Fiction & Poetry
Christine Adams
Christine Adams has authored two collections of poetry: Setting the Table in the Age of Reason and Quatrains, the first of which will be released by Propertius Press, Lynchburg Virginia later this year. Currently Chris is in the final research stages for a piece of creative nonfiction, a local history from the perspective of a 235 year-old former mill. The volume has a working title of Homespun: A Biography of a Connecticut Cottage, which is how she perceives her poetry: handcrafted with intention and borne in the spirit of love.
Laurie Lico Albanese
Laurie Lico Albanese is the award-winning author of Hester, a re-imagining of The Scarlet Letter that gives a voice to Hester Prynne, America’s original defiant single mother. Hester is an Audible Best Books of 2022, an IndieNext and Canadian and American Librarians selection, a Gillian Flynn Best Books of Fall, a Book of the Month club selection, and finalist in the Goodreads Best Books of the Year. Albanese earned her MFA in 2016 and teaches writing at Montclair State University. Previous books include Stolen Beauty, The Miracles of Prato, and a memoir in verse, Blue Suburbia. She lives in Montclair with her husband and their two rescue dogs, and is the mother of two grown children.
Keisha-Gaye Anderson
Keisha-Gaye Anderson is a Jamaican-born poet, writer, visual artist, and media strategist based in Brooklyn, NY. She is the author of Gathering the Waters (Jamii Publishing 2014), Everything Is Necessary (Willow Books 2019), and A Spell for Living (Agape Editions), a multimedia e-book that includes music and Keisha’s original artwork, which received the Editors’ Choice recognition for Agape's Numinous Orisons, Luminous Origin Literary Award. Keisha’s poetry, fiction, and essays have been widely published in national literary journals, magazines, and anthologies. In 2018, Keisha was selected as a Brooklyn Public Library Artist in Residence. Keisha holds an MFA in creative writing from The City College, CUNY. Learn more about her at www.keishagaye.ink
Asale Angel-Ajani
Asale Angel-Ajani is the author of A Country You Can Leave and Strange Trade: The Story of Two Women Who Risked Everything in The International Drug Trade. She’s held residencies at Djerassi, Millay, Playa, Tin House, and VONA. She is a recipient of grants from the Ford, Mellon, and Rockefeller Foundations. She has a PhD in Anthropology and an MFA in Creative Writing. She lives in New York City. Photo © Sylvie Rosokoff
Melissa Coss Aquino
Melissa Coss Aquino is a Puerto Rican writer from the Bronx. She received her MFA from the City College of New York, CUNY, and her Ph.D. from the Graduate Center, CUNY in English. She is currently Associate Professor of English at Bronx Community College, CUNY. She is a proud IWWG, VONA, AROHO, and Hedgebrook alumna. Her work has appeared in several anthologies and journals including Centro, Caminos Reales, We’moon 2022, MomEgg Review, Callaloo, The Fairy Tale Review and others. Her novel Carmen and Grace was published in April 2023.
Anne Berest
Anne Berest is the bestselling co-author of How to Be Parisian Wherever You Are (Doubleday, 2014) and the author of a novel based on the life of French writer Françoise Sagan. With her sister Claire, she is also the author of Gabriële, a critically acclaimed biography of her great-grandmother, Gabriële Buffet-Picabia, Marcel Duchamp’s lover and muse. She is the great-granddaughter of the painter Francis Picabia. For her work as a writer, she has been profiled in publications such as French Vogue and Haaretz newspaper. The recipient of numerous literary awards, The Postcard was a finalist for the Goncourt Prize and has been a long-selling bestseller in France. Photo © David Atlan
Marina Budhos
Marina Budhos is an author of award-winning fiction and nonfiction. Her newest novel, We Are All We Have, a Kirkus Best Book of 2022, is about Rania, a 17-year-old girl bursting with dreams, an asylum-seeker, when suddenly her life is shattered, and she takes to the road–in search of sanctuary and family truths. Prior to that she published The Long Ride, Watched which received an Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature YA Honor (APALA) and a Walter Honor, Tell Us We’re Home, a 2017 Essex County YA Pick, Ask Me No Questions, recipient of the first James Cook Teen Book Award, The Professor of Light and House of Waiting, and a nonfiction book, Remix: Conversations with Immigrant Teenagers. With her husband Marc Aronson, she has co-authored Eyes of the World: Robert Capa & Gerda Taro & The Invention of Modern Photojournalism, and Sugar Changed the World: A Story of Magic, Spice, Slavery, Freedom & Science, which was a 2010 Los Angeles Times Book Award Finalist. Budhos has received an NEA Literature Fellowship, a Rona Jaffe Award for Women Writers, three Fellowships from the New Jersey Council on the Arts, and has been a Fulbright Scholar to India. She is a professor emerita at William Paterson University and lives in New Jersey with fellow author Marc Aronson and their two sons.
Theresa Burns
Theresa Burns’ debut full-length collection of poems, Design, was published by Terrapin Books in 2022. She is also the author of the chapbook Two Train Town. Her poetry, reviews, and nonfiction have appeared in The New York Times, Prairie Schooner, New Ohio Review, Verse Daily, American Magazine, The Cortland Review, Plume, and elsewhere. A two-time Pushcart Prize nominee, she has been shortlisted for both the New Jersey Poet’s Prize and the Allen Ginsberg Poetry Prize. Burns is the founder, in 2019, of the community-based reading series Watershed Literary Events and teaches writing in and around New York. She lives with her family in South Orange, NJ.
Anne Burt
Anne Burt's debut novel, The Dig, is a March 2023 American Booksellers' Association Indie Next pick and the Strand Bookstore's mystery selection of the month. Anne is also the editor of My Father Married Your Mother: Dispatches from the Blended Family and coeditor, with Christina Baker Kline, of About Face: Women Write About What They See When They Look in the Mirror. Her essays and fiction have appeared in numerous publications and venues, including Salon, NPR, and The Christian Science Monitor; she is a past winner of Meridian’s Editors’ Prize in Fiction. Anne graduated from Yale in 1989 with a BA in history, and from NYU in 1997 with an MFA in creative writing. She lived in Montclair from 1999-2021 and currently lives in New York City.
Jai Chakrabarti
Jai Chakrabarti’s short fiction has appeared in numerous journals and has been anthologized in The O. Henry Prize Stories, The Best American Short Stories, and awarded a Pushcart Prize. Chakrabarti was an Emerging Writer Fellow with A Public Space and received his MFA from Brooklyn College. He was born in Kolkata, India, and now splits his time between the Hudson Valley and Brooklyn, New York. www.jaichakrabarti.com Photo © Peter Dressel
Gina Chung
Gina Chung is a Korean American writer from New Jersey currently living in Brooklyn, New York. A recipient of the Pushcart Prize, she is a 2021-2022 Center for Fiction/Susan Kamil Emerging Writer Fellow and holds an MFA in fiction from The New School. Sea Change is her debut novel. Photo © S.M. Sukardi
Rio Cortez
Rio Cortez is the New York Times bestselling author of picture books The ABCs of Black History and the forthcoming The River Is My Sea. Her debut poetry collection, Golden Ax, was longlisted for the 2022 National Book Award for Poetry and the Pen America Open Book Award. Born and raised in Salt Lake City, she now lives, writes, and works in Harlem.
