KEYNOTES
Liam Callanan is the author of The Cloud Atlas (Delacorte, 2004; Dial, 2005), All Saints (Delacorte, 2007; Dial, 2008), Listen (Four Way, 2015), and Paris by the Book (Dutton, 2018); his work has been or will be translated into Chinese, German, Italian, and Japanese. Liam was the winner of the 2017 George W. Hunt, SJ Prize in Arts, Letters & Journalism and a finalist for the Edgar Award.
He serves in the English department of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, and was previously its chair, as well as coordinator of its Ph.D. program in creative writing. He has regularly contributed to local and national public radio, and is possibly the only person now living (but consult your own Venn diagram) who has written for all of the following: the Wall Street Journal (on zeppelins, jetpacks, and touring Paris and Greece with children’s books), The Awl, Commonweal, Esquire.com (on swimming and flying), Slate, the New York Times Book Review, the Times op-ed page, the Washington Post Magazine, San Francisco Chronicle, Forbes FYI, Good Housekeeping, Parents, Milwaukee Magazine, Brain, Child and elsewhere.
His short fiction has appeared or is forthcoming in a variety of literary journals, including Gulf Coast, the New Haven Review, Tinge (where his story was named one of the Millions Writers Award Notable Stories of 2011 by storySouth), the Writers Chronicle, Blackbird, Crab Orchard Review, Southern Indiana Review, Caketrain, failbetter, and Phoebe. Liam is also the creator and co-executive producer of the Poetry Everywhere animated film series.
Nick Petrie received his MFA in fiction from the University of Washington and won a Hopwood Award for short fiction while an undergraduate at the University of Michigan. His story “At the Laundromat” won the 2006 Short Story Contest in The Seattle Review, a national literary journal. His first novel, The Drifter, won the 2016 Thriller Award and the 2016 Barry Award for Best First Novel, and was nominated for 2016 Edgar and Anthony Awards for Best First Novel, as well as the 2016 Hammett Prize for Best Novel. He was named one of Apple’s 10 Writers to Read in 2017, and won the 2016 Literary Award from the Wisconsin Library Association. His books in the Peter Ash series are The Drifter, Burning Bright, and Light It Up. A husband and father, he has worked as a carpenter, remodeling contractor, and building inspector. He lives in Milwaukee.
AUTHORS & PRESENTERS
A veteran conflict and environmental journalist, Peter Annin spent more than a decade reporting on a wide variety of issues for Newsweek. For many years, he specialized in coverage of domestic terrorism and other conflicts, including the bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City and the Branch Davidian standoff outside Waco, Texas. He has also spent many years writing about the environment, including droughts in the Southwest, hurricanes in the Southeast, wind power on the Great Plains, forest fires in the mountain West, recovery efforts on the Great Lakes, and the causes and consequences of the “dead zone” in the Gulf of Mexico.
After his time at Newsweek, Annin became associate director of the Institutes for Journalism and Natural Resources, a nonpartisan national nonprofit that organizes educational fellowships for mid-career environmental journalists. In September 2006, he published his first book, The Great Lakes Water Wars, which has been called the definitive work on the Great Lakes water diversion controversy. In 2007 the book received the Great Lakes Book Award for nonfiction. From 2010 to 2015 Annin served as managing director of the University of Notre Dame’s Environmental Change Initiative, which targets the interrelated problems of invasive species, land use, and climate change, focusing on their synergistic impacts on water resources.
He became co-director of the Burke Center for Freshwater Innovation at Northland College in August of 2015.
Douglas Armstrong’s new novel, Life on the Sun, spans ten days of anger and confusion in the bygone 1960s’ era of love beads, tear gas, and manual typewriters. A former columnist and critic for The Milwaukee Journal, he draws on his own newsroom experiences in this new mystery, which is told from three alternating points of view. The book is the first in a planned trilogy to be set in the turbulent years of 1967-’68, dealing with the major issues of the time: the Vietnam war, the civil rights movement, and women’s quest for “liberation.” Armstrong won the Wisconsin Writers Prize for best novel for his debut book, “Even Sunflowers Cast Shadows.” He has published short stories in Alfred Hitchcock and Ellery Queen mystery magazines, among others. He is a longtime member of the Mystery Writers of America. Married and the father of four children, he serves as a trustee on the boards of his local school district and public library. More about his work is available at http://douglasdarmstrong.com
Lise Haller Baggesen (1969) left her native Denmark in 1992 to study painting at the AKI in Enschede and the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam, before relocating to Chicago with her family in 2008. She completed her MA in Visual and Critical Studies at SAIC in 2013, with a SAIC VCS Fellowship Award. She is a recipient of Prins Bernhard’s Prize (2000) and the Royal Award for Modern Painting (2003), a nominee for The Joan Mitchell Foundation’s Emerging Artist Grant (2015) and a 2017 resident at Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity in Alberta, Canada.
She exhibits internationally, including Threewalls, Terrain, 6018 North, Jane Addams Hull House Museum, Poetry Foundation, MCA, the Art Institute of Chicago(IL), EFA and A.I.R. Gallery (NY), The Suburban, and The Poor Farm (WI), The Contemporary Austin (TX), Overgaden (DK),Württembergischem Kunstverein (D), MoMu Antwerpen (B) Théatre de la Ville de Paris, Villa Arson and Le Confort Moderne, Poitiers (F).
She is the author of Mothernism (2014), and co-organizer of The Mothernists, in Rotterdam (2015) and The Mothernists 2: Who Cares for the 21st Century in Copenhagen (2017).
Upcoming projects include the femi-futurist sci-fi extravaganza HATORADE RETROGRADE: The Musical, co-produced with SoEx (CA) to premiere in San Francisco in 2019.
Michael Barsa grew up in a German-speaking household in New Jersey and spoke no English until he went to school. So began an epic struggle to master the American “R” and a lifelong fascination with language. He’s lived on three continents and spent many summers in southern Germany and southern Vermont.
