Abigail Stewart is a fiction writer from the California desert. Originally from Houston, Texas, she studied Literature and Art History at Sam Houston State University, before going on to earn an M.Ed at Lamar University. She is the author of two novels, The Drowned Woman and Foundations, as well as a short story collection, Assemblage. Her new novel, Select Screen, is out now!

Brian Townsley is an award-winning writer, as well as the Executive Editor for Starlite Pulp. He is the author of the crime fiction books A Trunk Full of Zeroes and Outlaw Ballads, as well as three books of poetry. His short fiction has appeared in various publications, including Mystery Tribune, Black Mask, Quarterly West, Frontier Tales, Connecticut Review, and many others, and had a story make the distinguished list in Best American Mystery Stories, 2019. He is a graduate of the Professional Writing Program at USC and is also an alum of the mighty California Golden Bears. He shares his time between the mountains and deserts of Southern California.

Bruce Craven teaches Leadership Through Fiction, a popular MBA/EMBA elective at Columbia Business School, and has been on the Executive Education faculty for 30 years, leading workshops on resilience, emotional intelligence, and flexible thinking. He co-runs Craven Leadership LLC with his wife, Sherelle. Bruce is the author of Fast Sofa, which was adapted into a feature film, and Win or Die: Leadership Secrets from Game of Thrones. He also published a poetry collection, Buene Suerte in Red Glitter. He studied politics and literature at UC Santa Cruz and earned his MFA from Columbia. He lives in California’s Coachella Valley.

Carla Fernandez is a community strategist and facilitator focused on collective care and cultural change. She co-founded The Dinner Party, a national network for young adults navigating grief, featured in The New York Times, NPR, and Oprah Daily. Through her community design studio, she works on projects related to climate, democracy, and the arts. Carla is a senior fellow at USC’s Annenberg Innovation Lab and a Catherine B. Reynolds Scholar in Social Entrepreneurship at NYU. She splits her time between the Hudson Valley and Joshua Tree.

Catherine Auman is a multiple-award winning author with four of her books maintaining bestseller status on Amazon. She writes about the potential of the human spirit, sexuality, and personal and spiritual growth. In her day job, Catherine is a licensed psychotherapist in private practice. She lives in Yucca Valley with her husband and their two cats and five turtles.

Christopher C. Gorham is a lawyer, educator, and acclaimed author of THE CONFIDANTE (a Goodreads Choice Award finalist in History/Biography) and MATISSE AT WAR (Citadel, Sept. 30, 2025). His writing has appeared in the Washington Post, Literary Hub, Paper Brigade, and elsewhere. He is a frequent speaker at conferences, literary events, classrooms, and book club gatherings around the country.

ChristopherCGorham.com @christophercgorham

Cindy Rinne creates poetry, zines, and fiber art in San Bernardino, CA. Her poems have appeared in anthologies, art exhibits, and dance performances. Cindy is the author of several books: Dancing Through the Fire Door (Nauset Press), Today on Two Planets (Written by Veterans), The Feather Ladder (Picture Show Press) and more.

Damien Gossett received a Bachelor’s of Fine Arts degree from the University of Minnesota in 1973 and a Masters in Multimedia from California State University East Bay in 2005. He has been involved in a variety of endeavors from including, painting, photography, poetry, graphics, furniture design, music, housing finance and development, crashing a business and planning a new career for his later years. His history confirms accomplishment, setback and continued evolution of idea. His ultimate goal is to unravel a few threads that have hung on to his sleeves over the past thirty years. He doesn't believe in scissors.

Daniel Pyne is a versatile storyteller who moves between prose fiction and screenwriting. He is the author of Twentynine Palms, A Hole in the Ground Owned by a Liar, Fifty Mice, Catalina Eddy, and Water Memory (2021). His film credits include Backstabbing for Beginners, The Manchurian Candidate remake, Pacific Heights, Any Given Sunday, and Fracture. He has written for Miami Vice and Amazon’s Bosch. A Stanford graduate and UCLA MFA, he taught screenwriting for 20 years. Raised in Colorado, Pyne lives in Los Angeles and Santa Fe with his wife, their dog Luna, and a grumpy box turtle.

