Melody S. Gee is the author of three books of poetry, The Convert’s Heart is Good to Eat (Driftwood Press, 2022) runner-up for the Adrift Chapbook Prize; The Dead in Daylight (2016, Cooper Dillon Books), long listed for the Julie Suk Award; and Each Crumbling House (2010, Perugia Press), winner of the Perugia Press Poetry Prize. Her poems, essays, and reviews appear recently in Commonweal Magazine, Essay Daily, Lantern Review, Rappahannock Review, Ruminate, The Academy of American Poets. Born in Taiwan and raised in California, she is a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley and the University of New Mexico. She has taught writing at Purdue University, Southwestern Illinois College, and St. Louis Community College, and currently works as a freelance content and communications strategist. Melody is the recipient of Kundiman fellowships in poetry and fiction, a Sustainable Arts Foundation Award, an Artist Support Grant from the Regional Arts Commission of St. Louis, two Pushcart Prize nominations, a Best New Poets nomination, and the Robert Watson Literary Prize. She lives in St. Louis, MO with her husband and daughters.

Deirdre Fagan is the award-winning author of the memoir, Find a Place for Me: Embracing Love and Life in the Face of Death (Pact Press, Regal House Publishing, November 1, 2022), a short story collection, The Grief Eater (Adelaide Books, 2020), and a chapbook of poetry, Have Love (Finishing Line Press, 2019). Her poetry, fiction, and nonfiction have appeared widely in literary journals and anthologies. Fagan is also the author of the reference book, Critical Companion to Robert Frost (Facts on File, 2007) and has published critical essays on poetry, memoir, and pedagogy. Notably, her essay on Emily Dickinson’s dash was included in Harold Bloom’s Modern Critical Views. Fagan holds a doctorate in Humanistic Studies (English and Philosophy) and a master’s in English from University at Albany, SUNY, and a bachelor’s in English from University at Buffalo, SUNY, and has taught university courses in writing and literature for over two decades. She is a native New Yorker who has also lived in Arizona, Florida, Illinois, and Maryland, and currently resides in Michigan where she teaches and coordinates the creative writing program at Ferris State University. Living Now Awards Aging/Death and Dying Category Bronze Medalist, Eric Hoffer Book Award Category Finalist and Next Generation Indie Book Award Finalist for her short story collection, longlisted for Memoir Magazine’s 2022 Memoir Prize for Books, poetry Best of the Net finalist and Pushcart Prize nominee, Fagan is the poetry editor at Orange Blossom Review and is seeking a publisher for a recently completed poetry collection and drafted second memoir.

Artist Sean Fitzgibbon explores unusual, real places and events through his work.  He has an MFA in art and a passion for making art and visual storytelling. He is a 2021 Artists 360 recipient and a 2023 recipient of the Arkansas Arts Council Individual Artist Fellowship Award for graphic nonfiction “What Follows Is True: Crescent Hotel. He has exhibited work throughout the US.  He also illustrates books and recently completed writing and illustrating a documentary-style graphic nonfiction that explores the Crescent Hotel’s strange two years as the Baker Hospital, one of the darkest and most controversial legends in the town of Eureka Springs, Arkansas.

Be sure to also follow his work on Instagram at instagram.com/seanpfitzgibbon and Facebook at facebook.com/seanfitzgibbonart

More Than Tutus and Pointe Shoes: A Reading List of Ballet Books

Martha Anne Toll writes fiction, essays, and book reviews, and reads anything that’s not nailed down. Her debut novel, Three Muses, won the Petrichor Prize for Finely Crafted Fiction. Toll brings a long career in social justice to her work covering writers of color and women writers. She is a book reviewer and author interviewer at NPR Books, the Washington Post, Pointe Magazine, The Millions, and elsewhere. She also publishes short fiction and essays in a wide variety of outlets. Toll has recently joined the Board of Directors of the PEN/Faulkner Foundation.

Out of the Ashes: A Story of Recovery and Hope is educator Sallie Crotty’s first book. Previously she has published poems, personal essays, and articles in The Dairy Hollow Echo (an anthology of best selections from The Writers’ Colony at Dairy Hollow’s eMerge); The Drabble; eMerge; Resources to Recover (an online resource for people living with mental illness); The Menninger Clinic’s Annual Fund 2016 publication; Texas Jewish Post; and Capitalines. The Mayborn Literary Nonfiction Conference selected her writing for workshop three times, and in 2018 The Writers’ Colony at Dairy Hollow awarded her a residency. In 2018 Oral Fixation (An Obsession with True Life Tales) selected her to tell part of her story to an audience of nearly 400 people, with the performance later shared on YouTube.

Sallie has served as a middle school English teacher and private writing tutor for numerous students. Known for her creative lessons and individual attention, Sallie uses a writing and reading workshop approach.

