Authors September 2020 - Succeed2gether's Montclair Literary Festival

Fiction

Lauren Acampora is the author of the novel The Paper Wasp, published in June 2019 by Grove Atlantic. It was named a Best Summer Read by The New York Times, O Magzine, ELLE, Town & Country, BBC.com, Daily Mail (UK), Tatler, The Hollywood Reporter, Thrillist, Literary Hub, and Publishers Weekly, as well as one of USA Today’s “5 books not to miss.” It was also longlisted for the Center for Fiction's First Novel Prize and nominated for the Kirkus Prize. Lauren's debut collection of linked stories, The Wonder Garden, was named a Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers selection and an Indie Next selection, and was chosen as one of the best books of the year by Amazon and NPR. It won the GLCA New Writers Award and was a finalist for the New England Book Award, as well as being longlisted for the Story Prize and nominated for the Kirkus Prize. She lives in Westchester County, New York with her husband and daughter.

Laurie Albanese is the author of two novels and a memoir: Stolen Beauty, Blue Suburbia, and Lynelle by the Sea, and the co-author of the novel The Miracles of Prato. Her books have been translated into Spanish, French, German and Portuguese. Lico Albanese earned her MFA from Stonecoast at the Univesrity of Southern Maine, where she will be leading workshops this summer. She's taught creative and formal writing to all ages and has worked in book publishing and journalism. Her travel and general-interest stories have appeared in the New York Times, the Chicago Tribune, and elsewhere.

Jeffrey J. Antonucci is the author of the magical realism novel, Deep Within a Blueberry Sky. For many years, he followed in the footsteps of his father, uncle, and grandfather, all master tradesmen, by working in construction as a bricklayer. It wasn’t until the idea for his first novel came to Jeff, as he tells it, like a slideshow before his eyes, that he ever even thought of writing a story. Jeff wrote Deep Within a Blueberry Sky with a desire for spreading the importance of love and peace for all people and all things. Find out more at InspiredWorks.net Facebook.com/InspiredWorksLLC. Author image: Rigoglioso Photography.

Mona Awad is the author of the novel Bunny, published by Viking in 2019. Bunny was a finalist for a Goodreads Choice Award for Best Horror and for the New England Book Award; it was selected as a Best Book of 2019 by Time, Vogue, Bookriot, Electric Literature, CBC Books, and the New York Public Library. Her first novel, 13 Ways of Looking at a Fat Girl won the Amazon Best First Novel Award and was a finalist for the Scotiabank Giller Prize. She earned an MFA in Fiction from Brown University and a PhD in Creative Writing and English from the University of Denver. She is currently a Visiting Writer at UMass Amherst and lives in Boston.

Maisy Card holds an MFA in fiction from Brooklyn College and is a public librarian. These Ghosts are Family is her first novel. Her nonfiction has appeared in Lenny Letter and is forthcoming in School Library Journal. Her short fiction has been published by AGNI, Sycamore Review, Liars’ League NYC, and Ampersand Review. Maisy was born in St. Catherine, Jamaica, but was raised in Queens, New York. She earned an MLIS from Rutgers University and a BA in English and American Studies from Wesleyan University.

Philip Cioffari is a novelist, short story writer, filmmaker, playwright and Professor of English at William Paterson University. His newest novel, If Anyone Asks, Say I Died from the Heartbreaking Blues, is forthcoming in February 2020. Previous novels include: The Bronx Kill; Jesusville; Dark Road, Dead End; and Catholic Boys, and his story collection, A History of Things Lost or Broken, won the Tartt First Fiction Prize and the D.H. Lawrence award. Cioffari’s plays have been produced OFF and OFF-OFF Broadway. He teaches in the MFA program in Creative Writing, and directs the Performing & Literary Arts Honors program at WP University.

Christina Baker Kline is a #1 New York Times bestselling author of eight novels, including Tin Ticket (forthcoming 9/2020), Orphan Train, and A Piece of the World. Her 2013 novel Orphan Train spent more than two years on the NYT bestseller list, including five weeks at #1, and was published in 40 countries. Her writing has appeared in the New York Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, LitHub, and Psychology Today, among other places.

