Goldie Goldbloom’s first novel, The Paperbark Shoe, won the AWP Novel Award. Her short fiction has been published in Ploughshares, Prairie Schooner, and Narrative. She teaches at Northwestern and the University of Chicago and is the recipient of NEA and Dora Maar fellowships. She is an LGBT activist.

Sarah Stone is the author of The True Sources of the Nile and coauthor, with Ron Nyren, of Deepening Fiction: A Practical Guide for Intermediate and Advanced Writers. She teaches creative writing for Stanford University and in the MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College.

Yehoshua November is the author of two books of poetry, God's Optimism, a finalist for the L.A. Times Book Prize, and Two Worlds Exist, a finalist for the National Jewish Book Award and the Paterson Poetry Prize. November teaches at Touro College and Rutgers University. yehoshuanovember.com

Matthue Roth is the author of the picture book My First Kafka and several books without pictures, including the novel Never Mind the Goldbergs and Yom Kippur a Go-Go, a memoir. By day, he's a creative writer at Google.

Riva Lehrer is an artist and writer based in Chicago, known for portraiture that addresses the stigmatized body. Her art has been seen in major museums and galleries; her essays appear in multiple venues. She is on faculty at SAIC, and is at work on her first book, Golem Girl Gets Lucky.