Deanne Stillman is a critically acclaimed author known for her place-based literary nonfiction. Her latest book, Blood Brothers, about the alliance between Sitting Bull and Buffalo Bill, received a starred Kirkus review and is under option. Desert Reckoning, based on her Rolling Stone piece, won the Spur and LA Press Club Awards. Twentynine Palms, an LA Times bestseller, explores a post-Gulf War double homicide and was praised by Hunter S. Thompson. Mustang won the California Book Award silver medal and helped rescue wild horses. Her work appears widely, and her plays have been produced and honored in festivals nationwide.

Dennis Tafoya is the author of three crime novels set in and around Philadelphia. His short stories have appeared in magazines and anthologies such as Philadelphia Noir and Best American Mystery Stories. His work has been nominated for multiple awards and been optioned for film and television.

Meet Dr Oolong, the unconventional wordsmith whose life is as diverse as their storytelling. From living on a boat to roaming deserts, their eclectic experiences fuel their work, spanning sci-fi, comedy, and beyond. With a resume including directing plays, working in special effects for major films, and even chauffeuring bands to iconic concerts, Dr Oolong's journey is nothing short of extraordinary. Inspired by encounters with the Integratron and Giant Rock, their acclaimed book, "Bedtime Stories for Robots," is a testament to a life lived outside the lines.

Francene Kaplan is a native Californian and desert lover, enjoys writing poems and short stories when not playing household percussion or creating weird mixed–media art. She loves all things animal, vegetable, and mineral, reading / watching Sci Fi, and organic gardening. Attaining far too much formal education, she thus shares tidbits of this knowledge to alternative high school students. She teaches science, psychology, sociology, health, and foods. Teaching composting workshops to communities in Southern California, has earned her the moniker of the "Priestess of Rot".

Gene Rosow is a writer, filmmaker, historian, and environmental educator whose career spans books, articles, television, film and music. A former UC Berkeley history professor, he’s written, directed, and produced award-winning documentaries and feature films on topics ranging from gangster films (Born to Lose) to Jewish-Muslim coexistence (Routes of Exile), Afro-Cuban music (Roots of Rhythm), medieval knights (Les Chevaliers) and soil preservation (DIRT The Movie). His credits among others also include Doctora, Laurel and Hardy: A Tribute to the Boys, Silent Tongue, Zeus and Roxanne, and a new project, Joshua Tree Dance Party (2025).

George Bixley held a string of jobs, from parking attendant to night desk clerk, before finding his groove in Los Angeles, settling into the seedy underbelly of the metropolis and trying to keep ahead of the wave of gentrification. Bixley sells his soul by day and dredges the bottom by night.

Jardine Libaire is the co-editor of PO Box Outer Space, a new zine series of "open letters to the beyond," alongside Jennifer Prediger and designer Beth Middleworth. She lives in the High Desert and is captivated, confused, and enchanted by both the seen and unseen. Jardine is the author of Here Kitty Kitty, White Fur, and You're An Animal (Hogarth); co-writer of The Sober Lush (Tarcher Perigee); and has created two collaborations for Neotext: GoldTwinz with Neil Krug and A Lesson in Murder Ballads with Denise Prince. She also co-wrote the film Endings, Beginnings with Drake Doremus.

Jay Jones is the author of A Bilagáana Boy among the Navajo, a true story about his four years living on the Navajo Reservation in Window Rock, Arizona. Born in Japan to Air Force veterans, Jay had a turbulent childhood and joined the Marine Corps at 17. His career path included roles from cook and DJ to financial advisor, ultimately retiring after 33 years as a Chartered Financial Consultant. He earned a Business Management degree while working full-time. Now living near Tucson, Jay enjoys golfing, traveling, cooking, and soaking up the Arizona sun with a good book and a strong cocktail.

John Sierpinski lives in Yucca Valley, California. His two poetry collections: "Sucker Hole" and "Vacancy/No Vacancy" were published by Cholla Needles Arts and Literary Library.