Alice Elliott Dark
Alice Elliott Dark is the author of four works of fiction, most recently (2022) the national bestseller Fellowship Point. Earlier works are Think of England, In the Gloaming, Naked to the Waist. She is an Associate Professor at Rutgers-Newark in English and the MFA Program. One of her stories, "In the Gloaming," was made into two films and was chosen by John Updike for inclusion in Best American Short Stories of the Century. Photo © Beowulf Sheehan
Michael Gillespie
Michael Gillespie is a translator and scholar who holds a PhD in comparative literature from Indiana University and has taught global arts and cultures as an adjunct professor at New York University. His translations include work by the German-Jewish poet Else Lasker-Schüler that was set to music by André Previn. Most recently, he has translated and introduced Berlin Garden of Erotic Delights (2022), published by Warbler Press, a collection of five short stories on the theme of male same-sex desire first published in German in 1920, swiftly banned by two German courts, and never before available in English. Michael Bronski, author of A Queer History of the United States and Professor of the Practice in Activism and Media Studies of Women, Gender and Sexuality at Harvard University, describes Gillespie’s book as “one of the most important discoveries of lost queer literature in decades.”
Jenny Jackson
Jenny Jackson is a Vice President and Executive Editor at Alfred A. Knopf. A graduate of Williams College and the Columbia Publishing Course, she lives in Brooklyn Heights with her family. Pineapple Street is her first novel. Photo © Sarah Shatz
Claire Jiménez
Claire Jiménez is the author of the short story collection Staten Island Stories (Johns Hopkins Press, 2019) and What Happened to Ruthy Ramirez (Grand Central, 2023). She received her MFA from Vanderbilt University and her PhD from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. In 2020 she cofounded the digital archive The Puerto Rican Literature Project with a group of other Puerto Rican writers and scholars and the US Latino Digital Humanities Center at the University of Houston. Currently, she is an Assistant Professor of English and African American Studies at the University of South Carolina.
Mary Beth Keane
Mary Beth Keane was awarded a John S. Guggenheim fellowship for fiction writing, and has received citations from the National Book Foundation, PEN America, and the Hemingway Society. She is the author of The Walking People, Fever, and Ask Again, Yes, which spent eight weeks on the New York Times Best Seller List. The Half Moon is her fourth novel. She lives outside New York City with her husband and sons.
Tina Kelley
Tina Kelley’s Rise Wildly came out in 2020 from CavanKerry Press, joining Abloom and Awry, Precise, and The Gospel of Galore, which won the Washington State Book Award. She co-authored Almost Home: Helping Kids Move from Homelessness to Hope, and shared in a Pulitzer covering 9/11 at The New York Times.
Helen Elaine Lee
Helen Elaine Lee grew up in Detroit, Michigan and she is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School. Her first novel, The Serpent's Gift, was published by Atheneum and her second novel, Water Marked, was published by Scribner. Helen was on the board of PEN New England for 10 years, served on its Freedom to Write Committee and volunteered with its Prison Creative Writing Program, which she helped to start. She is Professor of Comparative Media Studies/Writing at MIT. Photo © Mark Ostow
Joyce Maynard
Over her fifty-year career, New York Times bestselling author Joyce Maynard has published hundreds of essays as well as eighteen books, both fiction and non-fiction, including the memoir At Home in the World and the novels To Die For and Labor Day, both adapted for film. Her novel, Count the Ways, was recently awarded the Grand Prix Literaire in France. Every winter for over two decades, Maynard has led the Lake Atitlan Memoir workshop, Write by the Lake, in San Marcos la Laguna, Guatemala. Her writing retreats take place at her hotel, Casa Paloma, where she wrote and finished a memoir and four novels, including The Bird Hotel, her latest novel. Learn more at casapalomaretreat.com
Jennifer Maritza McCauley
Jennifer Maritza McCauley is a writer, poet, and university professor. She has been awarded fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, Kimbilio, CantoMundo and the Sundress Academy for the Arts. She holds an MFA from Florida International University and a PhD in creative writing and literature from the University of Missouri. The author of the cross-genre collection Scar On/Scar Off and the short story collection When Trying to Return Home, she is an assistant professor of literature and creative writing at the University of Houston-Clear Lake.
Eliza Minot
Eliza Minot (Mine-it) is the author of the critically acclaimed novels The Tiny One and The Brambles, published by Knopf/Vintage. Knopf published her third novel, In The Orchard on April 25, 2023. Her work has appeared in a variety of magazines, a couple of anthologies, and her books have been named to various lists, including The New York Times Notable, Booksense 76, Nancy Pearl's, and Oprah's Top Ten Summer Picks. She went to Barnard College (’91) and received her MFA from Rutgers-Newark, where she was a Presidential Fellow, in 2017. She has taught at Rutgers-Newark, Barnard College, and NYU. She is a recipient of a New Jersey State Artist Fellowship and was on the shortlist for the £20,000 Notting Hill Editions Essay Prize. In April 2023, she received the Maplewood Library Literary Award. She grew up the youngest of seven children in Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts. She lives in Maplewood, NJ, with her family. Photo © Eliza Minot
Cleyvis Natera
Cleyvis Natera is the author of the critically acclaimed debut novel Neruda on the Park. She studied literature and creative writing at Skidmore College and holds an MFA in Fiction from New York University. Her fiction, essays and criticisms have appeared in The New York Times Book Review, URSA Story, TIME, Alien Nation: 36 True Tales of Immigration, Gagosian Quarterly, The Brooklyn Rail, The Rumpus, The Washington Post, Memorious, The Kenyon Review, Aster(ix) and Kweli Journal, among other publications. Her writing has been supported through awards, fellowships and artist residencies by PEN America, Rowland Writers Retreat, Hermitage Artist Retreat, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Disquiet International Literary Program, Voices of our Nation Arts Foundation and Juniper Summer Writing Institute. She teaches Creative Writing in New York City at the undergraduate and graduate level. She lives with her husband and two young kids in Montclair, NJ. Photo © Beowulf Sheehan
José Olivarez
José Olivarez is the son of Mexican immigrants. He is the author of Promises Of Gold. His debut book of poems, Citizen Illegal, was a finalist for the PEN/Jean Stein Award and a winner of the 2018 Chicago Review of Books Poetry Prize. It was named a top book of 2018 by The Adroit Journal, NPR, and the New York Public Library. Along with Felicia Chavez and Willie Perdomo, he co-edited the poetry anthology, The BreakBeat Poets Vol. 4: LatiNEXT.
Tracy O'Neill
Tracy O'Neill is the author of two novels, The Hopeful (2015) and Quotients (2020.) She was named a National Book Foundation as a 5 Under 35 honoree and received the Center for Fiction Emerging Writers Fellowship. Her writing has appeared widely, including in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Rolling Stone, The New York Times, and Granta. She teaches at Vassar College.
Amy Poeppel
Amy Poeppel is the award-winning author of the novels The Sweet Spot, Musical Chairs, Limelight, and Small Admissions. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Rumpus, Literary Hub, and Working Mother. She and her husband have three sons and split their time between New York City, Germany, and Connecticut. She would love to hear from you on Twitter or Instagram: @AmyPoeppel or at AmyPoeppel.com. Photo © George Baier
Andrew Porter
Andrew Porter is the author of the story collection The Theory of Light and Matter and the novel In Between Days. A graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, he has received a Pushcart Prize, a James Michener/Copernicus Fellowship, and the Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction. His work has appeared in One Story, The Threepenny Review, and Ploughshares, and on public radio’s Selected Shorts. Currently, he teaches fiction writing and directs the creative writing program at Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas. Photo © Sarah E. Cooper
Alexis Romay
Alexis Romay is the author of the novels La apertura cubana and Salidas de emergencia, and the books of poetry Los culpables and Diversionismo ideológico. He has a weekly opinion column —in décimas— in the Cuban independent newspaper 14ymedio which is banned by the Cuban government... Quelle surprise! His writing has been published in anthologies, magazines, and newspapers in Argentina, Colombia, Spain, Italy, Mexico, Russia, and the United States. He is the translator of I Have a Dream, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s iconic speech. He has written lyrics for 14-time Grammy Award winner Paquito D’Rivera, and has translated over fifty picture books, as well as novels by Ana Veciana-Suarez, Margarita Engle, Miguel Correa Mujica, Meg Medina, Stuart Gibbs, Adrianna Cuevas, and Jason Reynolds. He has also translated essays and articles by Pulitzer Prize winners María Hinojosa and Julieta Martinelli, as well as Emmy Award winner Peniley Ramírez. He lives in New Jersey with his family.
