Anne Barngrover is the author of two books of poetry—Brazen Creature (2016 Editor’s Choice Selection, University of Akron Press), Yell Hound Blues (Shipwreckt Books, 2013)—and co-author, with poet Avni Vyas, of the poetry chapbook Candy in Our Brains (CutBank, 2014). Her poems have appeared in North American Review, Ecotone, Crazyhorse, Copper Nickel, Indiana Review, and others. Barngrover earned her MFA from Florida State University and her PhD in English and Creative Writing from University of Missouri. She is an assistant professor of English and Creative Writing at Saint Leo University and lives in Tampa, Florida.
Nicholas Dighiera received an MFA from the University of Alaska Anchorage and is currently working on a nonfiction project called 53 Days With My Kids. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Fugue, Catamaran Literary Magazine, Under the Gum Tree, F Magazine, and the book The Better Bombshell.
Joan Frank is the author of six books of fiction and a book of collected essays. Prior work has received many honors and awards, including the 2016 Juniper Prize for the Novel, the Richard Sullivan Award for Short Fiction, and two ForeWord Reviews Book of the Year Awards (one for the essay collection Because You Have To: A Writing Life).
Sarah Curtis Graziano’s writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Salon, The American Literary Review, Literary Mama, the Huffington Post, and other publications. An MFA candidate at the Vermont College of Fine Arts, she lives in Michigan with her family.
Ted Gup is a known for his writing on government secrecy. He is the author of three books, including The Book of Honor: Covert Lives and Classified Deaths at the CIA, and A Secret Gift. He wrote for the Washington Post before joining the journalism department at Emerson College in Boston. Gup currently contributes to the New York Times, the Nation, the Washington Post, and other publications.
Mary Alice Haug is a South Dakota writer of personal essays and memoir. She is the author of Daughters of the Grasslands: A Memoir published by Bottom Dog Press. “Epiphany” is an excerpt from a chapter in the memoir she is currently writing.
Ann Hood is the author most recently of the bestselling novels The Book That Matters Most, The Obituary Writer, and The Knitting Circle. Her memoir, Comfort: A Journey Through Grief, was a New York Times Editor’s Choice and was named one of the top ten non-fiction books of 2008 by Entertainment Weekly. She is the recipient of two Pushcart Prizes, two Best American Food Writing Awards, a Best American Spiritual Writing and a Best American Travel Writing Award. Her memoir, Morningstar: Growing Up With Books, was published in August.
Cecele Kraus has authored two poetry chapbooks: Tuscaloosa Bypass (Finishing Line Press, 2012), and Harmonica (Liquid Light Press, 2014). Narrative essays have appeared in Eastern Iowa Review, Still: The Journal, and The Tishman Review. She lives in Copake, New York.
Marilyn Moriarty’s essays have appeared in The Antioch Review, The Kenyon Review, Creative Nonfiction and other literary magazines. She received the 2014 Pirates Alley Faulkner-Wisdom Gold medal for the essay; another essay was named a B.A.E. 2016 Notable. She is the author of Moses Unchained (AWP Prize for creative nonfiction) and a textbook on scientific writing, Writing Science through Critical Thinking. She is professor of English and Creative Writing at Hollins University, Roanoke, VA.
Amy Peterson is the author of Dangerous Territory: My Misguided Quest to Save the World (Discovery House, 2017). Her work has appeared or is forthcoming from St. Katherine Review, The Millions, Relief, The Other Journal, The Cresset, Books and Culture, and elsewhere. She is an MFA candidate at Seattle Pacific University.
Jessica Lind Peterson is a playwright and founder of a little theater in Minneapolis called Yellow Tree. Her play What I Learned from Grizzly
Bears is published by Smith & Kraus. Her essay “Motherhood and the Potential Hazard of Carpet Fibers” won the Mombo.org Essay Contest and was published in the Minneapolis Star Tribune. She was awarded runner-up for the Kennedy Center Mark Twain Comedy Playwriting Award and was also the runner-up for the 2015 Loft Mentor Series in Creative Nonfiction.
Ana Maria Spagna lives with her wife, Laurie, in a remote community in the North Cascades accessible only by foot, boat, or float plane. She is the author of several books including The Luckiest Scar on Earth, a novel for readers age 11 & up, Reclaimers, true stories of people reclaiming sacred land and water, the memoir/history Test Ride on the Sunnyland Bus, winner of the River Teeth literary nonfiction prize, and three collections of essays, Potluck, Now Go Home, and Uplake: Restless Essays of Coming and Going, forthcoming from University of Washington Press, in which “Fire One, Fire Two” will appear. She now teaches in the low residency MFA program at Antioch University, Los Angeles.
