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Author Directory
Authors listed alphabetically. Book titles link to bookstore pages when available.
A. B. C. D. E. F. G. H. I. J. K. L. M. N. O. P. Q. R. S. T. U. V. W. X. Y. Z
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Kathryn J. Abajian is the author of First Sight of the Desert: Discovering the Art of Ella Peacock. A native Californian, she has lived in the San Francisco Bay Area, where she teaches writing and literature, since the early 1970s. Her work has appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle Magazine, Salon, and Travelers’ Tales.
“This is a thoughtful, sensitive, and very honest double portrait of a painter and of the writer who attempts to capture her lonely artistry in words, only to discover that both their stories are inextricably mirrored. It successfully comb ines biography, art history, the literature of place, and the personal essay.” — Phillip Lopate
website: www.kathrynabajian.com.e-mail: kathryn@kathrynabajian.com
Lisa Alpine is a co-author of Wild Writing Women: Stories of World Travel (Globe Pequot Press). She is the travel columnist for the Pacific Sun in Marin County and was founding publisher of THE FAX, a community newspaper. Her work has appeared in numerous periodicals and anthologies. When not acting as book midwife and writing coach, she works as a freelance writer and teaches writing at The Writing Salon in San Francisco and Book Passage in Corte Madera.
website: www.lisaalpine.com.e-mail: writing@lisaalpine.com.good works: www.wildwritingwomen.com
Mark Arax A native of Fresno and a PEN Award winner, journalist Mark Arax chronicled his ongoing search for his father’s killers in his memoir, In My Father’s Name: A Family, a Town, a Murder. He also is co-author of The King of California.
“Almost every American town harbors some brutal secret, but few produce writers like Mark Arax with both the courage and artistic talent needed to coax the story out and shape it into fine literature.” — Los Angeles Times columnist Peter King.
e-mail: mark.arax@sbcglobal.net
Stacy Bierlein is a Los Angeles-based short fiction writer whose current works appear in various literary magazines and anthologies, including All Hands On, Cairn, Clackamas Literary Review, Emergence, Oyez Review, Pearl, PMS, So to Speak, Standards: An International Journal of Multicultural Studies, and Young Wives Tales: New Adventures in Love and Partnership. She serves as a contributing editor to Other Voices, and a senior editor to the new book imprint, OV Books.
“Stacy Bierlein’s short fiction is elegant, sensuous, and tough too. In addition to story, there’s rhythm here — heart and depth and precision. Reading them on the page I am struck with their lyricism and urgency.” — Lisa Glatt, author of A Girl Becomes a Comma Like That
website: www.othervoicesmagazine.org
Ray Bradbury The author of more than five hundred published works — short stories, novels, plays, screenplays, television scripts, and verse. Ray Bradbury’s books include The Martian Chronicles, The Illustrated Man, Fahrenheit 451, Dandelion Wine and Something Wicked This Way Comes.
“The jails are full of one million non-readers. We can’t let it happen again. If you allow another generation to grow up to be 12 years old without the ability to read, write, and think, we’re sunk.” — Ray Bradbury
website: www.raybradbury.com.e-mail: RayBradbury@harpercollins.com
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Catherine Brady is the author of two story collections, Curled in the Bed of Love, winner of the 2002 Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction, and The End of the Class War. Her stories have appeared in many journals and in Best American Short Stories 2004.
“Brady’s characters are painstakingly particularized, emotionally, complex, of their time and place: northern California in the late decades of the twentieth century… It’s rare for a writer to explore with such subtlety and respect the curious symbiosis of the needy and the needed as Brady does.” — Joyce Carol Oates, The New York Review of Books
e-mail: bradyc@usfca.edu
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Cecilia Manguerra Brainard Born in the Philippines and now a Santa Monica resident, Cecilia Manguerra Brainard is the author and editor of a dozen books, including the internationally acclaimed novel, When the Rainbow Goddess Wept (University of Michigan Press); Magdalena; and Growing Up Filipino: Stories for Young Adults (PALH). Most of her books explore her Philippine and Philippine-American experiences. She has received several awards including a California Arts Council Fellowship in Fiction, a Brody Arts Fund Award, a Certificate of Recognition from the California State Senate 21st District, and a Special Recognition Award for her work dealing with Asian American youths.
website: www.ceciliabrainard.com.e-mail: cbrainard@aol.com
Lynette Brasfield Lynette Brasfield’s novel Nature Lessons (St. Martin’s Press, May 2003) tells the haunting story of a woman’s search for her missing, mentally ill mother; it’s also a reflection on love and loss and guilt, and the unique perspective each of us brings to the universe. Five percent of book profits funds a Get Involved for Mental Health Scholarship.
“Nature Lessons is a striking debut…Lynette Brasfield movingly explores the weight of love between a mother and daughter and the complex legacy it leaves behind. Set against the turbulent backdrop of South Africa, the novel is both illuminating and absorbing.” — Gail Tsukiyama, author of Dreaming Water.
website: www.literati.net/Brasfield.e-mail: lbrasfield@literati.net
Richard Alan Bunch Born in Honolulu, Richard Alan Bunch grew up in the Napa Valley. His poetry works include A Foggy Morning and Wading the Russian River. Night Blooms is a selection of journal entries on philosophy, literature, and religion. His stories have appeared in several venues. He is also author of the play, The Russian River Returns. His poetry has appeared in California Quarterly, Black Moon, Oregon Review, Long Islander, James River Poetry Review and the Hawaii Review. His latest poetry collection is Running for Daybreak. He resides in Davis, California.
e-mail: rgbunch@ucdavis.edu
Allison Burnett lives in Los Angeles, where he works as a screenwriter. His debut novel, Christopher, was a finalist for the 2004 PEN Center USA Literary Award in Fiction. Allison’s second novel, The House Beautiful, was published in September 2006. His latest novel, published by Vintage Books in 2009, is Undiscovered Gyrl.
“Part Truman Capote, part Oscar Wilde, part Humbert Humbert, part Dr. Pangloss, and yet uniquely himself, B.K. Troop is that rarest find: an unexpected and entirely engaging new character. It is B.K.’s voice — his allusions, fulminations, deprecations and ultimately his hapless, hopeless romanticism — that makes this fine first novel such an enjoyable romp.” — Los Angeles Times
website: allisonburnett.com
Eve La Salle Caram is the author of four novels, including Dear Corpus Christi; Wintershine; Rena, A Late Journey; and The Blue Geography. She is the editor of a collection of stories. She teaches Fiction Writing in the Writers’ Program, UCLA Extension and Literature and Writing at California State University Northridge. She also currently teaches at Los Angeles City College.
David Carkeet was born and raised in Sonora, California. His most recent novels are The Full Catastrophe and The Error of Our Ways, both of them New York Times Book Review “Notable Books of the Year.”
“David Carkeet wrote The Greatest Slump of All Time, a baseball novel so funny that audiobook manufacturers hesitate to record it for fear of vehicular liability.” — San Francisco Chronicle Book Review Editor David Kipen, writing in The Atlantic
website: www.geocities.com/davidcarkeet/.e-mail: davidcarkeet@hotmail.com
Beverly Cleary Perhaps best known as the creator of the irrepressible Ramona Quimby, Beverly Cleary is the Newberry Award-winning author of numerous children’s books, including Ramona the Pest, Henry Huggins, Risby, Dear Mr. Henshaw, Sister of the Bride, Ralph S. Mouse, Romona Forever, Ramona’s World and the Ramona Boxed Set. She lives in Carmel.
“Cleary is adept at taking everyday events and making the reader see the humor and delight in simple things. Everyone will want to visit with this old friend.” — Sharon Salluzzo, Children’s Literature
Michelle Cliff Michelle Cliff is a Jamaican-American writer whose work includes the short story collections Bodies of Water and The Store of a Million Items — the latter chosen by The Village Voice as one of the best books of 1998. Her novels are Abeng, No Telephone to Heaven, and Free Enterprise. She is the recipient of two NEA fellowships and a Fulbright Distinguished Scholar, New Zealand. She currently resides along California’s Central Coast.
“Free Enterprise is an angry, gaudy, multicultural storm of a historical novel. At the heart of this story are two African-American women, comrades of abolitionist John Brown. Michelle Cliff brings together a fabulous cast of outsiders to retell New World history from the women warriors’ point of view.” — Elle.
website: www.citylights.com
Mark Coggins Author of The Immortal Game and Vulture Capital, Mark has been nominated for multiple book awards and his work has appeared in several best of the year lists, including those compiled by the San Francisco Chronicle and the Detroit Free Press. He lives in San Francisco with his wife, Linda, and their cat, Taki.
