Kij Johnson is an American writer of fantasy. She has worked extensively in publishing: managing editor for Tor Books and Wizards of the Coast/TSR, collections editor for Dark Horse Comics, project manager working on the Microsoft Reader, and managing editor of Real Networks. She is Associate Director for the Center for the Study of Science Fiction at the University of Kansas, and serves as a final judge for the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award. Johnson is the author of three novels and more than 38 short works of fiction. She is best known for her adaptations of Heian-era Japanese myths. She won the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award for the best short story of 1994 for her novelette in Asimov's, "Fox Magic." In 2001, she won the International Association for the Fantastic in the Art's Crawford Award for best new fantasy novelist of the year. In 2009, she won the World Fantasy Award for "26 Monkeys, Also The Abyss," which was also a finalist for the Hugo and Nebula awards. She won the 2010 Nebula Award for "Spar" and the 2011 Nebula Award for "Ponies," which is also a finalist for the Hugo and World Fantasy awards. Her short story "The Evolution of Trickster Stories Among the Dogs of North Park After the Change" was a finalist for the 2007 Hugo, Nebula, Sturgeon, and World Fantasy awards. Johnson was also a finalist for the 2004 World Fantasy Award for her novel Fudoki, which was declared one of the best SF/F novels of 2003 by Publishers Weekly.

Ken Scholes is the award-winning, critically-acclaimed author of five novels and over fifty short stories. His work has appeared in print for over sixteen years. His series, The Psalms of Isaak, is published by Tor Books and his short fiction has been released in three volumes by Fairwood Press. Ken's eclectic background includes time spent as a label gun repairman, a sailor who never sailed, a soldier who commanded a desk, a preacher (he got better), a nonprofit executive, a musician and a government procurement analyst. He has a degree in History from Western Washington University. Ken is a native of the Pacific Northwest and makes his home in Saint Helens, Oregon, where he lives with his twin daughters. You can learn more about Ken by visiting www.kenscholes.com.

I have always loved any fiction or art that opens doors—or windows or cracks in the air—to possibility, that lets wonder into the room. The first things I wrote, at nine years old, were fantastic literature, and that's where my heart has always been—whether you call it science fiction, fantasy, horror, dark fantasy, magic realism, or fabulism. My writing is about two things: exploring and expanding limits and notions of the possible, and feeding the body and spirit through language and story. Having lived and gone to school in Philadelphia, parts of Florida, California, and Maine, I make my home these days in Austin. Well-groomed cats, family, and good friends grace my life with their company. I've been employed as a house painter, a blueberry raker, an art house film projectionist, a glass artist's assistant, an English tutor, teaching assistant, and an editor, among other things. I dropped out of high school and now have a master's degree. I was a Michener Fellow in grad school, graduated from the Clarion West workshop, and have a large collection of Hong Kong movies. A narrative junkie from a young age, I have always found inspiration and solace in books, movies, and television. Also in animal life, nature, good food with friends, artful cocktails, and rain. Some of these facts are only tangentially related.

Barry is the first writer to win the Hugo, Nebula, and John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer all in the same year, for Enemy Mine. In addition to his acclaimed Enemy Mine Series, his works include the Circus World and Infinity Hold series, SF & fantasy novels, recovery and writing instruction works, and numerous short stories. He has just completed the first novel in his Redcliff Series, Turning The Grain, which is being serialized in Analog Science Fiction magazine, and is currently researching his new Civil War mystery-thriller. Series: * Circus World * Enemy Mine Series contributed to: * Alien Nation

Science Fiction and Fantasy short story author. Writing horror short stories under the pen name Kelda Crich.

Christopher Barzak is the author of the Crawford Fantasy Award winning novel One for Sorrow which has been made into the Sundance feature film Jamie Marks is Dead. His second novel, The Love We Share Without Knowing, was a finalist for the Nebula Award and the James Tiptree Jr. Award. His third novel, Wonders of the Invisible World, received the Stonewall Honor from the American Library Association and most recently was selected for inclusion on the Human Rights Campaign’s list of books for libraries in LGBTQ welcoming schools. He is also the author of three short story collections: Birds and Birthdays, a collection of surrealist fantasy stories, Before and Afterlives, a collection of supernatural fantasies, which won Best Collection in the 2013 Shirley Jackson Awards, and Monstrous Alterations. His most recent novel, The Gone Away Place, received the inaugural Whippoorwill Award, and was selected for the Choose to Read Ohio program by the State Library of Ohio, the Ohioana Library Association, and the Ohio Center for the Book. Christopher grew up in rural Kinsman, Ohio, has lived in the southern California beach town of Carlsbad, and the capital of Michigan; he taught English outside of Tokyo, Japan, where he lived for two years. He teaches creative writing at Youngstown State University, in Youngstown, Ohio.