He’s worked as an award-winning grant writer, an English teacher, and an environmental lawyer. He now teaches environmental and natural resources law. His scholarly articles have appeared in several major law reviews, and his writing on environmental policy has appeared in The Chicago Tribune and The Chicago Sun-Times. His short fiction has appeared in Sequoia.
The Garden of Blue Roses is his first novel.
Alex Bledsoe grew up an hour north of Memphis (home of Elvis) and twenty minutes from Nutbush (birthplace of Tina Turner). He’s been a reporter, editor, photographer, and door-to-door vacuum cleaner salesman. He now lives in a big yellow house in Wisconsin, where he tries to teach his three kids to act like they’ve been to town before. His novels include The Fairies of Sadieville, He Drank and Saw the Spider, and The Girls with Games of Blood.
Philip Chard is President/CEO of Empathia, Inc., a nationwide behavioral services firm providing health, safety and productivity solutions for over 340 organizations representing over 2 million covered lives. In addition, he is a practicing psychotherapist who writes an award-winning weekly column in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel titled “Out of My Mind,” and is author of The Healing Earth, which won the 1995 Midwest Publishers Award, and Nature’s Ways, which examines the spiritual aspects of nature interaction. Philip is a contributing writer to Chicken Soup for the Woman’s Soul, has been a guest expert on ABC Television’s 20/20, and has presented at the Brookings Institution, among many other venues. Prior to joining Empathia, he was Director of Behavioral Science Education at Michigan State University’s College of Human Medicine, where he was an associate professor and received the Outstanding Faculty Award.
Philip holds a MS in counseling psychology from Drake University, is a licensed clinical social worker, completed five years of post-masters study in health psychology from Saybrook University, is a Master Practitioner of NLP and a nationally recognized leader in the field of applied eco-psychology.
Nick Chiarkas grew up in the Al Smith housing projects in the Two Bridges neighborhood on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. When he was in the fourth grade his mother was told by the principal of PS-1 that, “Nick was unlikely to ever complete high school, so you must steer him toward a simple and secure vocation.” Instead, he became a writer, with a few stops along the way: a New York City Police Officer; the Deputy Chief Counsel for the President’s Commission on Organized Crime; and the Director of the Wisconsin State Public Defender Agency. On the way he picked up a Doctorate from Columbia University; a Law Degree from Temple University; and was a Pickett Fellow at Harvard. How many mothers are told their child is hopeless? How many kids with potential simply surrender to desperation? He wrote “Weepers”—for them.
Franklin K.R. Cline is an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation, a PhD candidate in English—Creative Writing at the University of Milwaukee-Wisconsin, a member of Woodland Pattern Book Center’s Board of Directors, and the book reviews and interviews editor of cream city review. His first book, So What, is available via Vegetarian Alcoholic Press.
Nina Corwin is the author of two books of poetry, The Uncertainty of Maps and Conversations With Friendly Demons and Tainted Saints, as well as three chapbooks, most recently, Dear Future. Twice nominated for the Pushcart Prize, Corwin curates Chicago’s Woman Made Gallery Literary Events. In daytime hours, she is a psychotherapist known for her work on behalf of victims of violence.
Kerry Crowley fell in love with writing in 7th grade, but thought the only way to make a living as a writer was working for a newspaper. After earning a Bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh, she worked for a time as a reporter, but soon realized that wasn’t a good fit. She put her writing aside until an odd conversation with her family led her to a character name she couldn’t resist. From there, her sons helped her weave a humorous adventure which will appeal to kids everywhere. She lives in Genesee, Wisconsin and although her boys are now young men, she continues to rely on them for inspiration. She is a member of AllWriters’ Workplace and Workshop and of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. The Adventures of Mucus Phlegmball series was released by MuseItYoung publishing beginning with the first book, Snoogers Rule, Mammoths Drool! Introducing the Amazing Mucus Phelgmball, in April 2015. This was followed by Rocket Farts, Zombie Parts: The Continuing Adventures of Mucus Phlegmball in December 2016. The final book in the series, Earwax and Cadillacs: The Final Adventure of Mucus Phlegmball debuted in February 2018.
Bobbi Dumas is a freelance writer and eclectic reader who reviews and writes about books, mainly for Kirkus, but including NPR, Barnes & Noble, and the New York Times Book Review. She is a women’s fiction specialist and a romance advocate, mainly because she believes that romance novels are (mostly) by women, for women and about women, and offer more hope, female agency and positive change than any other literary genre. Bobbi believes that women have the right to read whatever they want to, without being shamed for it, and that women writers have the power to change the world, one book, one reader at a time. She lives in Madison, Wisconsin.
The work of Wisconsin-based filmmaker and writer Chip Duncan spans four decades and more than forty countries. Duncan’s films have been seen in more than 150 countries and on domestic networks that include PBS, Discovery, HBO and Sundance Channel. Duncan has written and directed long form documentaries featuring history, science and adventure. His four published books include the fiction collection Half a Reason to Die and the recently released photography book Inspiring Change. For more information visit www.ChipDuncan.com.
David Fantle has been interviewing, writing and speaking about Hollywood’s Golden Age stars for 40 years where his work has appeared in media outlets throughout the world. He is coauthor of two book compendiums of Golden Age celebrity interviews, Reel to Real (2004) and Hollywood Heyday (2018). He is an adjunct professor in film and pop culture at Marquette University and a regular “Beyond the Podium” speaker for Celebrity Cruise Lines. He and his wife, Cathy, reside in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Joseph J. Foy is the Dean of the College of Arts, Sciences and Letters at Marian University in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. His debut book, Homer Simpson Goes to Washington: American Politics through Popular Culture was recognized with the John G. Cawelti Award by the Popular Culture/American Culture Association. He has since edited or co-edited four additional books exploring philosophical and political themes through popular and consumer culture, as well as authored over thirty essays in edited anthologies ranging from the dystopian writings of Stephen King to the importance of diversity reflected in the works of Dr. Seuss. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, and he has been an invited speaker at many venues, including the William Jefferson Clinton Presidential Library where he explores the importance of understanding the role of entertainment media in American Democracy. He lives in Wisconsin with his wife and three children, and their two cats and the world’s most loving French Bulldog.
