Category: Author’s Answer

Leah Angstman is the author of the debut novel of King William’s War in 17th-century New England, OUT FRONT THE FOLLOWING SEA (Regal House, January 2022), and the editor-in-chief of Alternating Current Press and The Coil magazine.

Steven Schwartz’s first novel, Therapy, was a Barnes and Noble Discover Selection and a finalist for the Harold U. Ribalow Award from Hadassah Magazine. His second novel, A Good’s Doctor’s Son, won the Colorado Book Award for the Novel. His stories, collected in four volumes, have received two O.Henry Prize Story Awards, the Nelson Algren Award from the Chicago Tribune, the Cohen Award from Ploughshares, the Foreword Review Gold Medal, the Sherwood Anderson Prize, and a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship. He lives in Fort Collins, Colorado.

Adesina Brown is a 21 year-old, queer, non-binary author who centers QTPOC in all their work. They have been previously published in Rigorous Magazine, Coffee People Zine, and more. Where the Rain Cannot Reach is their debut novel.

Sandra Cavallo Miller is a retired academic family physician in Phoenix who has helped launch hundreds of medical students and residents into their careers. Her unlikely path to medicine includes degrees in anthropology and creative writing at the University of Illinois before attending Rush Medical College. Her essays and poetry have been published in JAMA, PULSE – Voices from the Heart of Medicine, Under the Sun, and Embark, among others, as well as a trilogy about a woman physician at the Grand Canyon Clinic on the South Rim (THE COLOR OF ROCK / WHERE LIGHT COMES AND GOES / WHAT THE RIVER SAID). WHERE NO ONE SHOULD LIVE is her fourth novel.

Cameron MacKenzie is the author of the short story collection River Weather, from Alternating Current Press. His other books include the novel, The Beginning of His Excellent and Eventful Career, and monograph Badiou and American Modernist Poetics.

Jennifer Fliss (she/her) is a Seattle-based writer with over 200 stories and essays that have appeared in F(r)iction, PANK, Hobart, The Rumpus, The Washington Post, and elsewhere. She was a Pen Parentis Fellow and recipient of a Grant for Artist Project award from Artist’s Trust. She has been nominated four times for The Pushcart Prize and her story, Hineni, was selected for inclusion in the Best Small Fictions 2019 anthology. Her flash fiction collection, The Predatory Animal Ball will be published in late 2021. She is an alumna of the Tin House Summer and Winter Writers’ Workshops.

Briana Cole is an acclaimed author, motivational speaker, sex educator and actress. Her novels are known for exploring unconventional relationships and making readers question all expectations about love, lust, and monogamy – her latest release is Couples Wanted. An Atlanta native, she graduated cum laude from Georgia Southern University and is a proud member of the Delta Sigma Theta Sorority. Her motto and ultimate drive toward success is a famous quote from Mae West: “You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.”

KAREN E. OSBORNE’s  novels followed a forty-year career, first as an academic administrator and then co-owner of The Osborne Group, serving as a consultant, trainer, and motivational speaker. Now Karen writes women’s fiction/suspense novels full time.

Getting It Right, published by Akashic Books, came out in June 2017, and was featured in Essence Magazine and Poets & Writers. Tangled Lies, Black Rose Writing, was released on July 22, 2021. It was chosen as a 2021 BestThriller.com finalist. Reckonings is due out on June 16, 2022.

Prior to writing Sometimes Shells Make Sand, author Julie Doyle Cullen spent thirty years as an executive, mostly in the media business. During the pandemic, Julie transitioned her career to a company of community-based healthcare centers focused on senior adults. Julie currently resides in St. Clair Shores, Michigan with her husband Mark. They have three adult daughters between them that they love dearly: Kylie, Caitlin, and Erin. Unfortunately, Winnie the Labradoodle recently passed away, and is currently running wild in heaven reunited with her previous owner, Suzanne, Julie’s mother.

Gina Yates’s debut novel NARCISSUS NOBODY was released in April 2021 by Three Rooms Press. As the youngest daughter of the late American literary master Richard Yates, Gina always felt a natural impulse to craft stories that illuminate shared human vulnerabilities. After attending the University of British Columbia in the early nineties, she sidestepped higher academia, opting instead to hone her fiction writing skills along a less conventional path of world travel and entrepreneurship. Gina currently lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico with her two rescue dogs Fannie and Scarlett, and she is the owner/operator of an eclectic vintage clothing shop.