Frank Rubino
Frank Rubino is one of the Gang of Six, who organize the Red Wheelbarrow Poets monthly reading series at Felician College in Rutherford, NJ. He co-hosts a zoom poetry workshop every Tuesday evening. His poetry and art have appeared in The Red Wheelbarrow, Thimble, Caliban, The Esthetic Apostle, Chaleur, DMQReview, and other journals. He works as a cloud architect and lives in Montclair, NJ. Photo © Bill Shaw
Matthew Salesses
Matthew Salesses is the author of The Sense of Wonder, national bestseller Craft in the Real World, the 2021 finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction Disappear Doppelgänger Disappear, and two other novels. Adopted from Korea, he has written about adoption, race, and Asian American masculinity in The Best American Essays 2020, NPR’s Code Switch, the New York Times blog Motherlode, and The Guardian, among other media outlets. BuzzFeed has named him one of 32 Essential Asian American Writers. He lives in New York City, where he is an Assistant Professor of Writing at Columbia University. Photo © Grace Salesses
Clare Sestanovich
Clare Sestanovich is the author of Objects of Desire, published by Knopf, which was a finalist for the PEN Robert W. Bingham Prize. She was named a "5 Under 35" honoree by the National Book Foundation in 2022. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, Harper's, The Drift, and elsewhere. She lives in Brooklyn and is finishing a novel. Photo © Edward Friedman
Jade Song
Jade Song (she/they) is a writer, art director, and artist. Her debut novel Chlorine is forthcoming in 2023 from William Morrow. Her writing has been nominated for numerous "best of" year anthologies and has appeared in Electric Literature, Hobart, Kweli Journal, Waxwing, and elsewhere. Their art direction work has been awarded by and featured in The Shortys, Campaign US, The Smarties, SXSW, Advertising Week, Bustle, and AdAge, among others. She resides in Brooklyn and considers Pittsburgh and Beijing home too. They enjoy cooking tofu, supporting their friends, looking at paintings, and slowly translating Chinese literature.
Laura Spence-Ash
Laura Spence-Ash’s fiction has appeared in One Story, New England Review, Crazyhorse, and elsewhere. Her critical essays and book reviews appear regularly in the Ploughshares blog. She received her MFA in fiction from Rutgers–Newark, and she lives in New Jersey. This is her first book. Photo © Beowulf Sheehan
Megan Tady
Megan Tady is a writer and editor who runs the company Word-Lift. When she’s not scrutinizing copy, she can be found stocking her free neighborhood library, challenging anyone to a dance-off, or stewing over how Portlandia stole all of her jokes. She's hard at work on her next novel, Champions for Breakfast , which will also be published by Zibby Books. She’s a corn-fed Nebraska gal who now lives in a quaint New England town with her husband and two kids.
Matthew Thomas
Matthew Thomas’s New York Times bestselling novel We Are Not Ourselves was shortlisted for the James Tait Black Prize, the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize, and the John Gardner Fiction Book Award; longlisted for the International Dublin Literary Award, the Guardian First Book Award, and the Folio Prize; named a Notable Book of the Year by the New York Times; and named one of the best books of the year by the Washington Post, Esquire, Entertainment Weekly, and a number of other publications. It has been translated into a dozen languages. Photo © Yves Samuel
John J. Trause
John J. Trause, the Director of Oradell Public Library, is the author of six books of poetry, Why Sing?; Picture This: For Your Eyes and Ears; Exercises in High Treason; Eye Candy for Andy; Inside Out, Upside Down, and Round and Round; Seriously Serial; and Latter-Day Litany, the latter staged Off Broadway. His translations, poetry, and visual work appear internationally in many journals and anthologies, including Rabbit Ears: TV Poems. Marymark Press has published his visual poetry and art as broadsides and sheets. He is a founder of the William Carlos Williams Poetry Cooperative (Red Wheelbarrow) in Rutherford, N. J., and the former host and curator of its monthly reading series.
Alejandro Varela
Alejandro Varela (he/him) is based in New York. His work has appeared in The Point Magazine, Boston Review, Harper’s Magazine, The Rumpus, and The New Republic, among many other publications. He is a 2019 Jerome Fellow in Literature and is an editor-at-large of Apogee Journal. His graduate studies were in public health. His debut novel, The Town of Babylon (2022), was published by Astra House and was a finalist for the 73rd National Book Awards. Access his work at alejandrovarela.work and find him on Twitter and IG: @drovarela.
Tyriek White
Tyriek Rashawn White is a writer, musician, and educator from Brooklyn, where he served at-risk and marginalized youth, artists, and scholars in the classroom. He is currently the media director of Lampblack Lit, a literary foundation which seeks to provide mutual aid and various resources to Black writers across the diaspora. He has received fellowships from Callaloo Writing Workshop and the New York State Writer's Institute, among other honors. He holds a degree in Creative Writing and Africana Studies from Pitzer College, and most recently earned an MFA from the University of Mississippi. Photo © Zoraya Lau
Alice Winn
Alice Winn grew up in Paris and was educated in the UK. She has a degree in English literature from Oxford University. She lives in Brooklyn. Photo © Jamie Ting
George Witte
George Witte has published three books of poems, The Apparitioners, Deniability, and Does She Have a Name?, as well as a chapbook of poems, The Secret Alphabet. His fourth book of poems, An Abundance of Caution, will be published by Unbound Edition Press in April 2023. His work has appeared widely in journals and is anthologized in several collections, including The Best American Poetry. A native of Madison, New Jersey, he lives with his family in Ridgewood. www.facebook.com/george.witte.12 www.instagram.com/georgewittepoet/
Sharon Dennis Wyeth
Sharon Dennis Wyeth is the author of Black Eye, a chapbook published by Finishing Line Press. She is also an award-winning children's author. Her many titles for younger readers include Juneteenth Our Day of Freedom (also an Author Audiobook), commended by School Library Journal, and the American Girl Book Evette: The River and Me, recipient of the 2021 Good Housekeeping Best Toy Award and subject of a recent articles in The Washington Post, Smithsonian Magazine and segments on CNN, NBC and Fox 5. This year, Ms. Wyeth's classic picture book Something Beautiful, a Parents Magazine Best Book of the Year, celebrates its twenty-fifth year in print. Another picture book, Always My Dad, is a Reading Rainbow Book and subject of a television episode. The author's memoir piece I'm a Dancer is featured in the 2020 award-winning anthology The Talk, Conversations about Race, Love & Truth. Ms. Wyeth is the recipient of the Stephen Crane Literary Award, an NAACP Education Award, a Mid-Atlantic Arts Award and a Cave Canem Fellowship for African American poets. Additional book honors include citations from the Children's Book Council, LAMDA Literary Awards and the New York Public Library. Ms. Wyeth is a cum laude graduate of Harvard University, with an MFA in Creative Writing/Memoir from Hunter College, where she received the prestigious Shuster Award. She is a visiting Associate Professor of Creative Writing in the Children’s Literature Department at Hollins University. www.sharondenniswyeth.com
Non-Fiction
Neil Baldwin
A native New Yorker, Neil Baldwin received a PhD in Modern American Poetry from SUNY/Buffalo. He is the critically-acclaimed author of biographies of William Carlos Williams, Man Ray, Thomas Edison, and Henry Ford; as well as Legends of the Plumed Serpent: Biography of a Mexican God, and The American Revelation. He served as manager of The Annual Fund at The New York Public Library; and was founding executive director of The National Book Foundation, sponsor of the National Book Awards. In 1986, Baldwin moved from Brooklyn Heights to Montclair with his wife, the realtor Roberta Plutzik Baldwin, and their children, Nicholas and Allegra; and, in 1999, to Glen Ridge. As the Distinguished Visiting Professor of History in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences, and Professor of Theatre & Dance in the College of the Arts at Montclair State University, Baldwin created and taught BA and BFA undergraduate and MFA and MA graduate writing seminars in Great Books & Ideas, Cultural History, Dramaturgy and Danceaturgy; and was the founding director of The [virtual] Creative Research Center. Neil Baldwin is Emeritus Professor at MSU and Critic-in-Residence at The Blended Campus. He is represented by William Morris Endeavor Agency. Martha Graham - When Dance Became Modern was published by Alfred A. Knopf in October, 2022. Neil Baldwin Books
