Nonfiction

Debbie Hagan is author of the creative nonfiction book Against the Tide (Hamilton Books, 2004). Her writing has appeared in Boston Globe Magazine, Brain, Child, Pleiades, Hyperallergic, Don’t Take Pictures, the anthology Dime Story, and elsewhere. She is the book reviews editor for Brevity online literary magazine and visiting writing lecturer at Massachusetts College of Art and Design.  

Denise Emanuel Clemen’s fiction and essays have appeared or are forthcoming in the Georgetown Review (including an honorable mention for their prize,) Literary Mama, The Rattling Wall, Knee-Jerk, Chagrin River Review, New Plains Review, Berkeley Fiction Review, Serving House Journal, Sand Hill Review, and many other literary magazines. She’s received fellowships to the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Vermont Studio Center, Ragdale Foundation, and was an Auvillar fellow in France in 2009. Her memoir, Birth Mother, was published by Shebooks in 2014. 

Elizabeth Argento holds an MFA in Creative Nonfiction from Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia. She completed her undergraduate work at Eckerd College in St. Petersburg, Florida, where she was a Ford Apprentice Scholar of Literature. She is currently an Adjunct English Instructor at Old Dominion University. In the past, she has worked as a writing consultant, a tutor, a Barely South Review editor, and a PetSmart sales associate. She lives in Virginia Beach, Virginia with a Jack Russell Terrier who never tires of her.

Judith Sara Gelt began pursuing writing at age fifty-five after a career in public education. Excerpts from her memoir in progress appear in Iron Horse Literary Review, The Portland Review, and Broad Street Magazine and a flash essay is published in Referential Magazine. She lives in Denver where she is a member of Lighthouse Writers Workshop.

Julie Marie Wade is the author of Fugue: An Aural History (Diagram/New Michigan Press, 2023) and Otherwise: Essays (Autumn House, 2023), selected by Lia Purpura as the winner of the 2022 Autumn House Nonfiction Book Prize. Julie teaches in the creative writing program at Florida International University and makes her home with Angie Griffin and their two cats in Dania Beach. Her newest project is The Mary Years, winner of the 2023 Clay Reynolds Novella Prize selected by Michael Martone and forthcoming from Texas Review Press in fall 2024.

Kirsten Voris tells stories to challenge her judgements, divine her motivation, and practice laughing at herself, in that order. Her work has appeared in Magic Magazine and Hippocampus. She has performed at Odyssey Tucson and her essay Zamzam will appear in the forthcoming Sofra: A Gathering of Foreign Voices Around the Turkish Table. She lives and writes and grows radishes in Tucson, Arizona. Sometimes, she wishes she was still in Turkey.

Mary Ann Thomas is a New Jersey-born-and-raised queer South Asian traveler. She has been published in Brown Girl Magazine, Word Riot, is a VONA/Voices fellow and writes about her adventures as a travel professional and long-distance bike tourist.

Meghan McClure is author of the chapbook Portrait of a Body in Wreckages (Newfound Press, 2017) and co-author of A Single Throat Opens (Black Lawrence Press, 2017). Her work has  appeared in Black Warrior Review, Tupelo Quarterly, American Literary Review, Pithead Chapel, American Poetry Journal, and elsewhere. She lives in California.

Steve Howe is the Nonfiction Editor for Blue Mesa Review and his writing has appeared in The Rumpus and The Vermillion Literary Project Journal. Originally from South Dakota, he has lived in many cities around the country and now calls Albuquerque, NM home.