Sallie holds a B.A. in English from Sewanee: The University of the South and an Ed.M. from Harvard University. Currently she is pursuing her Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing at Queens University of Charlotte.

Since 2019 Sallie, a native Texan, has lived in Seattle with her husband. They have two young adult children. She is working on a poetry collection.

Lisa Braxton is an essayist, short story writer, and novelist. She earned her MFA in creative writing from Southern New Hampshire University, her Master of Science in Journalism Broadcasting from Northwestern University and her Bachelor of Arts in Mass Media from Hampton University. Her debut novel, The Talking Drum, was published by Inanna Publications in May 2020. She is a fellow of the Kimbilio Fiction Writers Program and a book reviewer for 2040 Review. Her stories and essays have appeared in Vermont Literary Review, Black Lives Have Always Mattered, Chicken Soup for the Soul and The Book of Hope. She received Honorable Mention in Writer’s Digest magazine’s 84th and 86th annual writing contests in the inspirational essay category. Her website is: Lisa Braxton | Author of the novel, The Talking Drum

Rosaleen Bertolino was born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area and is currently living in Mexico. She received her B.A. from the University of California at Santa Cruz and her M.A. in English/Creative Writing from San Francisco State University. Her awards include a Marin Arts Council Individual Artist Grant and an Honorable Mention for the James D. Phelan Award. She has twice been a finalist for Glimmer Train's Very Short Fiction Award, and has been a writer in residence at the Writer's Colony at Dairy Hollow in Eureka Springs, Arkansas, during 2008, 2007, and 2006. She is co-founder and host of the reading series Prose Cafe, based in San Miquel de Allende, Mexico, and the winner of the 2019 Many Voices Project Prose competition. Her debut collection, "The Paper Demon and Other Stories," was released New Rivers Press in the fall of 2021 and was a handpicked book at Small Press Distribution.

Helena Rho is a three-time Pushcart Prize nominated writer and a former assistant professor of pediatrics. She received her Doctor of Medicine in 1992 and has practiced and taught at Top Ten Children’s Hospitals—the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, the Johns Hopkins Hospital, and the Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh. She earned her MFA in Creative Nonfiction from the University of Pittsburgh. Her essays have been included in anthologies published by Southern Methodist University Press: “The Burden of Baby Boy Smith” in Rage and Reconciliation (2005) and “The Good Doctor” in Silence Kills (2007). She was awarded a writing fellowship in TWP: To Think, To Write, To Publish, a National Science Foundation program through the Consortium for Science, Policy & Outcomes at Arizona State University. Her work has appeared in Creative Nonfiction, Slate, Crab Orchard Review, Entropy, Sycamore Review, Solstice, Fourth Genre, 805 Lit + Art, and in Post Road.

Cheryl King is an author who lives in Eureka Springs, Arkansas with her best friend and husband, Harland. Her first career was in publishing working as a proofreader for Doubleday and then later as an editor for a vanity press publishing firm. Life then intruded and sent her on a course where she would spend the next thirty years in corporate America in the telecommunications industry. It was a vital and exciting time with massive growth and explosive changes. She participated in the launch of some of today's most critical data networks and platforms. Through all the years she carried the dream of writing and decided to pursue her passion when she parted company with corporate employment. Her story 'Red Sky at Dawn', from the Rare Coins: A Collection of Short Stories book, was chosen for inclusion in the 2019 edition of eMerge Magazine, the online magazine of the Writers' Colony at Dairy Hollow in Eureka Springs.

About Vicki Mayk in her own words: "I can still remember the first time I walked into a newsroom. I was 12 and it was early on a Sunday morning – probably one of the only times that it’s quiet in a place where the insanity of putting out a daily newspaper takes place. I was meeting one of the writers I admired, a dream come true for a kid from Pittsburgh who aspired to be a writer. It was a place where magic happened: Men and women wrote true stories about real people. I fell in love with writing those kinds of stories and my passion for it has never changed. First as a reporter on the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and The Courier News in Bridgewater, N.J., and later as the editor of three university magazines, writing stories about real people, places and events has been my passion. And passion is where good storytelling begins. It’s never been “just the facts, ma’am.” During my career, I also worked for a large health-care network, writing stories about the people who deliver care and the patients who receive it. Later, as a content writer, I knew telling good stories – not writing ad copy – was the best way to build a brand in a compelling and memorable way. When I earned a Master of Fine Arts degree, I considered writing poetry or plays, but the pull of the true story remained strong and I focused on creative nonfiction. I started writing about my own life – and began helping to teach others how to write their stories. I’ve taught writing in a hospice bereavement program, adult education workshops and in a college class called “The Power of Story.” Growing Up On The Gridiron, my first nonfiction book, gave me a new opportunity to tell a true story with the kind of detail and depth I’ve always brought to my work. That’s my true story."