Lisa Belkin
Lisa Belkin has spent a career covering American social issues, as a daily journalist, a magazine writer and a book author. During nearly 30 years at The New York Times, she was variously a Texas-based national correspondent, a medical reporter, a contributing writer for The New York Times Magazine, and the creator of the Life’s Work column and the Motherlode blog. She then spent a decade in the digital realm, in senior positions at HuffPost and Yahoo News. Belkin is the author of half a dozen books, including Life’s Work, Confessions of an Unbalanced Mom; First, Do No Harm; and Show Me A Hero, which was made into an HBO miniseries of the same name. Genealogy of a Murder: Four generations,Three families, One Fateful Night, will be released by W.W. Norton in June of 2023. lisabelkin.com
Jake Bittle
Jake Bittle is a staff writer for Grist, where he covers climate change. His work has appeared in The New York Times, The Guardian, Harper’s Magazine, and a number of other publications. Photo © Jasmine Clarke
Katherine Dykstra
Katherine Dykstra is the author of What Happened to Paula, which was a New York Times Best Book of Summer, a People magazine Best Summer Read, and one of CrimeReads Top Ten True Crime Books of 2021. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, Poets and Writers, Real Simple, and Guernica among others. She is at work on a novel that takes place in a maternity home in the 1960s. katherinedykstra.com Photo © Averie Cole
Andrea Elliott
Andrea Elliott is an investigative reporter for The New York Times and the recipient of a Pulitzer Prize, a George Polk award, an Overseas Press Club award and other honors. In 2015, she was awarded Columbia University's Medal for Excellence, given to one alumnus under the age of 45. She is the author of Invisible Child, chosen by The New York Times as one of the top 10 books of 2021. Photo © Nina Subin
Dionne Ford
Dionne Ford is an NEA creative writing fellow and the co-editor of the anthology Slavery's Descendants: Shared Legacies of Race and Reconciliation (Rutgers University Press). Her work has appeared in the New York Times, Virginia Quarterly Review, Literary Hub, New Jersey Monthly, Ebony and other publications and won awards from the National Association of Black Journalists and the Newswomen's Club of New York. She holds an MFA from New York University and a BA from Fordham University where she teaches creative writing. She lives in New Jersey with her husband and daughters.
Meryl Frank
Ambassador Meryl Frank (ret), former mayor of Highland Park, NJ, was an instrumental player in the development and passage of the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA). She has served in the leadership of many national and international organization’s governing boards, including as the President of American Jewish Congress - Women’s Division, Jewish Women International (JWI) and Sisterhood of Salaam Shalom (SOSS) and Warmheart Worldwide and The Connecting Group International. She was appointed by President Biden to the US Holocaust Memorial Council in May 2022. She also sits on the Board of YIVO, The Institute for Jewish Research.
Michael Frank
Michael Frank is the author of What Is Missing, a novel, and The Mighty Franks, a memoir, which was awarded the 2018 JQ Wingate Prize and was named one of the best books of the year by The Telegraph and The New Statesman. One Hundred Saturdays received a Natan Notable Book Award, two National Book Awards from the Jewish Book Council, and the Sophie Brody Award for outstanding achievement in Jewish literature. It was also named one of the best books of 2022 by the Wall Street Journal. A 2020 Guggenheim Fellow, Frank lives in New York City and Camogli, Italy. Photo © Marta Barisione
Gabrielle Glaser
Gabrielle Glaser is an investigative journalist and New York Times bestselling author, most recently of American Baby: A Mother, a Child, and the Shadow History of Adoption (Viking, 2021), which examines postwar adoption in the US through the eyes of one teenager and the son she was forced to relinquish. She lays bare how a predatory adoption industry coerced more than three million young mothers into surrendering their babies into a secretive system, and unearths the attitudes towards sex, marriage, gender and race that underlay this chapter of a not-so-distant American past. Her work on the intersection of health, medicine, and culture have appeared in The Atlantic, The New York Times Magazine, and The Washington Post, among many other publications. She teaches journalism at the University of Southern California.
Carly Goodman
Carly Goodman is a historian and senior editor at Made by History at the Washington Post, and the author of Dreamland: America’s Immigration Lottery in an Age of Restriction (University of North Carolina Press, May 2023).
Margo Jefferson
The winner of a Pulitzer Prize for criticism, Margo Jefferson previously served as book and arts critic for Newsweek and the New York Times. Her latest book Constructing A Nervous System is currently a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, was shortlisted for the 2023 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction, and was a Best Book Of The Year at The New York Times, the Washington Post, TIME Magazine, Oprah Daily, Vulture, The New Yorker, and Publishers Weekly. Her writing has appeared in, among other publications, Vogue, New York Magazine, The Nation, and Guernica. Her memoir, Negroland, received the National Book Critics Circle Award for Autobiography. She is also the author of On Michael Jackson and is a professor of writing at Columbia University School of the Arts. Photo © Claire Holt
Rabbi Marc Katz
Rabbi Marc Katz is the rabbi at Temple Ner Tamid in Bloomfield NJ, serving there since 2018. Originally from Barrington RI, Rabbi Katz received a B.A. from Tufts University in 2006. Before entering rabbinical school, Rabbi Katz worked as a Legislative Assistant for the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism lobbying for environmental protection and health care reform on behalf of the Reform movement. Rabbi Katz graduated from Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion in 2012 and began work as assistant rabbi at Congregation Beth Elohim in Park Slope, Brooklyn. Rabbi Katz is the author of the book, The Heart of Loneliness: How Jewish Wisdom Can Help You Cope and Find Comfort (Jewish Lights), which was a finalist for the National Jewish Book Award. When not at Temple Ner Tamid, Rabbi Katz is an adjunct professor of Talmud at Hebrew Union College as well as a fiction judge for the National Jewish Book Awards. Rabbi Katz and his wife Ayelet live in Montclair. He can often be found running or on a bike and is always excited to talk about what you are reading.
Mary Louise Kelly
Mary Louise Kelly is a mother, a daughter, a wife, a journalist and a novelist. The order of these titles—the order by which she defines herself—might shift, depending on which moment you catch her. But since 2003, when her first child was born, “Mom” has been the name she is proudest to answer to. When not driving soccer carpool, Mary Louise co-hosts 'All Things Considered', NPR’s flagship evening newsmagazine. Previously, she spent a decade as national security correspondent for NPR News, and she’s kept that focus in her role as anchor. That’s meant taking All Things Considered to Russia, North Korea, Iran, Ukraine and beyond. Mary Louise is the author of two suspense novels, Anonymous Sources and The Bullet. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Politico, Newsweek, and other publications. A Georgia native, her first job was working as a staff writer at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Her books have been translated into more than a dozen languages. She is a recipient of the Leonard Zeidenberg First Amendment Award from the Radio Television Digital News Foundation, a Gracie Award from the Alliance for Women in Media Foundation and the Award for Outstanding Broadcast Journalist from the Washington Women in Journalism Awards. She led the NPR team that was named Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2021, for on-the-ground reporting from Iran. She lives in Washington, DC with her husband and their two sons.