“From the boardrooms of Palo Alto to the wineries of Napa, [he] gives us Northern California in the 21st century, as noir as it ever was … Po Bronson, for all his talents, did not catch the Valley’s entrepreneurial/venture capital lifeblood … as unerringly as Coggins does.” — Salon.com
Website: www.immortalgame.com.e-mail: coggins@immortalgame.com
Sharleen Cooper Cohen Best-selling author of seven, internationally published novels: The Day After Tomorrow; Regina’s Song; The Ladies of Beverly Hills; Marital Affairs; Love, Sex and Money; Lives of Value; and Innocent Gestures. Also wrote the musicals Sheba (book and lyrics), Blackout (book and lyrics) and Stormy Weather, The Story of Lena Horne (book), which was awarded Honorable Mention in the Stage Play Script category of the Writer’s Digest 2000 Competition.
Website: www.sharleencoopercohen.com.e-mail: sccInc1@aol.com
Adrian Colesberry A biomedical engineer by training, Adrian spent a decade working in pharmaceutical manufacturing. In the evenings, after work, he did stand-up comedy, proving once more the age-old formula: corporate drug manufacturing + time (approx 2 hours) = comedy. After divorcing, Adrian found humbler employment as an extra in film and TV. It was during his Zen-like retreat into extra-land that Adrian wrote the memoir, How to Make Love to Adrian Colesberry (Penguin). He lives in Los Angeles.
“A few months ago, a book arrived with the most ludicrous title, and I had to flip to the first page to see if its hubris was warranted. I kept laughing, one graph after the next. After I chortled my way through a few chapters, I realized, This may be satire… but it’s also the most honest sex talk I’ve seen from a man in a very long time. Women would really learn a thing or two from this.” — Susie Bright
website: www.adriancolesberry.com.email: acolesberry@yahoo.com
Dora E. H. Crow is the author and illustrator of the children’s book, Winky & Wonder: Book I and Book II. Told with humor and excitement, these tales of adventure and triumph-over-evil present lessons about virtues, moral choices, accountability for one’s own actions, forgiveness, and life’s realities. Mrs. Crow lives in Santa Cruz County.
“Winky and Wonder are two courageous Whisper Children from Whisperland. Invisible to humans’ eyes and unheard by their ears, Winky and Wonder whisper directly to human children’s hearts, encouraging them to listen to what they already know deep inside.” — Winky & Wonder: Book I and Book II.
website: www.winkyandwonder.com
Kamau Daáood A mythic figure in the Southern California arts scene, Kamau Daáood is a performance poet, educator and community arts activist who is widely acknowledged as a major driving force behind Los Angeles’ black cultural renaissance. He is the author of two chapbooks, and a spoken word album, Leimert Park, named after the thriving Los Angeles community that is fast becoming the west coast’s black cultural mecca. The Language of Saxophones is his first book, a long-awaited selection from a lifetime of poetry.
“I was taught that the concept of the local artist is a noble one. That to live and work in a community and to be known for that work, is very dignified.” — Kamau Daáood
website: www.citylights.com
Antonio Damasio. An internationally renown neuroscientist, Antonio Damasio is the author of The Feeling of What Happens: Body and Emotion in the Making of Consciousness; Descartes’ Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain and Looking for Spinoza: Joy, Sorrow, and the Feeling Brain. Since 2005, he has been Director of the Brain and Creativity Institute at USC.
“In clear, accessible and at times eloquent prose, Damasio is outlining nothing less than a new vision of the human soul, integrating body and mind, thought and feeling, individual survival and altruism, humanity and nature, ethics and evolution.” — The San Francisco Chronicle.
website: http://www.usc.edu/schools/college/faculty/faculty1008328.html
Patricia Volonakis Davis Patricia V. Davis is the author of Harlot’s Sauce: A Memoir of Food, Family, Love, Loss, and Greece, billed as “an exhilarating sail on the Greek seas through xenophobia, dysfunctional family units, religious ravings, obsessive protocols, political disorder, European football, and fabulous food.” She also is the founder and editor-in-chief of the non-partisan Harlots’ Sauce Radio e-magazine and podcast. Patricia lives in Northern California in Sleepy Hollow.
websites: www.patriciavdavis.com.www.harlotssauce.com
Lucille Lang Day Lucille Lang Day’s first poetry collection, Self-Portrait with Hand Microscope, was selected for the Joseph Henry Jackson Award in Literature by Robert Pinsky, David Littlejohn, and Michael Rubin. Her other poetry collections are Infinities, Wild One, and Fire in the Garden. She also has a chapbook in the “Greatest Hits” series from Pudding House Publications.
“Few books of poems have the sheer narrative intensity of Lucille Lang Day’s Wild One. It sweeps the reader up like a powerful coming-of-age novel — half hilarious, half heartbreaking — but always with the sharp lyric edge of genuine poetry.” — Dana Gioia
Website: www.scarlettanager.com.e-mail: lucyday@earthlink.net
Joan Del Monte A resident of Venice, Ca, Joan taught a course in writing the mystery called “A Guide To The Pitfalls From Someone Who Has Fallen Into Most of Them.” She is the author of Plonk Goes the Weasel (2004) and Death had a Yellow Thumb (2005). She also wrote a bibliography on antiques for Los Angeles Public Library.
“The centuries old saffron mystique is a terrific device for a mystery.” — The Literary Guild, on Death had a Yellow Thumb
website: www.joandelmonte.com
David Dodd The author/editor/annotator of three books about the Grateful Dead, David Dodd is the City Librarian of San Rafael, California. He has reviewed books for Library Journal and the San Francisco Chronicle. He hopes to turn his efforts toward his fiction.
website: http://arts.ucsc.edu/gdead/agdl/david.html.e-mail: ddodd@well.com
Laurel Doud is a native Californian whose debut novel, This Body, was published in hardback, paperback, and translated into German. Film rights for This Body were optioned by Fox 2000, then Hartbreak Productions for Melissa Joan Hart, respectively. She is working on a next novel set in Berlin Germany before World War I and Hollywood in the 1920s-1930s. Doud is a research librarian and lives in the Sierra Foothills outside Fresno.
“A frisky, riveting debut… With Doud’s brightly visceral prose and deft sense of tragicomedy, This Body proves equally engrossing for the senses, soul, and mind.” — Megan Harlan, Entertainment Weekly
website: www.hachettebookgroupusa.com
email: ldoud555@aol.com
Joel Drucker This Oakland-based writer is one of the world’s leading tennis journalists. First book, Jimmy Connors Saved My Life (2004), set largely in LA. Wrote five major cover stories for San Diego Reader, including “A Jew & The California Dream” and “San Diego’s Tennis Curse.” Work cited in Best American Sports Writing.
e-mail: JDruck@aol.com
Wylene Dunbar Author of Margaret Cape, winner of Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters’ 1998 Best Fiction prize. She lives in Nevada City, California. Her second novel is My Life with Corpses (Harcourt, June 2004).
“Wylene Dunbar found a wonderful central metaphor . . . then invested it with life, passion, and an eerie resonance into the spirit of these troubled times. . . .a stunning new novel.” — Pulitzer Prize winner Robert Olen Butler said of My Life with Corpses
website: www.wylenedunbar.com . e-mail: wylene@wylenedunbar.com
Mikel Dunham is the author of the “Rhea Buerklin” murder mystery series (St.Martins Press), Stilled Life and Casting for Murder. He is also a reknown photographer and artist. He was the art director for two Nyingma Buddhist temples: one in Sarnath, India, and one in upstate New York. His photographic history, Samye: A Pilgrimage to the Birthplace of Tibetan Buddhism, was published in 2003. His newest book, Buddha’s Warriors, will be released by Tarcher/Penguin in January 2005. Buddha’s Warriors is a history of the Tibetan resistance who fought the Chinese invasion in 1950 and based on seven years of interviews with the warriors who led the resistance.
“…I am glad that Mikel Dunham has been able to tell these brave men’s story in this book, much as they told it to him.” — The Dalai Lama says of Buddha’s Warriors.
Dave Eggers Editor of McSweeney’s literary magazine, Dave Eggers is the author of A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, You Shall Know our Velocity (2002) and other books.
