore-owner-honored-at-writers-conference/
com/bookstoreinLosOsos/