Brooke Kroeger
Brooke Kroeger was UN correspondent for Newsday, deputy metropolitan editor at New York Newsday, and for more than a decade a correspondent, editor, and bureau chief for UPI both at home and abroad. She is a professor emerita of journalism at New York University, where she taught from 1998 to 2021, and serves on the editorial board of American Journalism: A Journal of Media History. She is the author of five books. Photo © Jenn Heffner/27eastcreative
Andy Kroll
Andy Kroll, author of A Death on W Street: The Murder of Seth Rich and the Age of Conspiracy, is an investigative reporter for ProPublica, a news organization that exposes abuses of power and publishes journalism in the public interest. Previously, he was the Washington bureau chief for Rolling Stone. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, The California Sunday Magazine, The New York Magazine, and The Atlantic. He has devoted his career to writing about the nexus of politics, money, power, and democracy. His reporting has sparked congressional investigations and been cited in national and international news outlets, academic papers, and U.S. Supreme Court briefs. andy-kroll.com
Aiden Levy
Aidan Levy is the author of Saxophone Colossus: The Life and Music of Sonny Rollins, Dirty Blvd.: The Life and Music of Lou Reed, and editor of Patti Smith on Patti Smith: Interviews and Encounters. A former Leon Levy Center for Biography Fellow, his writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Village Voice, JazzTimes, and The Nation. Photo © Jahsie Ault
Benilde Little
Benilde Little is the bestselling author of the novels Good Hair, The Itch, Acting Out, Who Does She Think She Is? and the memoir Welcome to My Breakdown. Her writing has appeared in the New York Times and numerous anthologies, including The Meaning of Michelle, About Face and Blue Light Corner. She was nominated for an NAACP Image Award and the Hurston Wright Legacy award. A former reporter for The Cleveland Plain Dealer, The Star Ledger, People magazine and a senior editor at Essence, Little has been featured in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Essence, Jet, People Magazine, Heart and Soul, More magazine, among others. She has also been featured in numerous media outlets, including NPR and The Today Show. Her work has been taught at Smith College and her alma mater, Howard University. The prestigious national book club, the Go On Girls, selected Good Hair as the best novel of the year. Natalie Cole bought the film rights. She has been a creative writing professor at Ramapo College and The City College of New York.
D.T. Max
D.T. Max is a staff writer at The New Yorker. His book, Every Love Story Is A Ghost Story: A Life of David Foster Wallace was a New York Times bestseller. He is also the author of The Family That Couldn't Sleep: A Medical Mystery. He lives in New Jersey.
Deborah D.E.E.P. Mouton
Deborah D.E.E.P. Mouton is an internationally-known writer, director, performer, critic and the first Black Poet Laureate of Houston, Texas. She is the author of the 2019 poetry collection Newsworthy, which was a finalist for the The Writer's League of Texas Book Award and Honorable Mention in the Summerlee Book Prize. Her poems have garnered her a Pushcart nomination and have been translated into multiple languages. She has been a contributing writer for Glamour, Texas Monthly, Muzzle, and ESPN's Andscape. Her work ranges from writing stage plays and librettos for operas such as Marian's Song to storytelling through film. She currently resides in Houston, Texas. Photo © Pin Lim
Regan Penaluna
Regan Penaluna is a writer and journalist based in Brooklyn. Previously, she was an editor at Nautilus Magazine and Guernica, where she wrote and edited long-form stories and interviews. A feature she wrote was listed in the Atlanticas one of “100 Exceptional Works of Journalism.” Penaluna holds a master’s degree in journalism and a PhD in philosophy. Photo © Rachel Papo
Deb Perelman
Deb Perelman is a self-taught home cook and photographer and the creator of the award-winning blog SmittenKitchen.com. She lives in New York City with her husband and their children. Photo © Christine Han
Joe Pompeo
Joe Pompeo is a senior correspondent at Vanity Fair who previously worked at publications including Politico and The New York Observer. He has also written for The New York Times, The New Yorker, New York, Bloomberg Businessweek, Columbia Journalism Review, and many other outlets. His first book, Blood & Ink: The Scandalous Jazz Age Double Muder that Hooked America on True Crime, was a New York Times Book Review editor's pick and Best True Crime of 2022. joepompeo.net/ Photo © New Moon Photography
Amelia Possanza
A full-time book publicist and part-time writer, Amelia Possanza currently lives in Brooklyn with her cat. Her work has appeared in The Washington Post, BuzzFeed, Electric Literature, The Millions, and NPR’s Invisibilia. Her first book, Lesbian Love Story, is due out from Catapult on May 30, 2023. Photo © Becca Farsace
Alissa Quart
Alissa Quart is the author of five acclaimed books of nonfiction, Bootstrapped: Liberating Ourselves from the American Dream, Squeezed, Republic of Outsiders, Hothouse Kids, and Branded. She is the Executive Director of the non-profit the Economic Hardship Reporting Project. She is also the author of two books of poetry Thoughts and Prayers and Monetized. She has written for many publications including The Washington Post, The New York Times, and TIME. Her honors include an Emmy, an SPJ award and a Nieman fellowship. She lives with her family in Brooklyn. Alissaquart.com Photo © Charlie Gross
Chita Rivera
A theatrical icon and one of Broadway's greatest triple-threat talents, Chita Rivera is one of the most nominated performers in Tony Award history having earned 10 nominations, won twice and received the 2018 Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre. Her most recent Broadway starring roles include The Visit, the revival of The Mystery of Edwin Drood; The Dancer’s Life, and the revival of Nine. She trained as a ballerina (from age nine) before receiving a scholarship to the School of American Ballet from the legendary choreographer George Balanchine. Her electric performance as Anita in the original Broadway premiere of West Side Story brought her international stardom. Her career is highlighted by starring roles in Bye Bye Birdie, The Rink (Tony Award), Chicago, Jerry’s Girls, Kiss of the Spider Woman (Tony Award), and the original Broadway casts of Guys and Dolls, Can-Can, Seventh Heaven, Mr. Wonderful. Chita was awarded The Presidential Medal of Freedom and the coveted Kennedy Center Honor; performed her solo concert at London’s Cadogan Hall and Carnegie Hall. Her most treasured production is her daughter, singer/dancer/choreographer Lisa Mordente. Photo © Laura Marie Duncan
Eliza Reid
Eliza Reid is a journalist, editor, and cofounder of the annual Iceland Writers Retreat. Eliza grew up on a farm near Ottawa, Canada, and moved to Iceland in 2003, five years after winning a student raffle for a date with the man who became her husband, Gudni Jóhannesson. When he took office as president of Iceland on August 1, 2016, Eliza became the country’s First Lady. In that capacity, she has been active in promoting gender equality, entrepreneurship and innovation, tourism and sustainability, and the country’s writers and rich literary heritage. Being the spouse of the head of state is an immense privilege, full of surreal and wonderful experiences. Eliza has been candid about the role, which is an unofficial position with no job description, penning a lauded op-ed in the New York Times and delivering a TEDx Talk on the topic. Her first book, Secrets of the Sprakkar, was an instant bestseller in Iceland and Canada, a New York Times Book Review Editors' Pick, and is forthcoming or available in numerous languages. Photo © Tara Flynn
Mark Rotella
Mark Rotella is the director of the Coccia Institute for the Italian Experience at Montclair State University, where he is also a professor of creative writing. He is a former senior editor at Publishers Weekly, where he covered cookbooks and books on food and drink. He has written two books, both published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux: Stolen Figs: And Other Adventures in Calabria and Amore: The Story of Italian American Song.