Douglas Smith is a multi-award-winning author described by Library Journal as “one of Canada's most original writers of speculative fiction.” His latest work is the multi-award-winning YA urban fantasy trilogy, The Dream Rider Saga (The Hollow Boys, The Crystal Key, and The Lost Expedition). Other books include the urban fantasy novel, The Wolf at the End of the World; the collections, Chimerascope, Impossibilia, and La Danse des Esprits (translated); and the writer's guide Playing the Short Game: How to Market & Sell Short Fiction. His short fiction has appeared in the top markets in the field, including The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Amazing Stories, InterZone, Weird Tales, Baen’s Universe, Escape Pod, On Spec, and Cicada. Published in 27 languages, Doug is a 4-time winner of Canada's Aurora Award, most recently in 2023 for The Hollow Boys, as well as the juried IAP Award for the same book. He's been a finalist for the Astounding Award, CBC's Bookies Award, Canada's juried Sunburst Award, the juried Alberta Magazine Award for Fiction, and France's juried Prix Masterton and Prix Bob Morane. Buy Doug's books Follow Doug on Amazon

NYT bestselling writer Jeff VanderMeer has been called “the weird Thoreau” by the New Yorker for his engagement with ecological issues. His most recent novel, the national bestseller Borne, received wide-spread critical acclaim and his prior novels include the Southern Reach trilogy (Annihilation, Authority, and Acceptance). Annihilation won the Nebula and Shirley Jackson Awards, has been translated into 35 languages, and was made into a film from Paramount Pictures directed by Alex Garland. His nonfiction has appeared in New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Atlantic, Slate, Salon, and the Washington Post. He has coedited several iconic anthologies with his wife, the Hugo Award winning editor. Other titles include Wonderbook, the world’s first fully illustrated creative writing guide. VanderMeer served as the 2016-2017 Trias Writer in Residence at Hobart and William Smith Colleges. He has spoken at the Guggenheim, the Library of Congress, and the Arthur C. Clarke Center for the Human Imagination. VanderMeer was born in Bellefonte, Pennsylvania, but spent much of his childhood in the Fiji Islands, where his parents worked for the Peace Corps. This experience, and the resulting trip back to the United States through Asia, Africa, and Europe, deeply influenced him. Jeff is married to Ann VanderMeer, who is currently an acquiring editor at Tor.com and has won the Hugo Award and World Fantasy Award for her editing of magazines and anthologies. They live in Tallahassee, Florida, with two cats and thousands of books.

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.

Peter Straub was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the son of Gordon Anthony Straub and Elvena (Nilsestuen) Straub. Straub read voraciously from an early age, but his literary interests did not please his parents; his father hoped that he would grow up to be a professional athlete, while his mother wanted him to be a Lutheran minister. He attended Milwaukee Country Day School on a scholarship, and, during his time there, began writing. Straub earned an honors BA in English at the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1965, and an MA at Columbia University a year later. He briefly taught English at Milwaukee Country Day, then moved to Dublin, Ireland, in 1969 to work on a PhD, and to start writing professionally After mixed success with two attempts at literary mainstream novels in the mid-1970s ("Marriages" and "Under Venus"), Straub dabbled in the supernatural for the first time with "Julia" (1975). He then wrote "If You Could See Me Now" (1977), and came to widespread public attention with his fifth novel, "Ghost Story" (1979), which was a critical success and was later adapted into a 1981 film. Several horror novels followed, with growing success, including "The Talisman" and "Black House", two fantasy-horror collaborations with Straub's long-time friend and fellow author Stephen King. In addition to his many novels, he published several works of poetry during his lifetime. In 1966, Straub married Susan Bitker.They had two children; their daughter, Emma Straub, is also a novelist. The family lived in Dublin from 1969 to 1972, in London from 1972 to 1979, and in the New York City area from 1979 onwards. Straub died on September 4, 2022, aged 79, from complications of a broken hip. At the time of his death, he and his wife lived in Brooklyn (New York City).