Shonda Buchanan, interim chair/asst. prof. in the Department of English & Modern Foreign Language Hampton University, teaches creative writing, composition, editing, and research. An  award-winning poet, her expertise includes narrative nonfiction, African American/American Indian poetry, memoir, and fiction.

Richard Bausch is the author of twelve novels, eight books of stories, and a volume of poems and prose. His ninth book of stories, Living in the Weather of the World, is nearing completion.

Percival Everett is the author of a bunch of novels, a few collections of stories, and a couple of volumes of poems. His latest books are Half an Inch of Water and Trouts Lie. He is Distinguished Professor of English at the University of Southern California.

Judy Grahn is internationally known as a poet, writer, and cultural theorist, and for having helped fuel feminist, gay and lesbian activism, and women’s spirituality movements since the 1960s. Recent publications include Love Belongs to Those Who Do the Feeling, The Judy Grahn Reader, and A Simple Revolution: the Making of an Activist Poet. Her forthcoming book is Hanging On Our Own Bones. Judy is a retired professor, continues writing and teaching, and co-edits an online journal based in her theory of menstrual ritual origins of human culture: Metaformia Journal.