Jeff Sharlet
Jeff Sharlet is a contributing editor for Vanity Fair and best-selling author or editor of seven books, including The Family, adapted into a Netflix documentary series. He is the winner of the National Magazine Award for Reporting, the Molly Ivins Prize, and the Outspoken Award, among other honors. He is the Frederick Sessions Beebe ’35 Professor in the Art of Writing at Dartmouth College and lives in Vermont. Photo © Jeff Goodlin
Jake Silverstein
Jake Silverstein is the editor-in-chief of the New York Times Magazine. During his tenure, the magazine has won fourteen National Magazine Awards and four Pulitzer Prizes. With his editorial oversight and vision, the magazine published the 1619 Project as a special issue, newspaper section, podcast, documentary series, and now, a best-selling book. Previously, Jake was the editor of Texas Monthly from 2008 to 2014, during which it was nominated for fifteen National Magazine Awards and won four. A former contributing editor to Harper’s Magazine, Silverstein is the author of Nothing Happened and Then It Did: A Chronicle in Fact and Fiction.
Amanda Vaill
Amanda Vaill is a best-selling and award-winning biographer, journalist, and screenwriter. Among other subjects, she has covered the 1920’s Lost Generation (Everybody Was So Young), the midcentury American dance and theater world (Somewhere, Jerome Robbins: By Himself, and the documentary Jerome Robbins: Something to Dance About), and the adventures of journalists caught up in the Spanish Civil War (Hotel Florida). A past fellow of the Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, NYU’s Center for Ballet and the Arts, and the Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library, she is currently writing a dual biography of Hamilton’s Schuyler sisters, entitled Pride and Pleasure.
Warren Zanes
Warren Zanes is a Montclair-based author, musician, and NYU professor. His NYT bestselling biography of Tom Petty was a Rolling Stone top 10 book. A former member of The Del Fuegos, Warren has released four solo recordings and is currently a member of poet Paul Muldoon’s Rogue Oliphant. He is a Grammy-nominated producer of the PBS Soundbreaking series and a consulting producer of the Oscar-winning Twenty Feet from Stardom. At one time a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame vice president, Warren has written for the Los Angeles Times, Oxford American , and more, is the editor of collections on Jimmie Rodgers and Tom Petty, has written books including Dusty in Memphis and Revolutions in Sound: Fifty Years of Warner Bros. Records. His latest book, Deliver Me from Nowhere: The Making of Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska, is coming out on May 2, 2023 and has been described by writer Nick Flynn as “one of the greatest books about the creative process ever written.” Photo © Piero Zanes
Kate Zernike
Kate Zernike has been a reporter for The New York Times since 2000. She was a member of the team that won the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Reporting for stories about al-Qaeda before and after the 9/11 terror attacks. She was previously a reporter for The Boston Globe, where she broke the story of MIT’s admission that it had discriminated against women on its faculty, on which The Exceptions is based. The daughter and granddaughter of scientists, she is a graduate of Trinity College at the University of Toronto and the Graduate School of Journalism at Columbia University. She lives in New Jersey with her husband and sons. Photo © Harry Zernike
Children's
Alliah L. Agostini
Alliah L. Agostini is the author of The Juneteenth Story: Celebrating the End of Slavery in the United States, the upcoming Oprah Winfrey: A Little Golden Book Biography, and Junior Library Guild Selection BIG TUNE: Rise of the Dancehall Prince. A Buffalo, NY native, Alliah writes to share joy and truth with children and their families. She resides in Montclair with her husband and two children.
Kwame Alexander
Kwame Alexander is a poet, educator, publisher, and New York Times Bestselling author of many books, including Swing; Becoming Muhammad Ali, co-authored with James Patterson; Rebound, which was shortlisted for prestigious UK Carnegie Medal; the Caldecott Medal and Newbery Honor-winning picture book, The Undefeated, illustrated by Kadir Nelson; and his Newbery medal-winning middle grade novel, The Crossover. A regular contributor to NPR's Morning Edition, Kwame is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award, the Coretta Scott King Author Honor, three NAACP Image Award Nominations, and the 2017 Inaugural Pat Conroy Legacy Award. Photo © Portia Wiggins Photography
Mike Allegra
Mike Allegra is the author of 17 books for children including the picture books Pirate and Penguin (Page Street, 2023), Sleepy Happy Capy Cuddles (Page Street, 2022), Scampers Thinks like a Scientist (Dawn, 2019), Everybody’s Favorite Book (Macmillan, 2018), and Sarah Gives Thanks (Albert Whitman and Company, 2012). He also wrote the chapter book series Kimmie Tuttle (Abdo Books, 2021) and Prince Not-So Charming (Macmillan, 2018-19; pen name: Roy L. Hinuss). Scampers was the winner of Learning Magazine’s 2020 Teacher’s Choice Award and was selected for inclusion in the Literati Kids subscription box. His story, “Harold’s Hat,” was the winner of the 2014 Highlights fiction contest and was published in the July 2015 issue. Mike’s essays have appeared in The Boston Globe Sunday Magazine and various anthologies. He has also received an Independent Artist Fellowship for playwriting from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts. He lives in Scotch Plains with his wife, Ellen; son, Alex; and a pair of neurotic gerbils, Dusty and Oreo. He also juggles, watches silent films, and plays the banjo—yet still can’t understand why he isn’t invited to more parties.
Mary Amato
Mary Amato is the award-winning author of over 25 books for children. Her books have been translated into foreign languages, optioned for television, produced onstage, and have won the children’s choice awards in Ohio, Minnesota, Utah, and Arizona. She teaches popular workshops on writing, art, music, and the creative process around the country. Locally, she teaches at the Montclair Art Museum and at In Tune Maplewood. www.maryamato.com.
Tracey Baptiste
Tracey Baptiste is a New York Times bestselling author of seventeen books and several short stories for children. She is best known for The Jumbies series which have been Junior Library Guild selections, We Need Diverse Books "Must Read" titles, New York Public Libraries Staff Picks, and Best Books of the year by Bank Street Books and NPR. Her novel Minecraft: The Crash debuted at #5 on the New York Times bestseller list in 2018. Photo ©Viscose Illusion
Soman Chainani
Soman Chainani is the New York Times bestselling author of the School for Good and Evil series. The fairy-tale saga has sold over 3 million copies, been translated into 31 languages and has been adapted into a major motion picture by Netflix, with Soman as executive producer. His most recent book, Beasts and Beauty: Dangerous Tales, was also an instant New York Times bestseller, and is in development to be a television series from Sony 3000. Soman is a graduate of Harvard University and received his MFA in film from Columbia University. Every year, he visits schools around the world to speak to kids and share his secret: that reading is the path to a better life. You can visit Soman at www.somanchainani.com. Photo © Chad Wagner and Steven Trumon Gray
Sabina Wasonga-Gitau
Storyteller Sabina Wasonga-Gitau, born and raised in East Africa, and now a resident of Montclair, New Jersey, will be sharing stories inspired from her childhood years growing up both in Kenya and Uganda. Recently, Sabina was a storyteller at the first International Cultural Diversity Fair in Secaucus, NJ. She is a recipient of the New Jersey Council on the Arts Folk Arts Grant. Sabina tells stories that teach morals, share the beauty of culture and unity. Her stories are interwoven with songs and chants in the Swahili language and she encourages her audience to join her.
Other Speakers
Carol Crittenden
Carol Crittenden's love of music expresses itself through her songwriting and live performances. She has performed and recorded lead vocals and harmonies with a variety of bands/projects in addition to her own original songs. Her sweet lilting vocals and folk-inspired melodic sensibilities infuse her music. Her songs may be found on Spotify and most streaming services.