Keziah Frost writes:
“It has been my happiest dream to write novels ever since I was in fifth grade and my dear white-haired teacher, Mrs. Kean, told me I would. She told me not to worry that I couldn’t seem to get the math, because I had a flair for writing, and when I grew up, people would enjoy the books I would write. At that moment, my own favorite books were Alice through the Looking Glass, Beautiful Joe, and Charlotte’s Web.
“In the decades following Mrs. Kean’s prediction, I went on to explore many diverse paths in my life, always feeling that I was “supposed to be” writing novels. I earned master’s degrees in English and Counseling. At various times I have taught college English, painted pet portraits, and worked as a bilingual elementary school teacher. I am now a psychotherapist in private practice.
“It is my greatest pleasure to sit quietly, get in the zone, and let the characters that come to me live out their dramas and comedies on the page. Especially their comedies. I hope that you enjoy reading my books as much as I enjoy writing them.”
Kathy Flanigan is a longtime journalist who went into the business during the age of Watergate but found her spot in features writing about how we live. She began her career at the Suburban Sun-Times in Chicago and worked at newspapers from Atlanta to Orange County, California before coming home, or close to home. She joined the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel in 1994 and has written about everything from why people don’t use curtains anymore to what it’s like to spend 24 hours at Potawatomi. She wrote a story on women and beer that turned into several stories on beer. It was serendipity that it happened at the same time that Milwaukee’s brewery scene was exploding.
Globe Pequot asked her to write a guide book to Wisconsin’s breweries called Beer Lover’s Wisconsin: Best Breweries, Brewpubs & Beer Bars and she happily accepted. Flanigan figures between the book, her full-time gig and her appreciation for beer, she has visited more than 100 of the state’s breweries.
During her teaching career, Barb Geiger spent every day surrounded by young children and good books. Now, retired, her extra time is spent volunteering in the community and pursuing her own dream of writing. Barb has studied with AllWriters’ Workplace & Workshop since 2011. Paddle for a Purpose is her first book. She lives in Waukesha, Wisconsin, with her husband, Gene, and their chinchilla, Raji.
Eloisa Gómez is the co-author of the book, Somos Latinas: Voices of Wisconsin Latina Activists. She recently retired is the Milwaukee County Director for University of Wisconsin-Extension.
Eloisa is a lifelong resident of Milwaukee, WI. She received her B.A. in history from Mt. Mary University and an M.S. in Urban Studies from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee; In 1983, Eloisa received a WI Humanities Grant for Latinas en Wisconsin, a Photo Essay of Latinas in Wisconsin. Her academic partner for the project was Alverno College.
In the mid 1980’s, she became a founding member of the Latina Task Force and the WI Council on Hispanics in Higher Education (WHCHE) in a collective effort to promote empowerment of Latinas and the Latinx community overall. Over the years, Eloisa has served on various local, state and national advisory and nonprofit boards, including the Latino Historical Society of WI and the Somos Latinas Advisory Committee. She is currently the co-chair of the Latinx Voter Ed & Outreach Team of the League of Women Voters of Milwaukee County and considers herself an emerging poet.
Ruth Goring is a poet, writer for children, visual artist, and activist. Her first poetry collection, Yellow Doors, was published by WordFarm (2003); her second is Soap Is Political (Glass Lyre, 2015). Her first children’s picture book, Adriana’s Angels / Los ángeles de Adriana, was released in 2017 (Sparkhouse Family / Augsburg Fortress); the Spanish edition won a silver Moonbeam Award.
Ruth’s poems have appeared widely in venues such as CALYX, Pilgrimage, RHINO, New Madrid, Crab Orchard Review, Iron Horse Literary Review, and Misunderstood People: Poetic Responses to Trump’s America (NYQ, 2018). She grew up in Colombia and in recent years has provided accompaniment and advocacy to Colombian peace communities and human rights defenders; currently she serves on the board of Colombia Vive Chicago. She works in the books division of the University of Chicago Press and teaches advanced manuscript editing in the Graham School of Continuing Liberal and Professional Studies.
Her favorite memories include donning a swimsuit to jump in the rain barrel under tropical downpours in southern Colombia; reading and singing with her kids, Claire and Graham, at bedtime when they were little; and, more recently, camping solo and cooking over a fire near the Illinois River.
Robert Goswitz was born and raised in Chippewa Falls Wisconsin, graduated from Milton College and holds an MA in Education from the University of Wisconsin Whitewater.
He was drafted into the US Army in March of 1971 and served in Vietnam from September of 1971 to August of 1972 as a member of the 196th Brigade, the last American Army infantry unit in country. Goswitz was awarded the Combat Infantry Badge and the Bronze Star for his service.
After the military Robert was a special education teacher from 1974 until his retirement in 2007. During his career he worked with cognitively disabled, emotionally disturbed and at-risk youth in the Wauwatosa and Waukesha School Districts.
Robert lives in Delafield with his wife Jody. He is the proud father of two adult children. His son Rob is a supervisor for Whole Foods in Minneapolis Minnesota. His daughter Andrea is in law school at The University of Wyoming.
His debut novel The Dragon Soldier’s Good Fortune, was published by Black Opal Books on July 21st, 2018. Excerpts from the novel have been published in O Dark Thirty, The Military Writer’s Anthology, and winningwriters.comliterarymagazine.
Gail Grenier is a veteran journalist, teacher, and community activist/volunteer. Since 1993, she has taught Creative Writing for Publication at Waukesha County Technical College in Pewaukee, Wisconsin.
As a freelance writer working from 1977—2004, she wrote articles, research pieces, poetry, book and music reviews, and essays in Baby Talk, Mothering, Nurturing, Let ‘s LIVE!, Utne Reader, Marriage and Family Living, Marriage Encounter, The Kerouac Connection, Salt, Milwaukee Journal, The Sun, CNI newspapers, and Wisconsin Poets Calendar. She was a contributing editor for Mothering magazine and a regular contributor for Marriage Encounter magazine. She wrote a weekly column that was syndicated in Wisconsin newspapers from 1989—2004.