Judith Lindbergh’s debut novel, The Thrall’s Tale, about women in Viking Age Greenland, was a Booksense (IndieBound) Pick, a Borders Original Voices Selection and praised by Pulitzer Prize winners Geraldine Brooks and Robert Olen Butler. Her work has appeared in numerous publications including Archaeology Magazine, Scandinavian Review, The World & I, the literary journal Other Voices, and most recently in UP HERE: The North at the Center of the World published by University of Washington Press. In January 2010, Judith founded The Writers Circle, offering creative writing workshops for children and adults. Learn more at www.judithlindbergh.com.

Laura Sims’ debut novel, Looker (Scribner), was published to critical acclaim in early 2019 and named a Best Book of 2019 by Vogue, Esquire UK, CrimeReads, and The Star-Ledger, and a Best New Book by People, Entertainment Weekly, CosmoUK, The Washington Independent Review of Books and more. Looker has been optioned for television by Entertainment One and Emily Mortimer’s King Bee Productions. Sims has also published four books of poetry, including, most recently, Staying Alive; her first poetry collection, Practice, Restraint, was the winner of the 2005 Fence Books Alberta Prize. Her poetry and prose have appeared in The New Republic, Boston Review, Conjunctions, Gulf Coast, and other journals. She lives in New Jersey with her family.

J. Courtney Sullivan is the New York Times best-selling author of the novels Commencement, Maine, The Engagements, and Saints For All Occasions. Her work has been translated into 17 languages. Sullivan’s writing has appeared in The New York Times Book Review, The Washington Post, The Chicago Tribune, New York magazine, Elle, Glamour, Allure, Real Simple, and O: The Oprah Magazine, among many others. She lives in Brooklyn, New York with her husband and two children.

Non-Fiction

Charlotte Alter is a national correspondent for Time, covering the 2016, 2018 and 2020 elections, women in politics, and the rise of the grassroots left. Her work has also appeared in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, and she has appeared on Good Morning America, Morning Joe, The Last Word, and CNN's Reliable Sources. The Ones We’ve Been Waiting For is her first book.

Steph Auteri is a writer and editor who has written about women's health and sexuality for the Atlantic, VICE, Pacific Standard, the Washington Post, Rewire.News, and other publications. Her more literary work has appeared in Narratively, The Rumpus, Virginia Quarterly Review, and elsewhere. Steph is the author of A Dirty Word (Cleis Press, October 2018), a reported memoir about the ways in which our culture has co-opted female sexuality. She lives in Verona, NJ with her husband and daughter.

Yasemin Besen-Cassino is a Professor and Chair of Sociology and Distinguished Scholar at Montclair State University. She is the Editor of Contemporary Sociology. She is the author of six books, her newest book Cost of Being a Girl: Teen Work and the Origins of the Gender Wage Gap came out from Temple University Press. Her work focuses on gender, work and youth. Her work has appeared in many academic journals and featured in popular outlets such as Washington Post, the Guardian, BBC4, the Atlantic, Fortune magazine, CNN, NBC and MTV among many others.

Ben Cohen is a sports reporter for the Wall Street Journal. He writes about the NBA, the Olympics and other topics that don't involve extraordinarily athletic people. He lives in New York with his wife and their cat. The Hot Hand is his first book.

Dr. Melissa L. Cooper is a writer, historian and professor. She is the author of the groundbreaking historical study, Making Gullah: A History of Sapelo Islanders, Race, and the American Imagination (University of North Carolina Press, 2017). Dr. Cooper’s teaching experience spans more than two decades. She is currently an Associate Professor of History at Rutgers University-Newark and has been a member of the faculty at the University of South Carolina and Columbia University. Her long teaching career includes teaching diverse populations of learners in New Jersey public high schools. As a result, Dr. Cooper was featured in the Peabody Award winning documentary “Minding the Gap: Why Good Schools are Failing Black Students” produced by Nancy Solomon, Spencer Fellow, in 2008. Dr. Cooper also appears in the interactive web documentary, Between the Waters: Hobcaw Barony. Dr. Cooper was recently awarded the 2019 Andrew Carnegie Corporation Fellowship.

