On the night that Brian Turner came to Valencia, the room was packed—with more than 85 students, faculty members and even literary celebrities.

They’d stuffed themselves into a room at the Winter Park Campus to hear Turner, an Army veteran, poet and memoirist who has served tours of duty in Bosnia and Afghanistan. They jammed the room to hear his gritty poems that describe life as an infantryman in a war that feels very foreign and remote to most Americans.

Turner was invited to speak at Valencia as part of the first Winter Park Writers Festival, a three-day event held at the Winter Park Campus in late September.

Before enlisting in the Army, Turner earned a Master of Fine Arts degree in poetry. When he signed up, the recruiters never asked him what his degree was in. They may not have realized the Army was getting a poet. We, however, are the beneficiaries.

After he read “Here, Bullet,” a poem that is also the name of his best-selling and award-winning first book, he reflected on the poem—which he wrote in 15 minutes while serving in Iraq. “There are some poems we write that we turn back to again and again… It’s like drawing water from the well,” he told the audience. “I’m still trying to figure out what that poem is all about.”

Turner told a crowd of fans—including former U.S. poet laureate Billy Collins and novelist Philip Deaver—that he began taking poetry classes at Fresno State, as a long-haired, surfing bass guitarist who simply wanted to write better lyrics for his band’s music.

Along the way, he met a professor who shoved a poem by Pulitzer Prize winner Phil Levine into his hands and, with that, lit a spark in a young man. “For me, that poem really stuck with me,” said Turner, reciting Levine’s poem “They Feed They Lion” from memory.

At the Valencia reading, Turner reflected on his decision to join the Army, a decision based on his reverence for generations of family members who’d served in American conflicts from the Civil War to Vietnam. Subconsciously, he said, he joined the infantry and forced himself through “a ritual test to see if I could survive this trial of fire.” That, he said, “is a pathology.”

In addition to “Here, Bullet,” Turner read from his other award-winning collection of poetry, “Phantom Noise.” His latest work, “My Life as a Foreign Country: A Memoir,” has been called “a stunning war memoir” by the New York Times.

“I wasn’t really familiar with his work,” said Valencia student Alex Homem, who attended the Thursday night reading. “But I thought his style was terrific. He has a very forceful way of speaking.”

For audience member Amy Rippis, the reading was a delight. “Before I came here, I didn’t know who he was, but it was a wonderful reading,” said Rippis, a former journalist who lives in Winter Park.

The crowds didn’t surprise organizers, including English professor Cate McGowan. “Brian Turner is a draw,” she said. “He’s as big a celebrity in the writing world as anyone—he’s world renowned.” As for the literary celebrities in the audience, she notes that “writers, even famous ones, support each other. And authors learn from each other, so we try to go to readings to hear new work and refine our own.”

On the second night of the festival, in addition to Turner, audiences heard readings from Valencia professors Ilyse Kusnetz and McGowan. Kusnetz, whose book, “Small Hours,” won the 2014 T.S. Eliot Prize for Poetry, read two poems: “Match Girls,” about the young women who worked in match factories in the early 20th century and were often poisoned by the materials they worked with; and “The Explosion Museum,” a poem about a museum with exhibits about explosions in miniature.

McGowan read from her collection of short stories, “True Places Never Are,” which won the 2014 Moon City Prize for Short Fiction.

—Cate McGowan

The final night of the festival wrapped up with one more reading by Turner, McGowan, Valencia instructor Jared Silvia (who’s host of the WPRK radio show, “Functionally Literate”), and a poetry slam, featuring a contest between four writers of “flash fiction” and four poets. Despite stormy skies, a crowd of more than 50 showed up for the final evening.

That kind of turnout has festival organizers at the Winter Park Campus gearing up for next year—when they plan to host the second Winter Park Writers Festival.

“We are definitely talking about another festival,” McGowan said. “Now who shall we invite to read next year? That’s the question.”