Leslie Jill Patterson's work has appeared in Pushcart XLIII, Prime Number Magazine, Hotel Amerika, and other journals. She teaches at Texas Tech University and serves as editor of Iron Horse. Her awards include a Soros Justice Fellowship and the Richard J. Margolis Award for Social Justice Writing.

David R. Dow is the Cullen Professor at the University of Houston Law Center, where he teaches constitutional law and theory and death penalty law. Dow and his team have represented more than 100 death row inmates in their state and federal appeals. His seven books include two memoirs and a novel.

Shani Gilchrist is a freelance journalist, essayist, and critic who seeks to highlight the nuance in America's history and discourse. Her work has appeared in Tthe Literary Hub and the Daily Beast, with essays about race, gender, and inequality in Catapult, the Toast, Longreads, and elsewhere.