Madge McKeithen is the author of Blue Peninsula: Essential Words for a Life of Loss and Change. Her writing has been published in TriQuarterly, Utne Reader, The New York Times Book Review, Best American Essays 2011, and in anthologies. She teaches nonfiction writing at the New School in New York.

Jessica Handler is the author of Braving the Fire: A Guide to Writing Through Grief and Invisible Sisters: A Memoir. Her nonfiction has appeared widely, including Tin House, Brevity, Drunken Boat, and the Chattahoochee Review.

Arlene Kim's first collection of poems, What have you done to our ears to make us hear echoes?, won the American Book Award. Her work has appeared in diode, DIAGRAM, Blackbird, and Cha. She reads for the DMQ Review.

Kate Sweeney’s forthcoming book, American Afterlife, follows ordinary Americans who find themselves involved with death and memorialization. She curates the popular nonfiction reading series True Story, and produces radio stories for Atlanta’s NPR station, WABE.

Nick Twemlow’s debut book of poems, Palm Trees, received the 2013 Norma Farber First Book Award from the Poetry Society of America. His films have played at Tribeca, South by Southwest, Slamdance, and many other festivals. He is an editor at Canarium Books and a senior editor of the Iowa Review.