Julie Hirschfeld Davis is the congressional editor and deputy Washington editor at the New York Times. She has covered politics and policy from Washington for two decades, including three presidential campaigns, three presidents and many sessions of Congress. She was previously a White House correspondent for the Times, and has also worked at Bloomberg, the Associated Press, the Baltimore Sun, and Congressional Quarterly. She is the 2009 winner of the Everett McKinley Dirksen Award for Distinguished Reporting of Congress for her coverage of the federal response to the 2008 financial meltdown. Julie is the co-author with Michael D. Shear of Border Wars: Inside Trump's Assault on Immigration, released in October 2019 and soon to be published in paperback by Simon & Schuster.

Arielle Eckstut is co-founder of The Book Doctors. She is the author of nine books including The Secret Language of Color: The Science, Nature, History, Culture and Beauty of Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue & Violet. She is also an agent-at-large at the Levine Greenberg Rostan  Literary Agency, where for over 20 years, she has been helping hundreds of talented writers become published authors. Lastly, Arielle co-founded the iconic company, LittleMissMatched, and grew it from a tiny operation into a leading national brand, which now has stores from coast to coast, everywhere from Disneyland to Disney World to Fifth Avenue in New York City.

Dionne Ford is co-editor of the anthology Slavery’s Descendants: Shared Legacies of Race and Reconciliation (Rutgers University, May 2019) and author of the memoir Finding Josephine. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, LitHub, More, Rumpus and Ebony among other publications and won awards from the National Association of Black Journalists and the Newswomen’s Club of New York. A 2018 recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in Creative Writing she lives in New Jersey with her family.

Matthew Futterman is a deputy sports editor and writer at the New York Times. He is the bestselling author of Running to the Edge: A Band of Misfits and the Guru Who Unlocked the Secrets of Speed, and Players: How Sports Became a Business. He was previously a senior special writer for sports at the Wall Street Journal. He was also part of the team at the Star-Ledger of New Jersey awarded the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News. He has covered the past five Olympics, five World Cups and numerous other major international sports events. In his spare time he runs marathons – 25 and counting.

Gabrielle Glaser is the author of the forthcoming, American Baby: A Mother, A Child, and the Shadow History of Adoption", to be published by Viking in June. Her 2013 book examining women's drinking and the American rehab industry, Her Best-Kept Secret: Why Women Drink -- and How They Can Regain Control, was a New York Times bestseller. Her 2015 Atlantic story, "The False Gospel of Alcoholics Anonymous," which examined science-based approaches to addiction, was included in the Best American Science and Nature Writing anthology of 2016. She has covered the intersection of health, medicine, and culture for the New York Times and many other publications, including the Daily Beast, the Washington Post, and Scientific American.

Victoria James has worked in restaurants since she was 13. She was certified as a sommelier when she was 21, making her the youngest sommelier in the country. She was Food & Wine’s Sommelier of the Year in 2018 and has appeared on both Forbes and Zagat’s “30 Under 30” lists. She has worked at some of the most prestigious restaurants in New York City, including Marea and Aureole. Currently, she is the Beverage Director and partner at Cote, a Michelin-starred hot spot in the Flatiron district. She is the author of Drink Pink: A Celebration of Rosé and Wine Girl: The Obstacles, Humiliations, and Triumphs of America’s Youngest Sommelier.

Melissa Klurman is a former book editor at both Fodor’s and Frommer’stravel guides; a Lowell Thomas Travel Writing Award Winner for her work on Fodor’s Caribbean Guidebook; and the editor of Frommer's 2020 Orlando/Walt Disney World Guidebook. Melissa’s travel writing has appeared in myriad lifestyle publications including Elle, Islands, Brides, Martha Stewart Weddings, Reader’s Digest, Parents, and Saveur. She lives in Montclair with her husband, son, and rescue dog, Pepper.