“Feldman takes the anecdotes of memory to give us a glimpse of life. The writing is simple, direct and unencumbered with self-consciousness.” — Hubert Selby Jr., author of Last Exit to Brooklyn.
e-mail: efeldman3@san.rr.com
Bill Fitzhugh Bill Fitzhugh is the author of the comic thrillers, Pest Control and Cross Dressing, now in development at Warner Brothers and Universal Studios respectively. He also wrote The Organ Grinders, an ode to human organ trafficking. Fender Benders won The Lefty Award for best humorous novel of 2001. Cross Dressing received the 2002 best fiction award from the Mississippi Library Association. His political satire, Heart Seizure, was published in March 2003. His sixth novel, Radio Activity will be published in 2004. The author lives in Los Angeles where he is currently at work on his next book.
“Fitzhugh is a strange and deadly amalgam of screenwriter and comic novelist and his facility and wit, and his taste for the perverse, put him in a league with Carl Hiaasen and Elmore Leonard.” — The New York Times
website: www.billfitzhugh.com.e-mail: bfitzhugh@earthlink.net.good works: www.flight711.com
Anjuelle Floyd A psychotherapist and writer, Anjuelle Floyd reveals the torment of secrets in Keeper of Secret … Translations of an Incident, a collection of short stories. She lives in the Oakland East Bay Area.
“Karmic truth, the effect of our decisions with our secrets and our deepest loves, comes back and squeeze the hearts of these characters…” — Clive Matson, author of Let the Crazy Child Write! and winner of the PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Literary Award for Outstanding Writing.
website:www.anjuellefloyd.com
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Sesshu Foster Sesshu Foster teaches composition and literature in East L.A. He is the author of four volumes of poetry — Angry Days, City Terrace Field Manual, American Loneliness and World Ball Notebook — and a novel, Atomik Aztex.
“This is pure California mainlined straight into language that sears the skin off 99 percent of what purports to be literary competence.” — Alvin Lu, The San Francisco Bay Guardian
website: www.citylights.com . www.english.uiuc.edu.e-mail: sesshu@earthlink.net
Amy Friedman has published two memoirs, Kick the Dog and Shoot the Cat and Nothing Sacred: A Conversation with Feminism. Amy also writes “Tell Me A Story,” the internationally syndicated column for children. Tell Me A Story, the audiobook she recently wrote and produced, was awarded the 2006 Parents’ Choice Silver Honors for Story telling and the NAPPA Gold Medal for 2006. She lives in Los Angeles.
website: www.mythsandtales.com.e-mail: kellsmom@comcast.net
Kathi Kamen Goldmark is the author of And My Shoes Keep Walking Back to You, a novel published by Chronicle Books in 2002. She is the co-author of The Great Rock & Roll Joke Book and Mid-Life Confidential: The Rock Bottom Remainders Tour America with Three Chords and an Attitude. She also is the founder of the all-author rock band The Rock Bottom Remainders; president and janitor of Don’t Quit Your Day Job Records; and producer of the coast-to-coast radio show “West Coast Live.” She lives in San Francisco.
Website: www.dqydj.com
Peter Grandbois is the author of the novel, The Gravedigger (Chronicle Books 2006). He received a Pushcart Prize honorable mention for “All or Nothing at the Fabergé,” a work from his short story collection titled A Single, Straight Line. His translation into English of San Juan: Ciudad Soñada by Edgardo Rodríguez Juliá was nominated for both the PEN Book of the Month Club award and the Lewis Gallantiere award. Grandbois is a former member of the United States National Fencing Team and a silver medalist at the 1993 U.S. National Championships. He is a professor of Creative Writing and Contemporary Literature at California State University in Sacramento.
“Readers who revel in magic realism will embrace this poignant debut about a poor but honest Spaniard with a gift for communicating with the dead. Reminiscent of the work of Luis Alberto Urrea and Gabriel García Márquez, this luminous first offering brims with earthy humor and heart” — Booklist starred review
website: brothersgrandbois.com.email: peter@brothersgrandbois.com
Reyna Grande Born in Guerrero, Mexico, Reyna Grande moved to the U.S. in 1985 at ten years of age. She was a 2003 Emerging Voices Fellow. In her first novel, Across a Hundred Mountains (Simon & Schuster, June 2006), Grande uses her own experience of growing up in Mexico without her parents, and then crossing the border as an undocumented person, to give life to her main character. She lives in Los Angeles.
website: www.reynagrande.com.e-mail: reynagrande@yahoo.com
Sands Hall is the author of the novel, Catching Heaven, a Random House Reader’s Circle Selection and a finalist for a Willa Award (Women Writing the West), Best Contemporary Fiction. She is also the author of a book of essays and exercises, Tools of the Writer’s Craft. Her produced plays include an adaptation of Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women and the drama Fair Use.
website: www.sandshall.com.e-mail: sands@sandshall.com
Jean Harfenist is the award-winning author of A Brief History of the Flood (Knopf 2002; Vintage 2003). A native of Minnesota, she now lives in Southern California.
“Wonderfully wry-melancholy….An auspicious and stirring debut.” — Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times
website: www.randomhouse.com.e-mail: harf@west.net
Eloise Klein Healy is the author of six books of poetry, including the The Islands Project: Poems For Sappho (Red Hen Press, 2007). She founded the MFA in Creative Writing Program at Antioch University Los Angeles and Arktoi Books (an imprint of Red Hen Press), and co-founded ECO-ARTS, an eco-tourism arts venture.
website: www.eloisekleinhealy.com.e-mail: contact.ekh@mac.com
Jack Hirschman Named Poet Laureate in San Francisco in 2006, Jack Hirschman was born in New York City in 1933 and has lived since 1973 in San Francisco. He has published more than 25 translations of poetry from eight languages. Among his many volumes of poetry are A Correspondence of Americans (Indiana University Press., 1960), Lyripol (City Lights, 1976), The Bottom Line (Curbstone, 1988), Endless Threshold (Curbstone, 1992), and Front Lines (City Lights, 2002).
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Khaled Hosseini was born in Kabul, Afghanistan. He attended Santa Clara University and graduated from UC San Diego School of Medicine. The Kite Runner was his first novel.
website: www.khaledhosseini.com
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Freeman House Author of Totem Salmon: Life Lessons from Another Species, winner of the BABRA best non-fiction award and the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ Harold D.Vursell Award for quality of prose.
“Discovering salmon proves to be a path to self and community, to a large spiritual and natural etiquette … As someone said, ‘To work on behalf of the wild is to restore culture.’ This grave and delightful book — both personal and cosmic — shows how that works.” — Gary Snyder
website: www.freemanhouse.net.e-mail: lfhouse@inreach.com.good works: www.mattole.org
Laurel House Co-author, The Gurus’ Guide to Serenity: A Me-Time Menu of Celebrity Stress Reducers (HarperCollins). Co-author, Raise the Barre (HarperCollins 2006). Co-author, Foundation Fitness (Wiley, January 08). West Coast Editor, Fit Magazine and Fit Yoga Magazine. Beauty Editor Healing Lifestyles and Spas Magazine.
website: www.byLaurelHouse.com.e-mail: laurel@bylaurelhouse.com
Kate Hovey is the award–winning author of three books of poetry for young people, Arachne Speaks, Ancient Voices and Voices of the Trojan War, all published by Margaret K. McElderry Books, an imprint of Simon and Schuster. A maskmaker and poet, Hovey combines her lifelong love of Greek mythology with poetry and the 20,000 year–old art of the mask to bring the gods and goddesses of ancient Greece to life for students in classrooms across the country.
“Kate Hovey’s verse is an excellent storytelling medium–clear, pictorial, full of action…the poems use a great variety of perspectives and (with good classical precedent) let us in on the very human feelings of the immortals.” — Richard Wilbur, Pulitzer Prize winner and Poet Laureate of the United States, 1987
website: www.KateHovey.com
Edward Humes A Pulitzer Prize winning journalist, Edward Humes is the best-selling author of nine nonfiction books, including Baby E.R., No Matter How Loud I Shout, Mean Justice, Mississippi Mud, and Monkey Girl. His latest is Eco Barons: The Dreamers, Schemers and Millionaires Who are Saving the Planet(2009). Ed frequently lectures at universities and conferences, and enjoys teaching narrative nonfiction writing workshops. He lives in Southern California.
