Jessica Faust is co-editor and poetry editor of the Southern Review, which she joined in 2004. She has composed lyrics for the award-winning and critically acclaimed records I the River, Hummingbird, Go!, and Street Parade.

Michael Knight the author of two novels, Divining Rod and The Typist; two collections of short stories, Dogfight and Other Stories and Goodnight, Nobody; and a book of novellas, The Holiday Season. He teaches creative writing at the University of Tennessee.

David St. John is the author of eleven collections of poetry (including Study for the World’s Body, nominated for the National Book Award), and most recently, The Auroras and The Window. He teaches in the PhD program in literature and creative writing at the University of Southern California. 

Anna Journey is the author of the poetry collections Vulgar Remedies and If Birds Gather Your Hair for Nesting, which was selected by Thomas Lux for the National Poetry Series. She is an assistant professor of English at the University of Southern California.

Bonnie Jo Campbell wrote the bestselling novel Once Upon a River, American Salvage: Stories, and other works. She was a finalist for the National Book Award and National Book Critics Circle Award, has won the AWP award for short fiction and the Eudora Welty Prize. She teaches at Pacific University and is a 2011 Guggenheim Fellow.