Steve Luxenberg is an associate editor at the Washington Post and an award-winning author. During his 40 years as an editor and reporter, Steve has overseen reporting that has earned many national honors, including two Pulitzer Prizes. His latest book, Separate, has garnered several honors: The New York Times named it as one of 100 Notable Books for 2019 and designated it as an Editors’ Choice. Amazon selected it as one of the year’s Best Books for History. It was longlisted for the Cundill History Prize, an international award recognizing the best history writing in English. As a work in progress, it won the 2016 J. Anthony Lukas Prize for excellence in nonfiction.

Adrienne Miller was the literary and fiction editor of Esquire from 1997-2006. She is the author of the novel The Coast of Akron. She lives in New York City with her husband, son, and Italian Greyhound. To learn more, please visit AdrienneMiller.com.

Eva Natiello is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of The Memory Box, a self-published psychological thriller which has sold hundreds of thousands of copies worldwide. She is a sought after speaker who has appeared at ThrillerFest, BookBaby Independent Author Conferences, Morristown Festival of Books, among others. Eva draws on her 20+ years of experience in PR, marketing and branding to coach authors on self-publishing and book marketing. Her articles and essays have appeared in the Huffington Post, New Jersey Magazine, Martha's Vineyard Magazine (2020), and others. The release date for Eva's newest psychological suspense, Following You, is November 16, 2020.

Adam Platt has been a contributing editor and restaurant critic for New York magazine since 2000. He won the James Beard Foundation Journalism Award for Restaurant Reviews in 2010. During the course of nearly twenty-five years in the magazine business, Platt has written for a variety of publications, including The New Yorker, The New York Observer, Esquire, and Condé Nast Traveler. He lives in Greenwich Village with his wife and two pizza-loving daughters.

Eduardo Porter was born in Phoenix and grew up in the United States, Mexico, and Belgium. He is an economics reporter for The New York Times, where he was a member of the editorial board from 2007 to 2012 and the Economic Scene columnist from 2012 to 2018. He began his career in journalism as a financial reporter for Notimex, a Mexican news agency, in Mexico City. He was a correspondent in Tokyo and London, and in 1996 moved to São Paulo, Brazil, as editor of América Economía, a business magazine. In 2000, he went to work at The Wall Street Journal in Los Angeles to cover the growing Hispanic population. He is the author of The Price of Everything (2011), an exploration of the cost-benefit analyses that underpin human behaviors and institutions. He lives in Brooklyn.

Leah Price has taught at Cambridge University, Harvard University, and Rutgers University, where she is currently Henry Rutgers Distinguished Professor of English and Founding Director of the Rutgers Book Initiative. Her most recent book is What We Talk About When We Talk About Books. She writes for the New York Times Book Review, London Review of Books, Times Literary Supplement, San Francisco Chronicle, Boston Globe, and Public Books, where she also serves as the “Print/Screen” editor.

Nancy Princenthal is a New York–based writer. A former senior editor of Art in America, where she remains a contributing editor, she has also written for the New York Times, Parkett, the Village Voice, and many other publications. She is currently on the faculty of the MFA art writing program at the School of Visual Arts. Her previous book, Agnes Martin, won 2016 PEN/ Jacqueline Bograd Weld award for biography.

Ben Reiter is the author of Astroball: The New Way to Win It All, a New York Times bestseller. As a longtime senior writer for Sports Illustrated, he wrote 27 cover stories and won the 2018 Deadline Award for Magazine Profile for his feature ‘The Seeker: The Complicated Life and Death of Hideki Irabu.’ Before joining SI, he was a research assistant for the legendary investigative journalist Wayne Barrett at the Village Voice. He is currently at work on both a narrative podcast and a documentary television series investigating the Houston Astros’ cheating scandal. Reiter is a member of the board of directors of The Marshall Project. He grew up in South Orange, NJ, and lives in New York City.