“Humes succeeds where many would have failed because he is working out of the best American tradition of nonfiction narrative, of literary journalism, by paying homage to practitioners of the craft such as John McPhee, Joan Didion, Richard Rhodes and Tom Wolfe.” — The Los Angeles Times
website: www.edwardhumes.com.e-mail: contact@edwardhumes.com
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Susan Schott Karr A San Francisco resident, Susan Schott Karr is the author of nine nonfiction children’s books, which have been published by Pearson Learning Group for use in the classroom as part of an effort to motivate reticent readers to read. For the past nineteen years, Karr has edited and written financial, technical, and marketing communications for more than forty Fortune 500 companies, as well as for many smaller ones. She has published more than forty-five magazine articles in Financial Executive and Compliance Week magazines.
“When I was a supervising editor in educational publishing, Susan was one of my best go-to writers for children’s nonfiction books. She can write on any subject, she is never fazed by guideline changes and always meets her deadlines, and her work is consistently accurate and engaging” — Cindy Kane
website: www.wordsuite.com. email: susankarr@wordsuite.com
T. Katz Working as a television production associate on hundreds of children’s animated tv shows, the author has had plenty of exposure to subjects that help kids learn while being entertained. The children’s chapter books, Miss L’eau and Pythagoras were written with that in mind. Miss L’eau is a story that weaves fantasy and fact about two boys and their efforts to organize an annual seaside cleanup. Pythagoras is an informative and touching book about the love of music.
“Students discover how to turn ocean science to advocacy and stewardship for healthy seas when Miss L’eau floods her classroom with the wonder and awe of ocean life. Miss L’eau is ocean literacy at its finest; it shines with bioluminescent light.” — Rob Moir, PhD, Director of Ocean River Institute
website: www.tkatz.com.email: tkatz@tkatz.com
Faye Kellerman The author of the Peter Decker/Rina Lazarus mystery series, Faye Kellerman’s novels include Stalker, Jupiter’s Bones, The Ritual Bath, The Forgotten, Serpent’s Tooth, Sanctuary and Prayers for the Dead. Her latest book is Stone Kiss (2002). She lives in Los Angeles with novelist husband Jonathan Kellerman.
website: www.mysterynet.com/kellerman_faye/
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Jonathan Kellerman Child psychologist turned author, Jonathan Kellerman writes psychological thrillers, including The Clinic, When the Bough Breaks, Blood Test, Over the Edge, Silent Partner, Time Bomb, Private Eyes, Devil’s Waltz, Bad Love, Self-Defense, The Web and The Murder Book. He lives in Los Angeles with novelist wife Faye Kellerman.
Susan Kelly-DeWitt Susan Kelly-DeWitt is a recipient of a Wallace Stegner Fellowship and author of five poetry collections, including A Camellia for Judy, Feather’s Hand, To A Small Moth, and The Book of Insects. She also has a chapbook in the Greatest Hits series from Puddinghouse Press. Her work appears in anthologies including Highway 99, A Literary Journey through California’s Great Central Valley (Heyday Books) and Claiming the Spirit Within (Beacon Press). She is former editor-in-chief of the online journal Perihelion, has written for the Sacramento Bee and has worked as program director for the Sacramento Poetry Center and the Women’s Wisdom Project, an arts program for homeless and low income women. Currently she teaches poetry workshops for University of California, Davis Extension.
website: http://www.versedaily.org/aboutskellydewittboi.shtml.e-mail: skellydewitt@gmail.com
Rochelle Krich Southern California mystery writer Rochelle Krich writes crime novels, including the Jessie Drake series ( Angel of Death, Blood Money, Dead Air and Shadows of Sin), Til Death Do Us Part and Nowhere to Run. The 2002 Blues in the Night begins the Molly Blume series.
“Krich shows that she really knows her stuff.” — The New York Times
website: www.rochellekrich.com
Leora Krygier grew up in Philadelphia but has lived in Los Angeles since the late 1970’s. Her novel, When She Sleeps, was released by Toby Press in December 2004.
“Her luminous prose transports the reader from the war-torn ruins of Ho Chi Minh City to the plastic suburbs of 1980’s California, with periodic jaunts through Paris and flashbacks to the Holocaust. She pays off with a poignant epic.” — Newsweek
website: www.leorakrygier.com . e-mail: lgkrygier@aol.com
Dean Koontz Southern California author of Lightning, Midnight, Cold Fire, Hideaway, Dragon Tears, Intensity, Sole Survivor, False Memory, By the Light of the Moon and other novels.
website: www.randomhouse.com/features/koontz/classic.html
Joe Kulbacki. Entrepreneur, farmer, vintner, outdoorsman, former professional athlete, and now author, Joseph Kulbacki is living the “American Dream”. Joe is author of America...A Nation That's Lost Its Way.
Website: http://America-A-Nation-Thats-Lost-Its-Way.Com
Vladimir Lange As a graduate of Harvard Medical School, Vladimir Lange’s fifteen years as a doctor of emergency medicine and his eighteen years as an international, award-winning medical multi-media producer — including his best-selling book, Be a Survivor: Your Guide to Breast Cancer Treatment — have prepared him for his current incarnation as a novelist of techno-medical thrillers. He is the author of Fatal Memories (Red Square Press, March 2005).
website: www.vladimirlange.com.e-mail: author@vladimirlange.com
Tony Lazzarini Prize-winning playwright and author of Never Trust A Man In Curlers and Highest Traditions. San Francisco native now living in Marin County, CA.
“Highest Traditions is the true story of the author’s experiances flying as a door gunner on a UH-1D (Huey) helicopter in Vietnam. Highest Traditions is one of the best Vietnam memoirs ever to cross my desk.” — RebeccaReads.com
website: www.tlazz.com . e-mail: tlazzarini@earthlink.net
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Lance Lee Poet, writer on film, novelist, educator, environmentalist. Contributor, On The Waterfront (July 2003); Becoming Human, Wrestling With The Angel, poetry; Second Chances, novel; A Poetics for Screenwriters and The Understructure of Writing for Film and Television (with Ben Brady), film; Time’s Up and Other Plays, Time’s Up, and Fox, Hound, and Huntress in Playwrights for Tomorrow, Vol. 10. The Cooked & The Raw, essays on screenwriting, film, and human nature is to come out in Spring, 2005 from the University of Texas Press.
On A Poetics for Screenwriters: “This is a brilliant, all-encompassing work. I cannot recall a book on screenwriting which delves so deeply into the art and antecedents of screenwriting. Aristotle himself would, no doubt, congratulate Lance Lee. However, without waiting for the great Greek’s response, put me down as a ‘Bravo!’ ” — William Froug, author of Screenwriting Tricks of the Trade and Zen and the Art of Screenwriting 2
e-mail: via Los Angeles literary agent Dorris Halsey, Reece Halsey Agency: gulyas911@aol.com
Paul Levine Paul Levine’s latest novel, Illegal, introduces combative L.A. lawyer Jimmy (Royal) Payne, on the trail of a beautiful Mexican woman who disappeared in a midnight border crossing. Levine is also the author of the Solomon vs. Lord series of legal thrillers, which have been nominated for the Edgar, Thriller, Macavity, and the James Thurber Humor Awards. Previously, he wrote the Jake Lassiter series. He lives in Southern California.
“Mystery writing at its very, very best.” — Larry King, USA Today
website: www.paul-levine.com
Aimee Liu The author of Flash House (2003), Liu also has written two other novels, Cloud Mountain (1997) and Face (1994). Her novels have been translated into more than a dozen languages. Liu published an acclaimed memoir of anorexia nervosa, Solitaire (1979), at the age of twenty-five. She has worked as an associate producer for NBC’s “Today” show, co-authored seven nonfiction books on medical and psychological topics and is past president of the national writers’ organization PEN Center USA. Liu teaches creative writing at UCLA Extension.
website: www.aimeeliu.net
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Dana Teen Lomax Dana Teen Lomax is the author of Disclosure (Dusie, 2009); Currency (Palm Press, 2006); Room (a+bend press, 1999); and the co-editor of Letters to Poets: Conversations about Poetics, Politics, and Community (Saturnalia Books, 2008). Her work has received the San Francisco Foundation’s Joseph Henry Jackson prize for poetry, among other awards, and has most recently appeared in UbuWeb, Jacket, Poets & Writers, and The Bay Poetics Anthology. She served as the Director of Small Press Traffic Literary Arts Center in San Francisco and currently edits Kindergarde: Avant-Garde Poems, Plays, & Stories for Children.