Grenier has published five books. One was an anthology of essays by various authors that she put together for LifeCycle Press. Two were books of personal essays (collections of her columns) and poems she self-published; and two were self-published novels. Grenier shares profits from the sale of these books with HOPE Network for Single Mothers, the Milwaukee-area charity she founded in 1982.
Young Voices from Wild Milwaukee: The Urban Ecology Center and Me, traditionally published by HenschelHAUS Books in 2018, is Grenier’s first book of creative nonfiction featuring oral histories of young people. She shares author profits with the Urban Ecology Center in Milwaukee.
Jolene Hansen is a retired writing specialist and English lecturer at UW-Waukesha. In recent years, she has volunteered in numerous programs that encouraged creativity in people facing memory loss and dementia. She chronicled some of her experiences in her book I Bring Daffodils.
B.J. Hollars is the author of several books, most recently Flock Together: A Love Affair With Extinct Birds, From the Mouths of Dogs: What Our Pets Teach Us About Life, Death, and Being Human, as well as a collection of essays, This Is Only A Test. Additionally, he has also written Thirteen Loops: Race, Violence and the Last Lynching in America, Opening the Doors: The Desegregation of the University of Alabama and the Fight for Civil Rights in Tuscaloosa, Dispatches from the Drownings: Reporting the Fiction of Nonfiction, and Sightings. His latest work, The Road South: Personal Stories of the Freedom Riders, was published in spring 2018. Hollars serves as a mentor for Creative Nonfiction, and the founder and executive director of the Chippewa Valley Writers Guild. An associate professor of English at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, he lives a simple existence with his wife, their children, and their dog.
C.J. Hribal is the author of the novel The Company Car, which received the Anne Powers Book Award, and the novel American Beauty. He’s also the author of the short fiction collections Matty’s Heart and The Clouds in Memphis, which won the AWP Award for Short Fiction, and he edited The Boundaries of Twilight: Czecho-Slovak Writing from the New World. His story “Do I Look Sick to You?: Notes on How to Make Love to a Cancer Patient” won the Goldenberg Prize for Fiction for 2017, selected by Ha Jin, and was awarded a Puschart Prize. He has held Fellowships from the NEA, the Bush, and from the Guggenheim Foundations. He is the Louise Edna Goeden Professor of English at Marquette University, and is a member of the fiction faculty at the Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers. He’s completing work on a new novel, Housebreaking, set in Door County.
Jeanette Hurt is an award-winning writer and the author of ten books, including the critically acclaimed Drink Like a Woman (Seal Press) and the Mark Twain award winner, The Cheeses of Wisconsin: A Culinary Travel Guide (The Countryman Press). She is currently working on books number eleven (The Wisconsin Cocktail Book, University of Wisconsin Press) and twelve (The Cider Rules, Skyhorse Publishing). She regularly contributes to dozens of magazines and websites, primarily writing about food, beverages and travel, and she is a regular contributor to WUWM’s Lake Effect. When she’s not writing or testing recipes (or taking her son to gymnastics practices), she can be found walking along Lake Michigan with her husband, their son and their new puppy.
Karla Huston, Wisconsin Poet Laureate (2017-2018), is the author of A Theory of Lipstick (Main Street Rag: 2013), winner of a Wisconsin Library Association Outstanding Achievement Award. She has published 8 books of poetry including Grief Bone from Five-Oaks Press: 2017. Her poems, reviews and interviews have been published widely, including in the 2012 Pushcart Best of the Small Presses anthology. She teaches poetry writing at The Mill: A Place for Writers in Appleton, Wisconsin, and serves on the author’s committee for the Fox Cities Book Festival as well as the board of directors for The Mill: A Place for Writers. As part of her WPL term, she plans to work with poetry and dementia and the Memory Café programs throughout the state.
Reggie Jackson has been a much sought-after speaker, published author, and journalist for over a decade. As a trainer/consultant with Nurturing Diversity Partners, he helps communities, institutions, and individuals around the country develop greater historical and cultural literacy, compassion, and capacity for action.
To do this, Reggie shares seldom-told stories of the African-American experience past and present and conducts anti-bias, diversity, and inclusion education at schools, libraries, social service agencies, churches, and businesses. He also frequently provides background on contemporary racial issues to regional, national, and international media.
Reggie began this work as a volunteer griot* (or docent) with America’s Black Holocaust Museum in 2002. A year later, he started training new volunteers as ABHM’s Head Griot, a position he holds to this day.
For many years, Reggie also served as a special education teacher in Milwaukee middle schools and taught sociology as an adjunct professor at Concordia University.
Mr. Jackson has received awards for his social justice and public service work from the Wisconsin State Assembly, Southeast Wisconsin’s YWCA, the City of Milwaukee, the First Unitarian Society of Milwaukee, MICAH (Milwaukee Inner-City Congregations Allied for Hope), the Jewish Community Relations Council, and the Milwaukee Press Club.
As a copywriter at a Milwaukee-based advertising agency, Matthew Janzen wrote ads for clients of all sizes and tax codes — but his passion was beer. So he quit his job, grabbed a camera, and hit the road to learn more about craft beer than he could gather from newspapers and liquor stores alone. Two years later, he published a book about breweries and the industries that supply them. Now, Matt’s on the road again; spreading the word about what he discovered, and continuing his mission to drink good beer made by people who give a damn about their communities.
Dasha Kelly is a nationally-respected writer, artist and creative consultant. She has delivered her uniquely engaging sessions to college campuses, corporate teams, churches, correctional institutions, arts groups, class rooms in every K-12 grade, elderly recreational programs and non-profit organizations.
Dasha has written features and essays for national, regional and local magazines; published two collections of poems, essays and short stories; four full-length spoken word recordings; a poetry chapbook; and two novels. Her most recent novel, Almost Crimson (Curbside Splendor) was named one of the “16 of the Most Exciting Books by Independent Publishers.”
