Brant Vickers started out as a caddy and then delivered flowers before going into the military, living in three foreign countries and seven states. He later found his true profession and vocation teaching students with special needs, some of the most endearing, sweet, loving people on the planet. He is the author of Chucky’s in Tucson and Fedor.

Working in niche publishing in 2005, Ekta has written and edited about everything from healthcare to home improvement to Hindi films. A writing contest judge for the Florida Writers Association and the Saturday Writers chapter of the Missouri Writers Guild, Ekta conducts writing workshops and also hosts Biblio Breakdown, where she examines books and offers writing exercises. She blogs original fiction, book reviews, and all things writing and editing at The Write Edge (http://thewriteedge.wordpress.com). Her holiday novella, The Truth About Elves, and her fairy tale for grownups, In the Heart of the Linden Wood, are both available now from Atmosphere Press.

Alex has been writing since the ripe ol’ age of 10, first cutting their teeth as a writer through fanfiction. A quarter of a century later, they have taken that love of fanfiction and branched out into doing their own thing. As a neurodivergent, nonbinary single parent whose child calls them “Mom,” Alex has been working on several novels—some nonfiction, some fiction—for years now, and wants to make their dreams of becoming a writer come true, despite their Dissociative Identity Disorder.

Sally Showalter was born and raised in rural Illinois. Much of her writing lingers through the four seasons and county of Pike. She settled in Tucson, Arizona in the mid-1980s with her husband, cats, and a backyard full of various plants from seeds collected from dozens of road trips over the years. Ms. Showalter has studied at the University of Arizona in the Creative Writing Program, Pima Community College, and the Center for Creative Writing Works. Her poetry has appeared in Pudding Magazine and Festival Writer and her fiction and memoir in collections of anthologies.

Cate McNider is a multi-disciplinary artist, and a psychophysical practitioner and movement educator registered as The Listening Body®. Since arriving in NYC in 1985, she has expressed her healing journey through poetry, multi-media movement performances and painting. She has performed her multi-media works in downtown venues and Brooklyn, and exhibited her paintings in solo shows in the East Village and NOHO. Poems from her first collection, Separation and Return, have been in several journals, in print and online. Escape Velocity is the follow-up on the success of her healing practices. Cate still lives in New York.

Scott lives and writes in a small village an hour north of Inverness, where he is encouraged daily by his wife Rachel. He has self-published six novels, two collections (both containing both poems and short stories), a malt whisky companion, and a book on cocktails. He is currently writing three more novels (all in separate genres), alongside a book on literary criticism and an Ancient Greek Theogony in the creative form. He is also completing the final semester of his honour’s degree in Creative Writing; works full-time; and sleeps less than the average giraffe. He plans to work on his Masters in Comparative Literature come the fall.

Award-winning author Katie L. Carroll began writing after her sixteen-year-old sister, Kylene, unexpectedly passed away. Since then writing has taken her to many wonderful places—both real and imagined. She wrote her YA fantasy Elixir Bound, winner of the 2019 Connecticut Author Project for Best YA, and its sequel Elixir Saved so Kylene could live on in the pages of a book.

Jasmine is a multiply neurodivergent licensed psychologist working from her psychology practice in Melbourne, Australia. In addition to providing professional supervision to students and other professionals, she works with clients across the neurodiverse spectrum in the context of both psychotherapy and assessment.

Mhlengi Skeelo ‘Melchizedek’ Khumalo has a lot of creative alter egos. He is a proud South African, the soon-to-be husband of his beloved Morgan, the dad of Destiny and Luzel, and the husband of Thandi Julia.

Sarah Westbrook is a Licensed Professional Counselor and the founder of Westbrook Counseling Services and Daisy Girl Communications. As a trauma survivor, she shares her story of growing up with personality-disordered parents and working through c-PTSD with the hope of helping others develop the courage to speak their truth and have their voices heard. In her spare time, she loves creating content with her husband and co-host Mason, entertaining her children, and hiding in her closet so she doesn’t have to share her chocolate or caramel popcorn with anyone else.

Lauryne Wright lives in the Las Vegas area with her critter sidekicks hoping that one day soon, she’ll hit the jackpot and her novels will come true…or the truth will come to light.

In addition to having been a teacher’s husband, Steven Earl Kladstrup is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Syracuse University, with Honors degrees in both Geography and Anthropology. He also holds a Master’s degree with Honors in International Management from Thunderbird (the former American Graduate School of International Management). After making a career out of writing and editing myriad proposals, contracts, marcom, and software documentation for other people, he has happily returned to his first love, the writing of fiction, with Jane Raggedfir Was a Dike, his debut novel.