“This courageous and visionary book enacts and embodies a concrete “relational aesthetics” that gives poetic voices an epistolary space—for linguistic intimacy and soul-sharing. Don’t miss it!” — Cornel West writing about Letters to Poets
website: www.letterstopoets.org.email: danateen@hotmail.com
Venita Louise Venita Louise was born in Southern California, and grew up in the San Fernando Valley. Her poetry works include The Last Time and On Bended Bough, both winning honorable mentions. Her short stories and essays have appeared in several venues. Set in the mid-sixties, her comedy/romance novel, Mixed Nuts, depicts family dysfunction at its finest. Additional works include In The Rough, an adventure/romance novel, and Dead on the Money, a mystery novelset in the 1940’s. Venita resides in Castaic, California.
Website: VenitaLouise.net
Mary Mackey Mackey’s published works include four volumes of poetry ( Split Ends, One Night Stand, Skin Deep, and The Dear Dance of Eros); a novella ( Immersion); and nine novels ( McCarthy’s List; The Last Warrior Queen; A Grand Passion; Season of Shadows; The Kindness of Strangers; The Year The Horses Came; The Horses at the Gate; The Fires of Spring; and The Stand In). Her tenth novel is Sweet Revenge (Kensington/ 2004). Breaking The Fever is her fifth collection of poetry. She is a Professor of English and Writer in Residence at California State University in Sacramento, where she teaches creative writing and film.
website: www.marymackey.com
devorah major became the third Poet Laureate for San Francisco in 2002. Her poetry books include street smarts (Curbstone Press); where river meets ocean (City Lights Foundation); and with more than tongue (Creative Arts Books, Inc.). She has two novels published, An Open Weave (Seal Press) and Brown Glass Windows (Curbstone Press). Her poems, short stories, and essays are available in a number of magazines and anthologies. She has taught poetry and creative writing as community artist–in–residence and/or college lecturer for more than twenty years.
“A visionary of hope, with a heart big enough to embrace every neighborhood, street and alley in this magical and poetical city. Here is a poet who shoots straight as Cupid’s arrow. Zing! Right to the heart.” — Alejandro Murguia, author of This War Called Love, winner of the American Book Award 2003
website: www.citylights.com
M.L. Malcolm The author of Silent Lies, M.L.Malcolm would love to meet with or “call in” to your book club! Born in New York, Malcolm earned a B.A. and an M.A. in political science from Emory University, and a J.D. from Harvard Law School. She eventually determined that “she and the law were not meant for each other,” and is now a self-described “recovering attorney.” M.L. Malcolm spent a year in France as a Rotary Foundation Fellow, and has won several awards for her short fiction. She lives in Los Angeles.
“A fabulous writer with an astonishing romantic clarity….Add ‘Silent Lies‘ to your collection of treasures. Rating: 5 stars out of 5.” — The International Herald Daily News
website: www.SilentLies.com.e-mail: mlmalc2@aol.com
Rubén Martínez Martinez was born in Los Angeles and is an Emmy Award-winning journalist, poet and performer. He was a Loeb Fellow at Harvard University and an editor for the Pacific News Service. In 2002, he received a literary fellowship from the Lannan Foundation. He is the author of Crossing Over: A Mexican Family on the Migrant Trail; and The Other Side: Notes from the New L.A., Mexico City and Beyond. His newest book is The New Americans (The New Press, 2004), a companion to the PBS television series detailing the lives of migrant families.
Joe Mathews A journalist who spent eight years at the Los Angeles Times, Joe is known for his writing on California and LA politics, government, labor, education, real estate and media. His book, The People’s Machine: Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Rise of Blockbuster Democracy (PublicAffairs, 2006), offered a behind-the-scenes account of the governor’s switch to politics. Joe pursues his journalistic work as Irvine senior fellow at the New America Foundation.
“A powerful account of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s political ascent—and of his subsequent fall from public grace … a penetrating, inside look at the celebrity California governor and his team … at once critical and sympathetic. Set against the backdrop of California’s fascination with direct democracy, this book is a triumph of meticulous reporting and solid research.” — Lou Cannon, author of Reagan biographies
website: www.joemathews.com. email: joe@joemathews.com
Robyn McGee. A longtime activist and women’s rights advocate, Robyn McGee is the author of Hungry for More: A Keeping-it-Real Guide to Black Women’s Weight and Body Image. She is Director of Women’s Resources at California State University, Dominguez Hills, where she focuses on education and fundraising for women’s health issues. Her work has been published in Seventeen, The Black World Today, and Fireweed. She lives in Southern California with her daughter.
“I promise this book will make you feel full. McGee dares to go where few authors do — into the heart, stomach and pulse of the African-American female battle with hunger and weight. This is a personal and urgent account of how women are destroying ourselves — and how we can turn the tide away from hunger and obesity into freedom and power.” — Eve Ensler, playwright
website: www.robynwrites.com.e-mail: robyn@robynwrites.com
Elizabeth McKenzie is the author of the novel MacGregor Tells the World (Random House, 2007) and the collection Stop That Girl (Random House, 2005). She is currently a Lecturer at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
“A deliciously intelligent novel, funny and original and exact. McKenzie has a wonderful eye — and a relishing appetite — for the craziness that’s everywhere in ordinary things if you know how to look.” — Tessa Hadley, author of The Master Bedroom and Sunstroke and Other Stories
website: macgregortells.com
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Christina Meldrum Christina Meldrum is a Harvard Law School graduate and former litigator who lives in the San Francisco Bay Area. Her first novel is Madapple (Alfred A. Knopf/ May 2008). Madapple is at once a literary novel and a psychological thriller, a novel of suspense and an intellectual puzzle. Addictive and thought-provoking, Madapple is a page-turning exploration of human nature and divine intervention—and of the darkest corners of the human soul.
website: www.christinameldrum.com . e-mail: christina@christinameldrum.com
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Marilyn Meredith Living in the southern Sierra, Marilyn Meredith has placed her fictional heroine, Deputy Tempe Crabtree, in the same locale. Books in the series include: Deadly Omen, Unequally Yoked, Intervention (Golden Eagle Press), and Deadly Trail (Hard Shell Word Factory), a prequel. She also wrote Final Respects (The Fiction Works) and Guilt by Association (Treble Heart Publishing).
“I love the Tempe Crabtree books. The characters are so real, so mixed up, so flawed, and so wonderful, that I find myself wanting so much for Tempe. I would truly like to introduce her to the world, so if you haven’t discovered Marilyn Meredith as an author, you might be cheating yourself out of some great reads. Yes, she’s that good. The quality doesn’t fade as this series progresses, it only grows stronger.” — Patricia Lucas White, Crescent Blues Book Views
website: http://fictionforyou.com.e-mail: mmeredith@ocsnet.net
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Michael Scott Moore is a critic and occasional reporter for SF Weekly, San Francisco Magazine, The San Francisco Chronicle, Salon, and The New York Times. His first novel, Too Much of Nothing, is set in the fictional town of Calaveras Beach.
A beautiful novel that manages to be scary, funny, and absolutely compelling. Moore’s talent for transporting the reader into the very heart of his fictional California surf town is astonishing. — Joy Nicholson, author of The Tribes of Palos Verdes
website: www.radiofreemike.com
Patt Morrison Columnist for the Los Angeles Times and host of KCET’s The BookShow, Patt Morrison is the author of Rio L.A.:Tales from the Los Angeles River, which won the Southern California Bookseller’s Award for best nonfiction book (2002). She lives in Los Angeles.
“Patt Morrison writes so well she proves there is water in the L.A. River 425 days a year.” — Ray Bradbury
website: www.pattmorrison.com
Bharati Mukherjee. An Indian-born American novelist, Bharati Mukherjee is the author of Desirable Daughters and four other works of fiction. She also has written two nonfiction books, and a collection of short stories, The Middleman & Other Stories, which won the National Book Critics Circle Award. Mukherjee is a professor at the University of California at Berkeley.
Website: http://english.berkeley.edu
Margaret McMullen. The author of five novels including In My Mother's House, Cashay, and When I Crossed No-Bob, a 2008 Parents' Choice Silver Honor, a 2007 School Library Journal Best Book, a 2008 finalist for the Willie Morris Prize for Southern Fiction, and a 2008 Horace Mann Upstander Honor book. She is currently a board member of the New Harmony Project and a professor of English at the University of Evansville, in Evansville, Indiana, where she's working on a collection of stories and a new young adult novel for Houghton Mifflin due out in 2010. She lives with her husband, Patrick O'Connor and their son, James.