Dasha holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Antioch University and a Masters in Marketing Communications from Roosevelt University and founder of Still Waters Collective, an arts outreach and community-building initiative.
A former “Army brat,” Dasha lives in Milwaukee with her husband, their blended brood of five children, and one imperious cat.
Sarah Kent, MS, RDN, CSOWM, CD, is the author of the Fresh Start Bariatric Cookbook and the Gastric Sleeve Bariatric Cookbook. For more than seven years, she served as lead dietitian for the bariatric surgery program at Froedtert & the Medical College of Wisconsin, a nationally certified Center of Excellence for bariatric surgery. A Registered Dietitian Nutritionist with a Master’s degree in Human Nutrition, Sarah also is a Certi¬fied Specialist in Obesity and Weight Management through the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. Although she has a clean approach to eating—Sarah emphasizes the importance of including favorite foods with a healthier twist as a part of a balanced lifestyle. Sarah is passionate about helping people with lifestyle changes, especially with regard to food, nutrition and cooking. Currently working with Abbott Nutrition, Sarah lives in Milwaukee, WI with her husband, twins and their Labrador retriever Ladis.
John Klima is the Assistant Director at the Waukesha Public Library. Klima edited the Hugo-Award winning speculative fiction magazine Electric Velocipede from 2001-2013. The magazine was also a four-time nominee for the World Fantasy Award and its stories were short-listed for the Tiptree and Sturgeon awards. In 2007 Klima edited an anthology of science fiction and fantasy stories based on spelling-bee winning words called Logorrhea: Good Words Make Good Stories. Klima edited a reprint anthology of fairy tale retellings called Happily Ever After that came out from Night Shade Books in the Summer of 2011. He co-edited Glitter & Mayhem with Lynne M. Thomas and Michael Damian Thomas—a Kickstarter-funded anthology of speculative nightclub stories—in 2013. The Best of Electric Velocipede was published by Fairwood Press in 2014. He has a few projects in the works for 2019.
Dean Kowalski is a professor of philosophy and the inaugural chair of the arts and humanities department in the College of General Studies at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee, Waukesha campus. He is the author or editor of seven books, the latest of which is Joss Whedon as Philosopher.
Steven Kuehn is a professional archaeologist and zooarchaeologist at the Illinois State Archaeological Survey, part of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He has nearly 30 years of field and laboratory experience in the identification, excavation, and analysis of prehistoric and historic archaeological sites, and specializes in the analysis of faunal (animal) remains from sites across North America. After preparing hundreds of technical reports and scholarly articles, the call of mystery fiction grew irresistible and Steve began chronicling the adventures of Professor Jacob Caine, archaeologist and amateur detective. His first novel, Sunken Dreams, was published in May 2016. He is currently putting the finishing touches on his second novel, Ghost Bog. Interested in learning more about archaeology, mysteries, and more? Come for a visit at www.stevenkuehn.com.
Sunken Dreams combines archaeology and classic mystery thriller, set at an archaeological dig in northern Wisconsin. Professor Jake Caine leads an excavation at the Waconah site, where another archaeologist died years earlier. Was it an accident or murder, as Jake begins to suspect? The cold case quickly heats up, and Jake has to uncover the truth before tragedy strikes again.
Dale Kushner is a poet and novelist, with a blog on PsychologyToday.com: Transcending the Past. Dale founded The Writer’s Place, a literary center in Madison, WI, and was trained in the theories of Carl Jung. Her acclaimed first novel, The Conditions of Love, was published by Grand Central in 2013. She is working on her second novel, The Lie of Forgetting. Her essay, “My Magdalene” will be included in a forthcoming anthology, Strange Attractors, published by U Mass Press. In 2019, her newest collection of poems on loss and desire will be published by 3: Taos Press.
Ms. Kushner is a recipient of a Wisconsin Arts Board Grant in the Literary Arts and has been honored by fellowships at the Wurlitzer Foundation, The Ragdale Foundation, and the Fetzer Institute as a participant of their first writers’ conference on compassion and forgiveness.
Her poetry collection More Alive Than Lions Roaring was a finalist for the May Swenson Poetry Award at Utah State Press, The Prairie Schooner Book Competition, the Agha Shahid Ali Prize at University of Utah Press and The Tupelo Prize. Her story, “When You Open the Door, Where Are You?” was nominated for a Pushcart Prize.
Dale and her husband live in Madison, Wisconsin with their Golden Retriever, Maisie.
Jim Landwehr has two nonfiction books, Dirty Shirt: A Boundary Waters Memoir and The Portland House: A ‘70s Memoir. Jim also has three poetry collections, Reciting from Memory, and Written Life, and On a Road. His non-fiction stories have been published in Main Street Rag, Prairie Rose Publications, Steam Ticket and others. His poetry has been featured in Torrid Literature Journal, Portage Magazine, Blue Heron Review and many others. He loves in Waukesha, Wisconsin with his wife Donna and their two children. He enjoys fishing, kayaking, biking and camping. Jim is currently serving as poet laureate for the Village of Wales, Wisconsin. For more on Jim and his writing, visit: http://jimlandwehr.com
Anna Lardinois, Wisconsin native and Milwaukee enthusiast, is the author of Milwaukee Ghosts and Legends, which is part of the Haunted America series, published by the History Press. Lardinois is also an award-winning tour guide, known for her collections of self-guided walking tours, Walking Milwaukee, and as the owner of Gothic Milwaukee, a company offering haunted, historical guided walking tours. She can be found tingling spines each week on her radio program, Haunted Heartland, a show that focuses on eerie Midwestern tales, broadcast on WXRW.
