Ursula Vernon, aka T. Kingfisher, is an author and illustrator. She has written over fifteen books for children, at least a dozen novels for adults, an epic webcomic called “Digger” and various short stories and other odds and ends. Ursula grew up in Oregon and Arizona, studied anthropology at Macalester College in Minnesota, and stayed there for ten years, until she finally learned to drive in deep snow and was obligated to leave the state. Having moved across the country several times, she eventually settled in Pittsboro, North Carolina, where she works full-time as an artist and creator of oddities. She lives with her husband and his chickens. Her work has been nominated for the Eisner, World Fantasy, and longlisted for the British Science Fiction Awards. It has garnered a number of Webcomics Choice Awards, the Hugo Award for Best Graphic Story, the Mythopoeic Award for Children’s Literature, the Nebula for Best Short Story, the Sequoyah Award, and many others.

Genevieve Valentine has sold more than three dozen short stories; her fiction has appeared or is forthcoming in Clarkesworld, Strange Horizons, Journal of Mythic Arts, Fantasy Magazine, Lightspeed, and Apex, and in the anthologies Federations, The Living Dead 2, The Way of the Wizard, Running with the Pack, Teeth, and more. Her nonfiction has appeared in Lightspeed, Tor.com, and Fantasy Magazine, and she is the co-author of Geek Wisdom (out in Summer 2011 from Quirk Books). Her first novel, Mechanique: A Tale of the Circus Tresaulti, is forthcoming from Prime Books in May 2011. You can learn more about it at the Circus Tresualti website. Her appetite for bad movies is insatiable, a tragedy she tracks on her blog.

"A veritable badass fairy princess." —Jim Butcher "The faerie princess of the worlds of weird." —Jonathan Maberry "Alethea Kontis IS fairy tales." —Jim C. Hines, author of Libriomancer "Alethea Kontis: Awesome, racks up award nominations, wears tiaras." —SF author Ferrett Steinmetz "I want to live in [Alethea's] head because I think that might be the most interesting place in the world!!!!" —Ellen Oh, author of Prophecy "Alethea Kontis, the woman who writes like Shakespeare would if he were alive today." —Aaron Pound "The beauty of a princess, the confidence of a queen, the brilliance of a writer, and the demeanor of a cheerful fairy comedian!" —Cheyenne Z. "This was the story before all of the other stories, and it was the other tales that were changed over time." —Nerdophiles, on ENCHANTED

Ken Liu (http://kenliu.name) is an American author of speculative fiction. He has won the Nebula, Hugo, and World Fantasy awards, as well as top genre honors in Japan, Spain, and France, among other places. Ken's debut novel, The Grace of Kings, is the first volume in a silkpunk epic fantasy series, The Dandelion Dynasty, in which engineers play the role of wizards. His debut collection, The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories, has been published in more than a dozen languages. He also wrote the Star Wars novel, The Legends of Luke Skywalker. He has been involved in multiple media adaptations of his work. The most recent projects include “The Message,” under development by 21 Laps and FilmNation Entertainment; “Good Hunting,” adapted as an episode of Netflix's breakout adult animated series Love, Death + Robots; and AMC's Pantheon, which Craig Silverstein will executive produce, adapted from an interconnected series of short stories by Ken. Prior to becoming a full-time writer, Ken worked as a software engineer, corporate lawyer, and litigation consultant. Ken frequently speaks at conferences and universities on a variety of topics, including futurism, cryptocurrency, history of technology, bookmaking, the mathematics of origami, and other subjects of his expertise. Ken is also the translator for Liu Cixin's The Three-Body Problem, Hao Jingfang's Vagabonds, Chen Qiufan's Waste Tide, as well as the editor of Invisible Planets and Broken Stars, anthologies of contemporary Chinese science fiction. He lives with his family near Boston, Massachusetts.

Keffy is a speculative fiction writer currently living on Long Island, where he is working toward a PhD in Genetics. His short fiction has been published in Apex, Fantasy Magazine, Lightspeed, and Uncanny, among other places. He is currently the editor and publisher of GlitterShip magazine.

Liz grew up in Canberra, China and country Australia. Her first real job was at a women's refuge and her last normal job was managing a circus. Author, poet, chick with a guitar. She writes love letters to inanimate objects and creates the webcomic "Things Without Arms and Without Legs." Her Roller Derby name is Betsy Nails. http://lizargall.com/