Website: http://www.margaretmcmullan.com/index.php
Yolanda Nava Nava is an Emmy Award-winning broadcast journalist, columnist and author of It’s All in the Frijoles. She has appeared on KXTV & KTXL/TV, Sacramento, and KNBC & KCET/TV, Los Angeles, and also hosted the nationally syndicated TV magazine Latin Tempo. The Latino Literary Hall of Fame awarded It’s All in The Frijoles the 2001 Best Self-help Book Award.
e-mail: NavaAssoc@aol.com
William O’Daly Raised in Los Angeles and now living in the Sierra foothills, William O’Daly is a poet, translator, and fiction writer. A National Endowment for the Arts Fellow, his published works include six books of the late and posthumous poetry of Chilean Nobel laureate Pablo Neruda ( Still Another Day, The Separate Rose, Winter Garden, The Sea and the Bells, The Yellow Heart, and The Book of Questions), and a chapbook of his own poems, The Whale in the Web. With his co-author, Han-ping Chin, he recently completed a historical novel, This Earthly Life, based on the Chinese Cultural Revolution. O’Daly’s poems, translations and essays have been published in a number of magazines and anthologies. A co-founder of Copper Canyon Press, he has worked as a college teacher, a literary and technical editor, and an instructional designer.
e-mail: wodaly@mindsync.com
Qevin Oji is a writer, playwright and photographer. A contributing writer to West magazine (LA Times), his published articles include “Manna from Yah,” and “Whomp, Giggle, Whee — Oh, No!” Oji’s articles also have appeared in SBC Magazine, PRIDE, and The Los Angeles Sentinel newspaper. His plays, “Roach Killers” and “Euphoria’s Egrets,” have been publicly staged. The Jerry Jazz Fiction Contest was his first fiction prize, for “Anacostia.” In 2005 he received PEN USA’s Emerging Voices Rosenthal Fellowship. Oji lives in Los Angeles and is polishing his novel, Moving Days, a Los Angeles coming-of-age tale.
website: www.qevinoji.com . e-mail: q@qevinoji.com
Daniel A. Olivas Born and raised in Los Angeles, Daniel A. Olivas is a rising voice in Chicano literature. He is the author of several books including Devil Talk: Stories (Bilingual Press) and Assumption and Other Stories (Bilingual Press). His first children’s book, Benjamin and the Word, will be published in spring 2005 by Arte Publico Press. He resides in the San Fernando Valley with his wife and son.
website: http://www.danielolivas.com.e-mail: olivasdan@aol.com
Linda Palmer. is a former wildlife photographer and former production vice president of TriStar Pictures. Love is Murder and Love Her to Death are the first two installments of her new mystery novel series.
Love is Murder (June 2004) and Love Her to Death (May 2005) feature soap opera head writer Morgan Tyler as she struggles to solve real life murder mysteries that threaten both her popular daytime TV drama and her own life.
website: www.lindapalmermysteries.com.e-mail: YelloRR@aol.com
Michael Parenti is an internationally known award-winning author and lecturer. He is one of the nation’s leading progressive political analysts. His highly informative and entertaining books and talks have reached a wide range of audiences in North America and abroad.
“Parenti, always provocative and eloquent, gives us a lively as well as valuable critique of orthodoxy posing as ‘history.’ ” — Howard Zinn
website: www.citylights.com.michaelparenti.org.e-mail: mp@michaelparenti.org
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Shirley Ann Parker Born and raised in England, Shirley Ann Parker has traveled across the U.S. and now lives in California. She is a freelance writer, technical writer and editor. Her books include Discoveries: A Journey Through Life and What Shall I Write? Personal Letters for All Occasions.
website: www.shirleyannparker.com.e-mail: topazcove@pacbell.net
Derek M. Powazek An author and designer from San Francisco, Powazek also is the leader of the storytelling magazine/movement Fray, which holds true story events all over the world. He also is the author of San Francisco Stories, a website and book of his true tales of life in the city.
website: www.powazek.com
Daniel Price is a novelist, essayist, humorist and motorist living in Los Angeles. His debut novel, Slick, a tale of PR and media manipulation, was released in hardcover in August 2004 by Random House/Villard. He also runs the website Abused by the News, and teaches a crash course in disinformation through the Center for Inquiry.
website: www.slicknovel.com.e-mail: dan@slicknovel.com.good works: www.abusedbythenews.com
Lynn Price. A native Californian, Lynn Price is the authorof Donovan’s Paradigm, a novel that tells the story of a new-kid-on-the-block surgeon/integrative health proponent who risks an intimate relationship and her reputation to initiate a controversial program on the surgical floor of St. Vincent’s de Croix Medical Center. The result is a tumultuous relationship with a backdrop of patient needs hanging in the balance.
“Lynn Price understands the human heart and the world of surgeons. She’s right that folks are flocking to complementary medicine because we’re not paying attention.” — David W. Page, M.D., FACS, Prof. of Surgery, Tufts University School of Medicine
website: www.lynnprice.net e-mail: priceless1@cox.net
Joe Quirk In high school, Joe Quirk was known for 4 things: getting detention for being a smart-ass, getting A’s in biology, being horny, and having a name like Quirk. He combined these four talents in his second book: Sperm Are From Men, Eggs Are From Women: The REAL Reason Men and Women Are Different.
“Sperm and Eggs is funny, funny, funny. Joe Quirk must be the bastard love-child of Stephen Jay Gould and Steve Martin. But it’s not just science leavened with humor to make it go down better. The humor springs from Quirk’s perspective on life, which is bothabsurdist and loving.” — Mike Chorost, “Rebuilt: How Becoming Part Computer Made Me More Human”
website: www.joequirk.com.e-mail: joe@joequirk.com
Regina Louise is the author of Somebody’s Someone, a memoir published in 2003 by Warner Books. She is a dynamic speaker devoted to the topics of resilience and succeeding amidst severe adversity. “Triumph of the Spirit” is the only way to describe Regina Louise’s trials as an orphan discarded by most, if not all, of the adults in her life. She lives in the Bay Area.
“Regina Louise’s Somebody’s Someone is an amazingly powerful and unforgettable literary debut.” — Sapphire, author of Push
website: www.reginalouise.com
Peter Richardson is the author of American Prophet: The Life and Work of Carey McWilliams (2005), the first book-length study of California’s preeminent public intellectual. His next book, on the history and influence of Ramparts magazine, is scheduled for publication in 2009. Richardson is editorial director at PoliPointPress and lectures on California culture at San Francisco State University. He holds a Ph.D. in English from UC Berkeley.
“[A] superb new biography. . .. . Richardson’s book, with its balanced perspective on his early, middle and late years, comes at a critical juncture when even hard-core McWilliams fans are in danger of losing sight of the whole man. . . . [A] fascinating portrait of activism deepened and sustained by Herculean labors of research and investigation. . .” — Mike Davis, The Nation
website: www.peterrichardson.blogspot.com
email: peter.richardson@sbcglobal.net
Alan Rifkin is the author of Signal Hill (City Lights/fall 2003). He also is a writer for Los Angeles Magazine and a former contributing editor to Details. His short stories have appeared in L.A. Style and The Quarterly, and he has also written for the L.A .Times Magazine, Premiere, L.A. Weekly, Salon, and Buzz Magazine. He was recently announced a finalist for the 2003 PEN Center USA Award in Journalism for his essay “Pool Man,” which appeared in the L.A. Weekly. He lives with his wife and four children in Long Beach, CA.
“Alan Rifkin’s stories have a magnificent plaintive beauty. Not since Flannery O’Connor have so many misfits prevailed. Days pass after reading, and weeks, and months, and you find yourself still haunted, somehow renewed, and connected again to the mysteries of being alive.” — Martha Sherrill, author of The Buddha from Brooklyn and My Last Movie Star
website: www.citylights.com
Pam Ripling So Cal author of contemporary romance, suspense and mystery novels; also young adult mysteries. Work in progress includes non-fiction title challenging today’s boomers to return to lost arts and traditions. Ripling also writes under her pen name, Anne Carter.
website: www.beaconstreetbooks.com.e-mail: annecarter@beaconstreetbooks.com
Harriet Rochlin is a Jewish native of Los Angeles who had visceral attachments to Jewish and Western cultures but no historical knowledge. Spurred by the Ethnic History Movement, she began to research. Her landmark illustrated social history Pioneer Jews: A New Life in the Far West inspired the fictional Desert Dwellers Trilogy — The Reformer’s Apprentice, The First Lady of Dos Cacahuates, and On Her Way Home. She currently writes articles and essays and lectures nationwide. Her voluminous data and photographs are at UCLA, Special Collections.