Kate Spencer is a mental health professional with a passion for poetry. Writing under the pen name Joella Muncel, she began sharing her poetry on Substack earlier this year. She released her first collection of narrative poetry, Desert Fairy Tales—a whimsical journey of magical stories inspired by the enchanting and mystical Mojave Desert—and is working on a second volume. Kate is a student of that which lies beyond the limitations of human perception. Her second work, The Book of RA, is a distillation of the RA Material, channeled in the late 80's from an entity named RA. The book contains all of the guidance RA offered to show humanity how to live a life in Love & Light.

Kelli Shapiro, PhD, is a public historian, historic preservationist, and local history author from Southern California. She holds degrees from Pomona College, Texas State University, and Brown University. She has written two books for Arcadia Publishing's Images of America series: 2024's "Inland Empire and San Gabriel Valley Movie Theatres" and 2018's "Historic Movie Theatres of West Virginia" (the latter done as the Preservation Alliance of WV's Program Associate). She has also authored successful state landmark nominations in California and Texas; academic journal articles; and entries for several encyclopedias.

Kenneth Nowling is a best-selling author, seasoned producer, and veteran television executive with over 30 years of experience in film and TV production. He began his career in 1992 as a production assistant and rose through the ranks to help bring major stories to life on screen. Now a full-time writer, Kenneth brings his cinematic instincts to the page, captivating readers with acclaimed Young Adult fiction and gripping Crime & Suspense novels. His debut, Havana Nights, blends high-stakes drama with atmospheric storytelling. Across every medium, Kenneth crafts immersive stories that entertain, challenge, and leave a lasting impression.

Kristina Ten has written about lovers experiencing erosion, demigods attending desert music festivals, spirits lurking in the backs of bathhouses, and seals granting wishes at the bottom of Lake Baikal. Her stories appear in McSweeney's, Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy, We're Here: The Best Queer Speculative Fiction, Lightspeed, Nightmare, Uncanny, and elsewhere. She has won the McSweeney's Stephen Dixon Award, the Subjective Chaos Kind of Award for Short Fiction, and the F(r)iction Writing Contest, and has been a finalist for the Shirley Jackson Award, the Locus Award, and the WSFA Small Press Award. Her debut collection, Tell Me Yours, I'll Tell You Mine, is forthcoming October 2025 from Stillhouse Press.

Laurie Kaye began her career in radio at KFRC-AM San Francisco, for years one of the nation’s greatest top 40 stations, where she started as an intern and worked her way up to on-air reporter and anchor. She wrote and coproduced numerous radio rock specials for RKO, including RKO Presents the Beatles (released in 1977, and later expanded and retitled as The Beatles from Liverpool to Legend), and The Top 100 of the 70’s before moving on to write Dick Clark’s weekly radio countdown show and syndicated newspaper column. Kaye then moved on to television and film as a writer, producer, and casting director, handling both creative content and line producing.

As an author, Maxfield's voice is fierce, funny and focused on women's issues. Her upcoming memoir JewGirl uses flashpoints from lived experience to explore what it means to be Jewish and female at a time when women's rights are at risk and antisemitism is on the rise. She lives in Southern California.

Michael G. Vail is a novelist, short-story author and poet. His most recent book, High Desert Elegy: Stories & Poems, and his novel, The Salvation of San Juan Cajon, are available at several locations in the Morongo Basin and on Amazon. A California native, Michael divides his time between San Clemente and a former homestead cabin in Twentynine Palms.

Nico Slate is a historian and author whose work explores race, democracy, and social change in the United States and India. Raised in California’s Mojave Desert, he was inspired by his mother, a public school teacher, and driven by personal experiences, including his brother’s tragic death. A Rhodes Scholar and Harvard Ph.D., Nico is the author of Brothers and several acclaimed books, including Colored Cosmopolitanism and Gandhi’s Search for the Perfect Diet. He teaches at Carnegie Mellon University, where he also co-founded LEAP and the Bajaj Lab for Rural Development. His writing blends scholarship with a deeply personal lens on justice.