David Rothkopf is an author and commentator who has written extensively on politics, power and national security. Recent books include Great Questions of Tomorrow, National Insecurity, Power, Inc., Superclass, and Running the World. He is a former senior official in the Clinton Administration and has taught international affairs at Columbia, Georgetown, and Johns Hopkins. He lives in New York City. Twitter @djrothkopf

David Henry Sterry is co-founder of The Book Doctors. He is the author of 16 books on a wide variety of subjects, from memoir to middle grade fiction, sports to reference. His work has been translated into over a dozen languages, optioned by Hollywood, and appeared on the cover of the Sunday New York Times Book Review. He is a regular contributor to The Huffington Post. Before writing professionally, David was a comic and an actor. His one man show, based on his memoir, Chicken, was named the number one show in the United Kingdom for its entire run at the Edinburgh Theatre Festival, Fringe by The Independent.

Dr. Larry Westreich, a board-certified psychiatrist, is Associate Clinical Professor Psychiatry at the New York University School of Medicine. Dr. Westreich formerly directed the Detoxification Ward and the Dual Diagnosis Ward at Bellevue Hospital, where he remains on the faculty. He maintains a private practice in addiction treatment in New York and New Jersey, is Past President of the American Academy of Addiction Psychiatry, and the author of Helping the Addict You Love, (Simon and Schuster, 2017) and A Parent’s Guide to Teen Addiction (Skyhorse Publishing, 2017). Dr. Westreich has served since 2003 as the Consultant on Behavioral Health and Addiction to Major League Baseball.

Eilene Zimmerman has been a journalist for three decades, covering business, technology and social issues for a wide array of national magazines and newspapers. She was a columnist for The New York Times Sunday Business section for six years and since 2004 has been a regular contributor to the newspaper. In 2017, Zimmerman also began pursuing a master’s degree in social work. She lives in New York City.

Other Participants

Marissa Rothkopf Bates writes about food for the New York Times, Food52, Newsweek and New Jersey Monthly, among others. She is currently working on a book about the history of technology and innovation in the American kitchen. Marissa has worked at SPY magazine, Nickelodeon, CondéNast and Oxygen TV. Marissa has a graduate degree in history and earned her professional qualification as a chef from the Institute of Culinary Education, yet still gets nervous when asked to make custard. In her spare time she enjoys writing about herself in the third person. For the best pizza in NJ, follow her: Twitter@MarissaRothkopf and Insta @MarissaRothkopfEats

Peter Coyl has been the Director of the Montclair Public Library since March 2017. Previously he was the Manager of the Dallas Public Library's J. Erik Jonsson Central Library. He is a frequent presenter at regional, state, and national library conferences and workshops. He served as chair of the American Library Association's GLBT Round Table, chair of the Stonewall Book Awards Committee, and as a member on the Intellectual Freedom Committee. Currently he is a Trustee of the Freedom to Read Foundation and a member of the Public Library Association's Task Force on Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Social Justice.

Jim Johnson is an American politician, attorney, and community activist, who was formerly an Assistant Secretary of the Treasury and Under Secretary of the Treasury for Enforcement, where he received the Hamilton Award, the Department of Treasury’s highest award. He was a Democratic Party candidate in the 2017 New Jersey gubernatorial race.

Lindsey N. Mach is the owner of Lindsey Noelle Publishing Services LLC. She is a freelance writer, editor, and marketer who is also a certified teacher. She has almost ten years of experience in the publishing industry and has worked in both trade and educational publishing. Her publishing experience includes editorial and publicity/marketing. Lindsey’s goal is to help writers and companies find and refine their voice and connect with their audiences. In addition to providing publishing services, she offers workshops to help writers bring their projects to publication and connect with readers. Find out more at Reedsy.com/Lindsey-Mach

Kate Zernike has been a reporter for the New York Times since 2000, and was a member of the team that shared the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for explanatory reporting. She is the author of Boiling Mad: Behind the Lines in Tea Party America, published in 2010, and is writing a book about women in science.