Dagmara Dominczyk
Dagmara Dominczyk was born in Poland. Her family emigrated to the United States as political refugees in 1983. A graduate from Carnegie Mellon University’s prestigious School of Drama, Dag has starred in films, television, and on/off Broadway plays for the past twenty years, including The Count of Monte Cristo, The Lost Daughter, Succession (HBO), We Own This City (HBO) and Hello, Tomorrow! (Apple TV). In 2013, her debut novel, The Lullaby of Polish Girls (Random House) was described by The New York Times as “a coming of age tale…brimming with teary epiphanies, betrayal, and love.” Dominczyk’s essays have appeared in Huffington Post, and most recently in the book Pretty Bitches. She is currently working on her finishing her second novel. Dag lives in Montclair with her husband and two sons.
Skip Dye
Skip Dye, SVP, Library Marketing and Digital Sales, Sales Operations, Penguin Random House, LLC, serves as Chairperson for United for Libraries Intellectual Freedom, Advocacy, & Public Policy Committee and is actively engaged with the Office of Intellectual Freedom and the Freedom to Read Foundation. Skip is the co-founder of the Penguin Random House Literacy Award for Teachers and co-founder of Penguin Random House Innovation Awards for Libraries. Skip is a Board Member of United for Libraries, a division of the American Library Association where he also served as Past-President. Skip has spoken at a number of conferences and organizations on the topic advocacy training and intellectual freedom issues. He recently attended ALA’s Fly-In event in DC to advocate for better library funding and to raise awareness to book challenges and book bans on the Hill. “Free People Read Freely.”
Rachel Quinn Egan
Rachael Quinn Egan is a grassroots activist, and writer on topics ranging from humor to culture, race and adoption. She has been published by (and performed at SOPAC for) Listen to Your Mother. Her essays and opinion writing has been published in outlets including The Star Ledger, The Huffington Post and The Good Men Project. A native of Ireland, she lives in Montclair with her husband and three children.
Naomi Extra
Naomi Extra is a poet, writer, scholar, and cartoonist. In both her creative and scholarly work, she explores the themes of agency and pleasure in the lives of black women and girls. You can find her work in places like the Boston Review, Zora, The New Yorker, The Lily, and elsewhere. Currently, she teaches jazz poetry at Rutgers University, Newark.
Nicole Gray
Nicole Gray is a top content-marketing writer in the NYC area. Her bylined work has been published in numerous pharmaceutical trade publications, Scientific American, New Jersey Monthly, and various pubs devoted to pregnancy, health, and fitness. She has written about the biopsychosocial benefits of coffee on her blog for 15 years, and references coffee extensively in her essay, “In the 90’s”, published in the “Gen X Anthology.” When not writing, Nicole focuses on social justice work, hiking, and spending time with family and friends. She has lived in Montclair with her husband and two daughters for 17 years. You can find and follow Nicole on Medium.
Jazmine Hughes
Jazmine Hughes is a story editor for the New York Times Magazine. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, the New Yorker, New York Magazine and the New Republic, among others. She was named to Forbes Magazine's 30 under 30 in 2017.
William Johnson
William Johnson is the Director of PEN Across America at PEN America. A longtime steward in the writing community, Johnson was the editor and publisher of Mary Literary, a literary magazine committed to showcasing work of artistic integrity. He also co-produced Nepantla: A Journal Dedicated to Queer Poets of Color, the first major anthology for queer poets of color in the United States. In 2011, Johnson began his tenure at Lambda Literary, an organization dedicated to promoting LGBTQ literature. As the deputy director of Lambda Literary, Johnson oversaw many of the organization’s most dynamic programs and public events, including the Writer’s Retreat for Emerging LGBTQ Voices and Lambda’s web magazine, the Lambda Literary Review. In 2021, Johnson was awarded The Publishing Triangle’s Leadership Award, an award recognizing contributions to LGBTQ literature by those who are not primarily writers, such as editors, agents, librarians, and institutions.
Peter Kingstone
Dr. Peter Kingstone is Dean of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at Montclair State University. He is the former Professor of Politics and Development at King’s College London, where he co-founded and then chaired the Department of International Development, and a professor in the Political Science Department at the University of Connecticut. Peter is the author of several books on Latin America, including Crafting Coalitions for Reform: Business Preferences, Political Institutions and Neoliberal Reform in Brazil, The Political Economy of Latin America: Reflections on Neoliberalism and Development After the Commodity Boom as well as co-editor of Democratic Brazil: Actors, Institutions and Processes, Democratic Brazil Revisited, Democratic Brazil Divided and the Handbook of Latin American Politics. He has published various articles and book chapters on the subject of democratization and the politics of neoliberal economic reforms.
Merrie Koehlert
Merrie Koehlert has been painting and making art for 37 years. After earning a BFA in painting from the University of Michigan, Merrie moved to New York City where she took classes at the NY Academy of Figurative Art, The Art Students League, and the School of Visual Arts. During this time she sold work through her business, “Artwork For Public Spaces”, making commissioned pieces for restaurants, nightclubs, and neighborhood billboards in Manhattan. Merrie became an art educator and taught at Winston Prep School for 22 years, both in New York City and in Whippany, NJ. She has an ongoing series of female heroes that feature large-scale oil portraits of legendary women artists. Most recently, in 2021 Merrie had a solo show titled “Heartworn Places” at Montclair State University’s LAB studio, which featured oil paintings of domestic objects and explored their unexpected beauty in our lives. She coordinates, prepares and contributes to shows atb Studio Montclair. She is a full time painter. Her work is currently being shown at The Gallery at The Paper Mill Playhouse.
Rachel Martens
Rachel Martens is a writer, voice-over artist, violinist, and computer geek. She is a veteran of the Montclair Story Salon, and a co-creator and co-host of a new podcast called ‘Lost in Jersey’. She was lost for a bit, but has found New Jersey to be pretty great! Rachel loves interviewing locals, business owners, and friends in order to share their stories with the world. When she pays attention she finds life is oftentimes hilarious.
Leslie-Ann Murray
Leslie-Ann Murray is a fiction writer from Trinidad & Tobago. She created Brown Girl Book Lover, a social media platform where she interviews diverse writers and reviews books that should be at the forefront of our imagination. She also produces a monthly newsletter, Come Get Your Diversity. Leslie-Ann is currently working on her first novel, This Has Made Us Beautiful. Leslie-Ann has been published in Poets & Writers, Zone 3, Ploughshares, Brittle Paper, Obsidian Literary Magazine, and Salamander Literary Magazine. Leslie-Ann has taught creative writing in France, Trinidad and Tobago, South Africa, China, and New York City. She’s currently the Director of Education Programs at Bard Prison Initiative.
Richard Ridge
Richard Ridge is the lead correspondent for Broadway World, one of the most popular theatre websites receiving over 8 million visitors every month. For Broadway World, he is the host of “Backstage with Richard Ridge” which has long been the most popular outlet for Broadway stars and legends to talk about their careers. His guests have included Chita Rivera, Lin Manuel Miranda, Josh Groban, Cherry Jones, Julie Taymor, Laura Benanti, Brian Cox, Zachary Quinto, Judith Light, Joan Rivers, Elaine Paige, Kristen Chenoweth, Nick Jonas, Jessie Mueller and Hugh Dancy. Prior to that, he was the host of the groundbreaking “Broadway Beat” for 20 years. His latest venture is the filmed SAG/AFTRA Foundation/ BroadwayWorld “Conversations Q & A series”, which recognizes and celebrates the vibrant theatre community in New York City. These in-depth interviews are filmed for the Foundation’s educational archives and Broadway World. Past participants have included Ian McKellen, Patrick Stewart, Matt Bomer, Bobby Cannavale, Harold Prince, Stockard Channing, Nathan Lane, Darren Criss, Sara Bareilles, Tony Goldwyn, Cheyenne Jackson, Kelli O’Hara, David Tennent, Vanessa Redgrave, Liev Schreiber, Jeff Daniels, David Hyde Pierce, Jim Parsons, Gena Rowlands, Michael Urie, Jason Alexander and Juliette Binoche. Richard made his Broadway debut in 2019 in the groundbreaking musical “The Prom”.