Andrea Lochen is the author of three novels. Her first novel, The Repeat Year (Penguin 2013), was praised by Kirkus Reviews as “an engaging, satisfying read that explores friendship, love and who we really are when it truly matters.” A draft of the novel won the 2008 Hopwood Novel Award. The Repeat Year was also produced as an audiobook and translated into German and Hungarian editions. The film option was sold to Ineffable Pictures. Andrea’s second novel, Imaginary Things, was published by Astor + Blue in April 2015 and described as a, “a beautiful book, filled with vivid scenes, unforgettable characters, and oodles of heart. With a page-turning plot and an utterly unique concept, Imaginary Things entertains, inspires, and provokes thought.” Her third novel, Lake Indigo, is forthcoming from Red Adept Publishing in Fall 2019.
Andrea earned her Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor and her Bachelor’s degree in English from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Since 2008, she has taught undergraduate writing at the University of Wisconsin-Waukesha and was recently awarded the UW Colleges Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching. Andrea lives in Johnson Creek with her husband and two children.
Valya Dudycz Lupescu is the author of The Silence of Trees and the founding editor of Conclave: A Journal of Character. With her partner, Stephen H. Segal, she is the co-author of the book Geek Parenting and the co-founder of the Wyrd Words storytelling laboratory. Valya earned her MFA in Writing from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and her poetry and prose have been published in Kenyon Review, Gone Lawn, Jersey Devil Press, Strange Horizons, Mythic Delirium, Scheherezade’s Bequest, Abyss & Apex, and multiple anthologies. Valya teaches at DePaul University in Chicago, and is currently at work on a novel set during the genocidal famine (Holodomor) of 1932–33 in Soviet Ukraine.
Kathy Lyons is the wild, adventurous half of USA TODAY bestselling author Jade Lee. A lover of all things fantastical, Kathy spent much of her childhood in Narnia, Middle Earth, Amber, and Earthsea, just to name a few. “There is nothing I adore more than to turn around on an ordinary day and experience something magical. It happens all the time in real life and in my books.” Winner of several industry awards including the Prism-Best of the Best, Romantic Times Reviewer’s Choice, and Fresh Fiction’s Steamiest Read, Kathy has published over 50 romance novels and yet says she’s just getting started. “It’s the love story that gets me every time. There’s magic powers and then there’s the magic of love. The first is cool. The second is life.” Check out her latest news at www.KathyLyons.com, Facebook: KathyLyonsBooks, Twitter: KathyLyonsAuth, Instagram: KathyLyonsAuthor
Robin MacArthur is the author of the collection of short stories Half Wild and of the novel Heart Spring Mountain, both set in the hills and woods of southern Vermont. MacArthur won the 2017 PEN/New England award for fiction and was a finalist for the Vermont Book Award and the New England Book Award. She is a two-time recipient of Creation Grants from the Vermont Arts Council and the National Endowment for the Arts. Her essays and stories have appeared, among other places, in the Washington Post, Orion Magazine, and on NPR. She is occasionally one half of the indie-folk duo Red Heart the Ticker, and lives with her husband and two children on the land where she was born.
Bill Mathis published his first novel in July, 2018 with Rogue Phoenix Press. Face Your Fears confronts the traditional concepts of normalcy. It tracks the separate lives of two men as they come of age, careen through their teen years into adulthood, eventually meet and fall in love. One of the men is a quadriplegic with cerebral palsy. It is not a book of pity or sympathy for either character, but instead treats disability as normal. The book deals with complex issues of LGBT, disability, and family in an often humorous, yet realistic manner. Bill hopes his second novel, The Rooming House Diaries: Life, Love & Secrets at 4922 South Justine Street, will publish in 2019. Part LGBT historical novel set in Chicago, it primarily stresses the role of non-DNA family.
Bill directed YMCA camps for 25 years, then worked with foster children for 20 years before retiring to Beloit, Wisconsin where he lives with his partner. A hospice volunteer, Bill enjoys traveling, reading, photography, and writing about the non-Biblical visions he sees along with the voices he hears. He says that 45 years of working with kids can do that to a person.
Melanie Radzicki McManus has worked as a news reporter at a Green Bay radio station, as a press secretary at the Wisconsin State Capitol and as editor of two Madison publications. Since 1994, McManus has worked as a freelance writer and editor, specializing in travel and fitness. She has won numerous awards for her writing, most notably prestigious Lowell Thomas Gold and Grand Awards for her travel journalism. Her first book, Thousand-Miler (Wisconsin Historical Society Press, 2017), is a memoir about her record-setting thru-hike of the Ice Age National Scenic Trail.
Golden heart winner, Christine Merrill has written over twenty novels and an assortment of stories and novellas. She’s sold over a million and a half books world-wide and has been translated into more than 15 languages.
She lives with her high school sweetheart, in a renovated Catholic church, complete with stained glass windows and a bell tower. They have two sons, a labradoodle, and two cats with active social lives.
When not writing, Chris can be found at the movies, halfway back and towards the center, with a large buttered popcorn (but only if the film has a happy ending).
Visit her on the Web at www.christine-merrill.com.
Ethan Michaeli is the author of The Defender: How the Legendary Black Newspaper Changed America, (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016) praised by The New York Times as “a towering achievement that will not be soon forgotten.” Winner of the Best Non Fiction of 2016 prizes from the Chicago Writers Association as well as the Midland Authors Association, named as a Notable Book of 2016 by The New York Times, the Washington Post and Amazon, and to the short list of the Mark Lynton Prize.
Ethan was a copy editor and investigative reporter at The Chicago Daily Defender from 1991 to 1996, after which he founded the Residents’ Journal, a magazine written and produced by the tenants of Chicago’s public housing developments, and an affiliated not-for-profit organization, We The People Media. Ethan’s work has been published by Oxford University Press, Atlantic Magazine, The Nation, The Forward, In These Times, and the Chicago Tribune, among other venues. He has served as a judge in prestigious literary contests including the Lynton Prize and is currently an instructor at the Harris School of Public Policy at the University of Chicago, where he teaches a course on “Race, Politics and the Media in the 20th Century.” His forthcoming book, Twelve Tribes: Promise and Peril in the New Israel, will be published by Custom House Books in 2019.