“Rochlin gets it all in — the harsh realities along with the shining illusions, shame and sin along with joy and triumph but best of all the juices of life flow in every man and woman” — C.L. Sonnichsen, Western historian, author, critic.
website: www.rochlin-roots-west.com.e-mail: harochlin@aol.com
Rayn Roberts Roberts has lived in California most of his life and still keeps a home-base in San Diego, but now teaches in South Korea. He worked for years hosting weekly poetry readings, bringing all kinds of poets to audiences in San Diego and other California cities. A graduate of the University of San Diego, Roberts is the author of Jazz Cocktails and Soapbox Song and a collection of Buddhist poems, The Fires of Spring. His work appears in anthologies by Beyond Borders Press, Sherman Asher & Foothills Publishing and The Philosophical Library of Escondido’s Anthology of Arts, and in many printed and online journals.
About making poetry Roberts says, “It’s an escape from and the discovery of reality, a disease and a cure, a song and a dance, a great love.”
website: www.poeticmatrix.com/Press/Partners.html.e-mail: raynrobkorea@yahoo.com
Ona Russell holds a doctorate in American literature from the University of California, San Diego. She currently teaches a range of interdisciplinary courses and lectures nationally on the intersection of literature and the law. She lives in Solana Beach. Russell’s debut novel, O’Brien’s Desk, was published in 2004 by Sunstone Press. She is working on her second novel, also historical fiction with a mystery twist.
“O’Brien’s Desk is a terrific read because of its riveting story and because so much of the author’s identity is invested in the events it so vividly portrays.” — Richard Lederer, author of A Man of My Words and host of NPR’s “A Way With Words”
website: www.onarussell.com . e-mail:info@onarussell.com
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Carolyn See is the author of five novels, including The Handyman and Golden Days. Her most recent book is Making a Literary Life. She is the Friday morning book reviewer for The Washington Post and is on the board of PEN Center USA West. She has a Ph.D. in American literature from UCLA. Her awards include the prestigious Robert Kirsch Body of Work Award (1993) and a Guggenheim Fellowship in fiction.
website: www.carolynsee.com
Eric Shapiro Originally from New Jersey, now a resident of Los Angeles. Author of Short of a Picnic and It’s Only Temporary. Presently a partner in, and headwriter of, Ghostwriters Central.
website: www.ghostwords.com
Kathleen Sharp is an award-winning journalist who follows money. Her book, Mr. & Mrs. Hollywood: How Edie and Lew Wasserman Created an Empire (Carroll & Graf), was published in 2003. In Good Faith (St. Martin’s Press, 1996) covered a Wall Street scam. She writes for Playboy, the New York Times, and Salon, among others. She lives in Santa Barbara.
website: http://www.kathleensharp.com.e-mail: kathleensharp@yahoo.com
Deirdre Shaw Deirdre Shaw’s first novel is Love Or Something Like It (Random House/ April 2009), a coming of age story about a woman in her early thirties who moves from New York to Los Angeles, gets married, quickly gets divorced, and goes on to try to make a life for herself in L.A. Shaw’s fiction has appeared in Folio and Swink, and her nonfiction in The New York Times and The New York Observer. She lives in Santa Monica and teaches at UCLA Extension Writers Program.
“A delicious, honest look at what it is to live, love, and languish in L.A. From the first celebrity-attended, social-climbing pool party, Deirdre Shaw’s fresh prose and witty observations will have you hooked.” — Katie Crouch, bestselling author of “Girls in Trucks”
website: www.deirdreshaw.com.email: loveorsomething@gmail.com
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Don Shay is the author of the award-winning 2008 coffee-table book Endangered Liaisons on African wildlife and the safari experience. He is also the founder/publisher of Cinefex, a quarterly magazine on movie special effects, and has written extensively on motion picture technology for that publication and others. His book, The Making of Jurassic Park, topped the New York Times best-seller list for several weeks in 1993. He lives in Riverside.
“In Endangered Liaisons, Don Shay captures the true essence of being on safari. His personal narrative and stunning images exude a knowledge of and commitment to the continent that are derived from many remarkable forays ‘into the bush’ and an unrelenting devotion to conserving the unparalleled wildlife splendor he has seen.” — Patrick J. Bergin, CEO African Wildlife Foundation
website: www.africagraphica.com.email: info@alaruspress.com
Jeff Sherratt Mystery writer Jeff Sherratt lives in Newport Beach. He is the author of the Jimmy O’Brien mystery series. Both of his novels, The Brimstone Murders (2008) and Guilty or Else (2009), were published by Echelon Press. His short fiction has appeared in magazines and anthologies. Jeff Sherratt is a past board member of Sisters in Crime and a member of Mystery Writers of America.
website: www.jeffsherratt.com.email: jeffsherratt@aol.com
Julia Flynn Siler is the author of The House of Mondavi: The Rise and Fall of an American Wine Empire, a New York Times bestseller released in paperback in May 2008. She is a contributing writer for The Wall Street Journal and was a London-based staff correspondent for the WSJ and BusinessWeek. She attended Brown University and Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism and received her MBA from Northwestern University. Julia lives in the Bay Area.
“The House of Mondavi is a compelling, sweeping, and ultimately heartbreaking American story of ambition, lust, and wine. The reporting on the rise and fall of the Mondavis is stunning. Think ‘Barbarians at the Grape’.” — Dorothy J. Gaiter and John Brecher, The Wall Street Journal Guide to Wine.
website: www.juliaflynnsiler.com . e-mail: julia@juliaflynnsiler.com
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Erica Silverman is the author of award-winning picture books and easy readers. Her books include Big Pumpkin, Don’t Fidget a Feather (California Young Reader’s Medal), Sholom’s Treasure: How Sholom Aleichem Became an Author (Sydney Taylor Award), and the Cowgirl Kate and Cocoa series of early readers, the first of which received the 2006 Theodore Geisel Honor Award.Her most recent publications are Cowgirl Kate and Cocoa: Rain or Shine and There Was a Wee Woman. Forthcoming books include: Cowgirl Kate and Cocoa:Horse in the House and Pettina and the Wind-Rope. Erica speaks at schools, libraries and conferences. Having loved libraries since she was four years old, she recently became a librarian with Los Angeles Public Library.
“Spunky Cowgirl Kate and her talking horse Cocoa return in their second adventure, which is something of a rarity: a chapter book for new readers that pairs terrific illustrations with smart, funny writing that never condescends. The concepts are simple — Cocoa does not want to be shod, he wants to wear cowboy boots like Kate (until she reminds him that horseshoes bring good luck); Cocoa decides to take a dip in the river when Kate is on his back (without consulting her). The love between the girl and her horse shines through on every page. A.” — Tina Jordan, Entertainment Weekly
website: www.ericasilverman.com.email: erica@ericasilverman.com
James R. Smith California historian James R. Smith is the author of San Francisco’s Lost Landmarks, as well as a number of historical articles. A well-respected authority on California history, he has spent years chronicling the stories of San Francisco and the California Gold Country. Smith is a frequent lecturer and discussion leader at universities, historical societies, libraries and bookstores. A member of the California Historical Society, the San Francisco History Association, the San Francisco Museum & Historical Society, and the Library Fund at the University of California, Berkeley, Smith is active in the preservation and promotion of history and historical lore. He is a fourth-generation native of San Francisco.
website: www.historysmith.com
Martin J. Smith The editor of Orange Coast Magazine, Martin J. Smith has written three crime novels, Straw Men, Time Release and Shadow Image. He is also the co-author of Poplorica.
website: www.martinjsmith.com
Julia Stein is a poet, critic, and playwright. She has published four books of poetry: Under the Ladder to Heaven; Shulamith; Desert Soldiers; and Walker Woman. Her essays are in Literary LA and What We Hold in Common. Her play is Lilith and Eve.
website: her blog.e-mail: galiastein@yahoo.com
Bonnie Domrose Stone Raised in Los Angeles, Bonnie worked as a journalist for weekly and daily newspapers where ever her husband was stationed. She specialized in reporting on the family. Two of her books are histories: Aloha Cowboy, history of the horsemen and women of the Hawaiian Islands, (U of Hawaii Press) and Campfollowing, A History of Military Wives (Praeger). Uncle Sam’s Brides got her on Good Morning America. Her other books are When Husbands Come out of the Closet (which she ghosted) and Civil War in Paradise (Minstrel Press). Her sixth book is San Andreas Ain’t No Fault of Mine, a fun and fact-filled guide to the Antelope Valley.
website: www.bonniedstone.com.e-mail: bonnie@bonniedstone.com
Raymond Strait California resident since 1957. Two dozen biographies: James Garner, Jayne Mansfield, Alan Alda, Sonja Henie, Mario Lanza, Rosemary Clooney, Bob Hope, Lana Turner, Hollywood’s Children, Star Babies, Hollywood Star Children, Lou Costello, etc. Author is a veteran speaker – radio, television, public.