Eric Roston
Eric Roston is a journalist who has covered climate change — from science to economics to human behavior — for more than 20 years, half that span at Bloomberg News. He is the author of The Carbon Age (Bloomsbury USA, 2009), a tour of more than a dozen scientific disciplines relevant to readers trying understanding the warming world. He is a former TIME magazine Washington correspondent and New York-based business reporter. Roston has lived in Montclair for nine years, with his wife and daughter.
Liz Samuel
Liz Samuel is an actress, producer and writer with credits in film, television and theatre. Recent credits include CBS’ East New York, Apple TV’s Dear Edward and the upcoming feature film, Men of Divorce. Liz created the award-winning series, MOMTRESS, a semi-autobiographical dramedy about juggling parenting, aging and an acting career. She hosts and produces Montclair Story Salon, a bi-monthly storytelling fundraising event. When she’s not performing or creating, she’s either trying to hang-out with her teens or walking her big Golden Retriever, Mattisse. www.lizsamuel.com IG:@lizgsamuel
Amol Sinha
Amol Sinha just celebrated his fifth anniversary as executive director of the ACLU of New Jersey, a powerhouse of advocacy in our courts, Legislature, and in communities like Maplewood. Under his leadership, the ACLU-NJ has continued to change New Jersey’s social justice landscape for the better. He leads with the goal of advancing equity, diversity, and inclusion in every aspect of his role, from internal capacity-building to external advocacy.
Stacia Thiel
Stacia Thiel, a classically trained opera singer born into a family of musicians in rural Wisconsin, explores through beautiful vocals and sharp witted lyrics, the emotions and experiences that connect us. Stacia’s music combines Americana, Folk and Country while offering up a sound that feels fresh. She recently opened for Crys Matthews at Montclair’s Outpost in the Burbs. Stacia's single, 'Sunny Days' from her solo album 'Straight to the Middle' broke into the Top Ten of Roots Music Report's Americana Song Chart. It’s available everywhere!
Kate Tuttle
Kate Tuttle is an executive editor at People magazine, covering books. A past president of the National Book Critics Circle, she formerly edited the books pages at the Boston Globe. Her reviews and essays have appeared in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, and elsewhere.
Diane Wachtell
Diane Wachtell is the executive director of The New Press, which she co-founded with André Schiffrin in 1990. Wachtell spearheads The Press’s criminal justice program, acquiring and developing books by such legal scholars as Paul Butler, David Cole, David Harris, and Marc Mauer, among others. She edited The New Press’s bestselling The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander. Wachtell also publishes on progressive education, race, national security, and the law and was responsible for The Press’s groundbreaking May It Please the Court series of books and audio recordings of Supreme Court oral arguments and for editing bestsellers including Jim Loewen’s Lies My Teacher Told Me and Lisa Delpit’s Other People’s Children. Other authors with whom she has worked include Booker Prize finalists Romesh Gunesekera and Abdulrazak Gurnah, antinuclear activist Helen Caldicott, and educators Herb Kohl and Robert Coles. Prior to co-founding The New Press, Wachtell worked at Alfred A. Knopf and Pantheon Books, acquiring and editing titles in foreign literature and literary nonfiction.
Workshop Leaders
Chris Ciulla
Chris Ciulla is a TV and film actor, audiobook narrator, and the CEO and founder of Leonardo Audio. Leonard Audio has been producing quality audiobooks and interactive gaming audio since 2013, and in 2021 moved into audio publishing, developing regional imprints in New Jersey, New England, Florida, and California, and also local narration talent and engineering/post-production teams. Leonardo Audio also develops audiobook assets to assist with screenplay and teleplay script pitches to agents and studios/networks. Chris has narrated approximately 450 titles in his audiobook career. This year, he received two Audie nominations for Best Thriller (Snowstorm in August) and Best Multi-Cast (Star Trek: No Man’s Land). He’s received parts of six Earphones Awards from AudioFile Magazine, a 2022 SOVAS nomination for Best Mystery (No One Will Miss Her), and an Odyssey Award (Sadie). You may also have seen Chris in shows such as Castle and Gotham. Chris is married to his high school sweetheart Suzanne (don’t ask what year they graduated), loves to spend every day with his Frenchie Leo and Boston Terrier Coco, and dearly misses his first-born pugboy Rocky.
Christina Kapp
Christina Kapp specializes in teaching writing practice and craft to beginner writers and short story/flash fiction writers for The Writers Circle, where she also serves as their Outreach and Development Coordinator. Her writing has appeared in dozens of publications including Passages North, Hobart, The MacGuffin, Forge, PANK, Gargoyle, Blood Orange Review and has been nominated for numerous Best of the Net and Pushcart Prizes. Her creative nonfiction is forthcoming in fall 2023 in Rooted 2: The Best New Arboreal Nonfiction. In addition to her creative work, Christina loves working with college students and has taught in the Writing Program at Rutgers University—Newark for the last ten years. She has also worked in a range of administrative and teaching roles at universities including Johns Hopkins University, Columbia University – Teachers College, and New York University. She welcomes you to follow her on Twitter @ChristinaKapp and visit her website: www.christinakapp.com.
Judith Lindbergh
Judith Lindbergh’s new novel, Akmaral, about a nomad woman warrior on the Central Asian steppes in the 5th c. BCE, is forthcoming from Regal House Publishing in spring 2024. Her debut novel, The Thrall’s Tale, about three women in the first Viking Age settlement in 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 in Zibby Magazine, Next Avenue, Edible Jersey, Archaeology Magazine, Other Voices, and UP HERE: The North at the Center of the World published by University of Washington Press. She also contributed to the Smithsonian Institution’s exhibition Vikings: The Norse Atlantic Saga and was an expert commentator on the History Channel’s documentary series MANKIND: The Story of All of Us. Judith is the Founder/Director of The Writers Circle, a New Jersey-based creative writing center providing workshops and events in person and online. She regularly teaches creative writing to students from ages 8-80.
Kristine Lombardi
Kristine Lombardi is the author and illustrator of several picture books for children including Lovey Bunny, The Grumpy Pets, Mr. Biddles and her most recent release My Wish for the World. She absolutely adores animals, which tend to be her favorite source of inspiration. Kristine found childhood to be a magical time and loves to write for kids. She lives and works in Montclair.
Leslie-Ann Murray
Leslie-Ann Murray is a fiction writer from Trinidad & Tobago. She created Brown Girl Book Lover, a social media platform where she interviews diverse writers and reviews books that should be at the forefront of our imagination. She also produces a monthly newsletter, Come Get Your Diversity. Leslie-Ann is currently working on her first novel, This Has Made Us Beautiful. Leslie-Ann has been published in Poets & Writers, Zone 3, Ploughshares, Brittle Paper, Obsidian Literary Magazine, and Salamander Literary Magazine. Leslie-Ann has taught creative writing in France, Trinidad and Tobago, South Africa, China, and New York City. She’s currently the Director of Education Programs at Bard Prison Initiative.
Eva Lesko Natiello
Eva Lesko Natiello is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of psychological thrillers The Memory Box and Following You. Her self-published titles have sold hundreds of thousands of copies worldwide, including traditionally published translations and audio. She is a sought-after speaker and has appeared at book festivals and writers conferences nationwide. Eva has assisted hundreds of authors to publish and market their books. She is a former VP of Global Communications for Estee Lauder Inc.