Mel Miskimen is the author of two books: Cop’s Kid (Terrace Books, 2003) and Sit. Stay. Heal: How An Underachieving Labrador Won Our Hearts and Brought Us Together, (Sourcebooks 2016). It was called a ‘must read,’ by Modern Dog magazine, and one of Target’s Book Club Selections. Sit. Stay. Heal was featured on Wisconsin Public Radio’s Chapter a Day program in May of 2017. She is busy writing her third book about her experiences renovating her house, her husband and ‘hood, “Sometimes the walls you tear down are your own.”
Carrie Newberry’s first novel, an urban fantasy called Pick Your Teeth With My Bones, came out last year with EDGE Lite Science Fiction and Fantasy. The book was accepted on its first submission. For the most part, she writes fantasy and horror, though she has written short pieces of literary fiction as well as flash memoir pieces.
After studying Creative Writing at UW-Madison and after maxing out on Creative Writing Workshops at UW-Madison, Carrie decided to leave academia behind in order to pursue her career as a dog groomer’s assistant and have lots of time to write. She continues her studies at AllWriters Workplace and Workshop, as a member of the monthly Saturday morning New Year’s Resolution Write a Book Workshop, because writers can always learn more from their peers. In 2016, Carrie joined the faculty at AllWriters, where she teaches a weekly online book-writing workshop. She works as a dog groomer and lives in Madison, Wisconsin, with a greedy terrier and a cock-a-poo who loves to sing along to the radio (and who is absolutely never on-key).
In her forties, Robin Oliveira began taking writing classes at the local community college, then at the University of Washington Extension, and finally entered the MFA in Writing program at Vermont College of Fine Arts (then Vermont College.) In between she wrote many failed short stories and one completed but unpublished novel. It wasn’t until 2007, when she was awarded the James Jones First Novel Fellowship for her debut novel-in-progress, then entitled The Last Beautiful Day, that she began to reap rewards from her years of hard work. My Name is Mary Sutter was published by Viking in 2010. It hit the New York Times and ABA bestseller lists, received the 2011 Michael Shaara Prize for Excellence in Civil War Fiction and the 2010 American Historical Fiction Honorable Mention from the Langum Charitable Trust, was chosen as an all-city read for Schenectady, N.Y., Kirkland, Washington, and Roswell, Georgia, and as an all-state read for Iowa. It became an Indie Next pick, a Good Housekeeping top 10 “Good Read,” and was featured in “O” The Oprah Magazine. It was translated into several languages.
Published in February 2014, Oliveira’s second book, I Always Loved You, examines the lives of the Impressionist artists in late nineteenth century Paris, particularly Edgar Degas and Mary Cassatt. The novel is the result of meticulous research. Among other highlights, Oliveira was granted access to the basement of the Musée d’Orsay in Paris to view rarely seen artifacts from Edgar Degas’s studio.
Her third novel, Winter Sisters, published in February 2018, is now available from Viking.
Amy E. Reichert, author of The Coincidence Of Coconut Cake, Luck, Love & Lemon Pie, The Simplicity of Cider, and The Optimist’s Guide to Letting Go, loves to write stories that end well with characters you’d invite to dinner. A wife, mom, amateur chef, Fix-It Mistress, a volunteer baby snuggler, and cider enthusiast. She earned her MA in English Literature, honed her writing and editing skills as a Technical Writer for many years, and now serves on her library’s board of directors. She’s a proud member of Tall Poppy Writers.
An Emeritus Professor of English at Central Michigan University, Robert Root also has taught writing in the Ashland University MFA Program in Ohio, the Lighthouse Writers Workshop in Denver, and the Loft in Minneapolis. His books on creative nonfiction include the anthology The Fourth Genre: Contemporary Writers of/on Creative Nonfiction, co-edited with Michael Steinberg; the craft text The Nonfictionist’s Guide: On Reading and Writing Creative Nonfiction; the craft anthology Landscapes with Figures: The Nonfiction of Place; and the craft study E. B. White: The Emergence of an Essayist. A sometime contributor to Wisconsin Life on Wisconsin Public Radio and a past artist in residence at three national parks, he is co-editor with Jill Burkland of The Island Within Us: Isle Royale Artists-in-Residence 1991-1998. He is the author of the travel narratives Recovering Ruth: A Biographer’s Tale and Following Isabella: Travels in Colorado Then and Now, the essay collections Limited Sight Distance: Essays for Airwaves and Postscripts: Retrospections on Time and Place, and the memoir Happenstance. A video of his book talk on Walking Home Ground: In the Footsteps of Muir, Leopold, and Derleth is viewable at https://wpt.org/lecture-series/history-sandwiched. He and his wife live in Waukesha. His website is www.rootwriting.com.
Christine Schlagenhauf R.D., CSOWM, CD is a Registered Dietitian Nutritionist currently working for Froedtert & The Medical College of Wisconsin, Workforce Health. Working in the field of dietetics for almost 20 years, she has seen food trends come and go, but she remains focused on teaching my clients the core principles of good nutrition with a focus on the benefits of eating a wide variety of foods to meet our daily micro and macronutrient needs. She lives and teaches a healthy lifestyle in order to help her clients achieve their wellness goals through better eating and behavior modification.
Sophfronia Scott is author of an essay collection, Love’s Long Line, a memoir, This Child of Faith, and two novels, Unforgivable Love and All I Need to Get By. Sophfronia teaches at Regis University’s Mile-High MFA and Bay Path University’s MFA in Creative Nonfiction. She blogs at www.Sophfronia.com.
Stephen H. Segal is the coauthor of the books Geek Parenting: What Joffrey, Jor-El, Maleficent, and the McFlys Teach Us About Raising a Family (with his partner Valya Dudycz Lupescu) and Geek Wisdom: The Sacred Teachings of Nerd Culture. Since 2016 he has served as senior editor at Legacy.com, which hosts the world’s largest collection of online obituaries. Previously, he has edited the Hugo Award-winning American short story magazine Weird Tales, the Philadelphia Weekly, and the bestselling YA novel Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children.