“Books reflect our culture; Biography is the essence of those who create culture” — Raymond Strait
e-mail: cooze@earthlink.net
Ellen Sussman has published a novel, On a Night Like This, with Warner Books (Feb. 2004) and a dozen short stories in literary and commercial publications. She also is the author of Dirty Words: A Literary Encyclopedia of Sex (June 2008). She lives in the Bay Area.
Advance praise for On a Night Like This: “Take a deceived man who thinks he doesn’t want to live, and introduce him to a woman who thinks that if she has enough sex she might not have to die, add a good kid and a great dog, a wicked humor and a clean prose style and you have a novel that’s hard not to read in one sitting.” — Pam Houston, author of Cowboys Are My Weakness
website: www.ellensussman.com.email: ellen@ellensussman.com
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Robert Sward has taught at Cornell University, the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, and UC Santa Cruz. A Fulbright scholar and Guggenheim Fellow, he was chosen by Lucille Clifton to receive a $500 Villa Montalvo Literary Arts Award. His recent books include: God is in the Cracks, A Narrative in Voices (2006); The Collected Poems, 1957-2004 (2004); and Heavenly Sex, Selected Poems (2002). Sward lives in Santa Cruz.
“I like the wide sweep of it. There are many mysteries between father and son that people don’t talk about… There’s much leaping, but each line, so to speak, steps on something solid.” — Robert Bly on Rosicrucian in the Basement (Black Moss Press, 2001)
website: www.robertsward.com.email: robert@robertsward.com
Hector Tobar A Los Angeles-born writer and journalist, Tobar was raised in Hollywood and educated in California public schools, including the University of California Santa Cruz and the University of California, Irvine, where he received a Masters of Fine Arts in Creative Writing. His novel The Tattooed Solider (Penguin Books, 1998) was a finalist for the PEN Center USA West Award for Fiction. He is the Buenos Aires Bureau Chief for the Los Angeles Times and was a member of the reporting team that won the Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the 1992 Los Angeles riots. His non-fiction book, Translation Nation: On the Trail of a New American Identity, was published in 2005 by Riverhead Books.
Website: www.hectortobar.com
Jennifer Vandever Originally from Oregon, Vandever is a screenwriter and novelist currently living in Los Angeles. Her first novel, The Brontë Project, was published by Random House in 2005. She teaches at Emerson College in its Los Angeles Program.
“Clever… A zippy romp in which Vandever skillfully parodies both academia and Hollywood….Witty and artful.” — New York Times Book Review
website: jennifervandever.com.email: jennifervandever at sbcglobal dot net
Jo Anne Van Tilburg Jo Anne Van Tilburg, Ph.D. is an archaeologist with two decades of experience in California and on Easter Island. She is a Research Associate of the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at UCLA and director of the UCLA Rock Art Archive, recipient the Governor’s Award for Historic Preservation, 2000. She wrote Among Stone Giants: The Life of Katherine Routledge and Her Remarkable Expedition to Easter Island (Scribner’s, 2003).
“Jo Anne Van Tilburg has written a stellar biography, based on thorough detective work and historical sleuthing, which puts Katherine Routledge’s work in modern perspective.” — Brian Fagan, professor of anthropology, University of California, Santa Barbara
website: www.easterislandstatueproject.org.e-mail: jvantil@ucla.edu
D.J. Waldie Waldie is the author of Holy Land: A Suburban Memoir; Real City: Downtown Los Angeles Inside/Out; and Where We Are Now: Notes from Los Angeles. His book reviews and commentary appear in the Los Angeles Times. He is a contributing writer for Los Angeles Magazine. He lives in Lakewood.
J. Michael Walker Author-illustrator of All the Saints of the City of the Angels: Seeking the Soul of L.A. on Its Streets (Heyday 2008). Raised in Arkansas, J. Michael came to Los Angeles by way of Mexico—a critical stopover that “explained” L.A. to him: its historical, thriving roots churning beneath the asphalt. Since 1984, he has participated in more than one hundred exhibitions; received a dozen grants, fellowships, and artist residencies; and enjoyed solo shows in both the U.S. and Mexico. This is his first book.
“J. Michael Walker sees angels everywhere, the divine in the ordinary, saints in survivors. And that, in our era of fear and rage, is miracle enough for me.” — Sandra Cisneros, author of Caramelo and House on Mango Street
website: www.allthesaints.com.email: jmichael@allthesaints.com
Tony Waters is a Professor of Sociology at California State University, Chico. He has published four books, including When Killing is a Crime, (2007) The Persistence of Subsistence Agriculture: Life Beneath the Level of the Marketplace (2007), Bureaucratizing the Good Samaritan (2001), and Crime and Immigrant Youth (1999). He also writes about the sociology of schooling and education. Waters is a California native, but has also lived in Thailand, Tanzania, and Germany. His writing often reflects his thoughts about California and the other places he has lived.
“Waters deftly explores the social construction of killing across time and place, offering vivid examples to illustrate the importance of this neglected topic. Entertaining enough to hold the attention of undergraduates, yet analytical enough to be used by graduate students and scholars, When Killing Is a Crime should appeal to anyone who studies crime.” — Cindy Kane
website: http://www.csuchico.edu/soci/facultyStaff/Waters.shtml. email: twaters@csuchico.edu
April Halprin Wayland Her novel in poems, Girl Coming In For A Landing (Knopf) won two major poetry prizes. She’s lectured and performed in schools and universities across America, England, Italy, Germany, France, Poland; she’s on the Writers’ Program faculty of UCLA Extension.
Marianne Wiggins Author of seven novels and several short story collections, Marianne Wiggins has taught creative writing workshops on fiction at USC since 2005. Her books include John Dollar, a feminist revision of the Robinson Crusoe story and Golding’s Lord of the Flies, and her 2003 novel of America in the first half of the twentieth cenury, Evidence of Things Unseen, named an LA Times Book Of The Year in 2003.
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Julie Williams Poet, workshop leader, educator — Julie’s first book, Escaping Tornado Season: A Story in Poems (March 2004 from HarperTempest), is a young adult novel that appeals to teens and adult readers of all ages. Born in Idaho, raised in Nebraska and Northern Minnesota, Julie called Wisconsin, Illinois and Colorado home before settling in Southern California twenty years ago. Recently retired from California State University, Northridge, she is currently working on a second book with her editor at HarperCollins.
Lolly Winston holds an MFA in creative writing from Sarah Lawrence College. As a freelance journalist she has written for Redbook, Family Circle, Glamour, New Woman, Lifetime, the San Jose Mercury News and other publications. Her short fiction has appeared in The Sun and in the Southeast Review. Her first novel, Good Grief, was published by Warner Books in April 2004. She is at work on her second novel.
“Good Grief is one of the best first novels I have ever read, and anyone who thinks there is nothing new to read about loss, pain, love, humor and ultimate renewal, should grab this book now.” — Anne Rivers Siddons, author of Low Country
website: www.lollywinston.com
Victoria Zackheim A native of Compton, Victoria is the author of The Bone Weaver. She teaches creative writing (UCLA Writers’ Program, Delancey Street Foundation, etc.), writes books reviews (San Francisco Chronicle, jbooks.com, etc.), and is a freelance writer/editor.
“The Bone Weaver is a superbly written generational story… The history of past survivors helps present-day descendent Mimi Zilber better understand herself, where she comes from, and how to best set her sights on the future…a unique…inspiring, and very highly recommended novel.” — The Midwest Book Review
website: www.theboneweaver.com, www.WretchedReviews.com.e-mail: vdzack@aol.com
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