Nikki Rawnsley is an award-winning author, marketing leader, and creative force whose work blends soulful depth with whimsical imagination. A British-born Australian living in California, she draws inspiration from her travels, global connections, and spiritual practice. With an empathetic heart and curious spirit, Nikki channels her inner fairy, nymph, or ninja to craft poetry that stirs emotion and awakens the soul. Her writing aims to radiate transformative energy—teasing the mind, drawing readers in, and cracking open the heart. A seeker and high-vibe traveler, she lives each day in love for the highest good of all, guided by creativity and connection.

Nolan Knight is the author of Gallows Dome, The Neon Lights Are Veins and Beneath the Black Palms. He is a fourth generation Angeleno and former staff writer for Los Angeles’ Biggest Music Publication, the L.A. Record. His short fiction has been featured in various publications including Akashic Books, Thuglit, Shotgun Honey, Tough and Action, Spectacle. His work has been met with praise by luminaries such as Barry Gifford, James Sallis, Allison Anders and Lydia Lunch. He lives in Long Beach with a new novel, The Gorgon of Los Feliz, being published by Down & Out Books on July 14, 2025.

Paulina Rael Jaramillo is an author, counselor, and speaker whose work spans inspirational nonfiction, cultural history, and children’s literature. She began her writing career in 1991 and has contributed to Latina Style magazine and nine inspirational anthologies. With a master’s in Rehabilitation Counseling, Paulina brings real-world experience to her books on healing from loss, including Life Interrupted and Life Resumed. Her other titles include The American Southwest: Pride, Prejudice, Perseverance and The Littlest Chef, a children’s cookbook. A recipient of the “Purveyors of Peace and Hope” award, Paulina is also a frequent speaker on trauma, education, and memoir writing.

Rose Baldwin is a Midwesterner by birth and a storyteller by instinct—plainspoken, occasionally thickheaded, and often unexpectedly insightful. A lifelong joker, daydreamer, and scribbler, she spent years working in banking, teaching finance, and serving in government, where her supervisors frequently noted she might be happier elsewhere. They were right. In 2014, she moved to California and now lives in Yucca Valley with her two cats. Her works include The Claire Stories (2016), Mike's Magic Burgers (2017), Claire Streaking Through the Autumn of Her Life (2021), and Claire Still Kicking (2023). She's still writing—and still kicking.

Ryanna Hammond is the founder of All With Heart, where creative writing, mental health, and spirituality meet. After overcoming years of anxiety, disordered eating, and self-doubt, she found healing through therapy, journaling, and spiritual awakening. Ryanna holds a Bachelor's Degree in Psychology and a Master’s Degree in Creative Writing. She now creates books, workshops, and services to help others expand their mindset, reconnect with their authentic selves, and transform their lives. Through poetry, education, and deep inner work, Ryanna empowers others to share their stories and heal from within—always, and only, with heart.

DTed is a desert-based artist, curator, and patient advocate known for his project Scarred for Life: Monoprints of Human Scars, which chronicles the stories of individuals who have survived accidents and health crises. A lifelong patient with Gaucher Disease, Ted uses his art to improve patient-physician communication and explore life with illness. His work has been featured by NPR and The New York Times, and he serves as Artist in Residence at USC Keck School of Medicine. His latest book, The Room Sinatra Died In, and Other Medically Adjacent Stories, will be released in September 2024.

Vanda Krefft is the author of Expect Great Things!, a social history of the Katharine Gibbs School and its pioneering role in expanding workplace opportunities for women. The book, which explores the unlikely story of Katharine Gibbs and her school's trailblazing graduates, will be published by Algonquin Books in March 2025. Vanda is also the author of The Man Who Made the Movies (HarperCollins, 2017), the first full biography of Twentieth Century Fox founder William Fox. A former journalist, her writing has appeared in Elle, Redbook, Woman’s Day, and the Los Angeles Times. She holds degrees from the University of Pennsylvania.