Sue William Silverman’s newest book, The Pat Boone Fan Club: My Life as a White Anglo-Saxon Jew, a memoir-in-essays, was a finalist in the IndieFab Book of the Year Award, and Kirkus Reviews says that “a masterly stylist continues her uncompromising examination of the inner life.” Her previous books are Because I Remember Terror, Father, I Remember You, which won the Association of Writers and Writing Programs award in creative nonfiction, and Love Sick: One Woman’s Journey through Sexual Addiction, also made into a Lifetime TV movie. Her craft book, Fearless Confessions: A Writer’s Guide to Memoir, was named “one of the essential books for writers” by Poets and Writers. She teaches at the low-residency MFA program at Vermont College of Fine Arts. Virtually, you can find Sue at www.SueWilliamSilverman.com, on Facebook @SueWilliamSilverman, on Twitter @SueSilverman, on Instagram at suewilliamsilverman. To watch her book trailer for The Pat Boone Fan Club, please click here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXVi5psxI4A.
Brice D. Smith became an historian because of the transformative power of LGBTQ+ storytelling. A 2018 Lambda finalist, Dr. Smith is now adapting his biography of transgender pioneer Lou Sullivan into a feature film screenplay. He also coordinated the Milwaukee Transgender Oral History Project.
Dianne Sposito’s work has been produced in professional, university and community theatres throughout the USA. Libretti: Commedia Paradia, Harbledown and Heaven in Your Pocket, 2008 official selection, New York Musical Theatre Festival. Plays: Almost Full Circle at the Guggenheim, When There’s a Will, They’re Away!, What’ll the Neighbors Think?, Love at the Louvre, Hell’s Kitchen, Dream of a Play, and To Canterbury They Went. She is a two-time winner of the BRIO Award in playwriting from the Bronx Council on the Arts for Suddenly, Lasagna! and Officials of the Stardust Mission, which was also work-shopped at LAByrinth Theatre Company’s Intensive Ensemble, where she was a guest playwright. Latest works are three TYA world premiere productions (2016-2020): Cinderella (love what you wish for), The Sleeping Beauty (a light within) and The Emperor’s New Clothes, all co-authored with Mark Boergers. Her monologues have been published by Smith & Kraus, and her poetry and essays have appeared in Visible Ink, a literary journal for cancer survivors. Ms. Sposito holds an M.A. in Theatre and is a current member of the Advisory Council for the College of Arts & Sciences at Cardinal Stritch University. She is a member of The Dramatists Guild of America.
Jessica Swearingen lives in Milwaukee with her husband and two cats. She has a MA in English and Writing from Mount Mary University and an MFA in Fiction from the Solstice program at Pine Manor College. She teaches in the Humanities, Social Science, and Communication department at the Milwaukee School of Engineering. Her first novel, What Remains, was released in April, 2018 from Orange Hat Publishing. Her fiction and non-fiction has been published by the Sheepshead Review, Door is a Jar, Common Ground Review, Hidden Timber Books, Quail Bell Magazine, and Litbreak, and she was a Wisconsin Writer’s Association Jade Ring Award winner for non-fiction. She spends her free time reading and running many, many miles—she and her husband are trying to run a marathon in all fifty states.
Jennifer Trethewey is an actor-turned-writer who has moved her performances from the stage to the page. In 2013, she traveled to Scotland for the first time, where she instantly fell for the language, humor, history, and breathtaking landscape. Her love for Scotland is translated into her series of historical romance novels, the Highlanders of Balforss. The first three books in this sexy, adventurous series, Tying the Scot, Betting the Scot, and Forgetting the Scot are available on amazon.com. Visit her web page and sign up for her Scot Curious newsletter.
Susan Valerian is a longtime writer and journalist. She spent 15 years as a newspaper reporter, most recently at The Plain Dealer in Cleveland, Ohio.
She worked at Glamour magazine in New York City and as an investigative television producer at the NBC affiliate in Cleveland. Her articles have appeared in The New York Times and Atlanta Journal Constitution.
Jennifer Werner writes:
“I have been a dietitian for 17 years mostly in long-term care and rehabilitation. I did my nutrition course work at University of Wisconsin-Green Bay. I completed my dietetic internship at Indiana University Purdue University of Indianapolis. Prior to becoming a dietitian, I taught high school math and science. I am currently a substitute teacher of the School District of Waukesha. I am mother of two children, Kurt and Cheryl. I also have been married 14 years to my wonderful husband, Scot. I am active leader in both Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts. In my free time, I like to volunteer at Waukesha STEM Academy, geocache, read, and do jigsaw puzzles.”
Kelly Wilz, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor of Communication/Theatre Arts and Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Marshfield/Wood County. Her research and teaching explore the intersections of education, media literacy, gender, politics, democracy, and popular culture. The focus of her primary research is on rhetorical constructions of gender, violence, and dissent within the context of U.S. war culture and American politics. Related topics of interest include how dehumanizing and demonizing rhetoric extend beyond war to broader patterns of social violence based on intersectional discourses of race, gender, sexual orientation, ethnicity, and other identity markers. Wilz’s academic publications have appeared in multiple edited collections and top-tier journals such as Rhetoric & Public Affairs and the Global Media Journal. An award-winning teacher, she has taught a wide range of classes, including: an introduction to gender and women’s studies, women in popular culture, gender and communication, public speaking, communication, rhetoric, film and television, interpersonal communication, organizational communication, and business communication. A passionate speaker and an inspiring advocate, Wilz has given talks with a wide variety of audiences and forums, such as: an Aging and Disability Resource Center; an Iraq War Symposium; a Lecture Series on Women, Violence, and the Media; on Rape Culture and Silence on college campuses; on Violence and American Masculinity; and more. As a firm believer in public engagement, Wilz also is a cultural critic. She currently is a writer at the American Association of University Professors’ Academe Blog. Her work has appeared on The Huffington Post, Thought Catalog, Feministing, and other media outlets.