Shelley Blanton-Stroud: I grew up in California’s Central Valley, the daughter of Dust Bowl immigrants who made good on their ambition to get out of the field. I recently retired from teaching writing at Sacramento State University and still consult with writers in the energy industry. I co-direct Stories on Stage Sacramento, where actors perform the stories of established and emerging authors, and serve on the advisory board of 916 Ink, an arts-based creative writing nonprofit for children. I’ve also served on the Writers’ Advisory Board for the Belize Writers’ Conference. Copy Boy is my first Jane Benjamin Novel. Tomboy (She Writes Press 2022) will be my second. The third, Working Girl, will come out in November 2023. My writing has been a finalist in the Sarton Book Awards, IBPA Benjamin Franklin Awards, Killer Nashville’s Silver Falchion Award, the American Fiction Awards, and the National Indie Excellence Awards. I and my husband live in Sacramento with an aging beagle, Ernie, and many photos of our out-of-town sons and their wonderful partners.
Month: June 2022
Mark Zvonkovic
Mark Zvonkovic is a writer who lives in Rosarito Beach, Baja California, Mexico, with his wife Nancy and their two dogs, Finn and Cooper. He has written three novels, A Lion in the Grass, The Narrows, and Belinda, and he also regularly writes book reviews and essays for various publications. Before retiring to Mexico, Mark practiced law for 35 years at 3 multinational law firms in Houston, Texas and New York City. He attended college at Southern Methodist University and Boston University, and his law degree is from SMU School of Law. Mark grew up as an oil company brat and lived in Latin America, Texas and New York.
Lisa Knopp
Lisa Knopp is the author of seven books of creative nonfiction including Bread: A Memoir of Hunger and What the River Carries: Encounters with the Mississippi, Missouri, and Platte. Her essays have appeared in the best journals including Georgia Review, Seneca Review, Missouri Review, Shenandoah, Gettysburg Review, Creative Nonfiction, and Brevity. Knopp is a Professor of English at the University of Nebraska-Omaha. She lives in Lincoln.
Mark Rubinstein
Mark Rubinstein is the author of Assassin’s Lullaby. Rubinstein, a novelist, physician, and psychiatrist, has written eight nonfiction books, including The Storytellers. He has also written eight novels and novellas, including the Mad Dog trilogy and The Lovers’ Tango. He lives in Wilton, Connecticut.
Elizabeth Gould
Elizabeth Gould has long been fascinated with feminine archetypes, mythology, and rites of passage. She has taught and mentored girls at puberty and is the former director of a non-profit dedicated to positive menstrual/menopausal education and awareness. She holds a BA in Art History from Stanford University and an MS in Education from the State University of New York.
Jane Enright
Jane Enright is an ordinary person who has survived some extraordinary things. An inspiring and humorous inspirational author, speaker, and positivity expert, Canada-based Enright is a former kindergarten teacher, strategic planner, and university lecturer, as well as the founder and CEO of Everything at My Super Awesome Life Inc. She is also the author of Butter Side Up: How I Survived My Most Terrible Year & Created My Super Awesome Life and Jane’s Jam: Inspiration To Create Your Super Awesome Life.
Ben Ewell
Ben Ewell was born and raised on a small farm near Brighton, Ohio. He received his BA from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, and his JD from UC Hastings College of Law in San Francisco, California. He practices law, specializing in water rights, in Fresno, California, where he resides with his wife, Suzanne. He is the father of five sons. He is also a developer whose projects include a New Town financed by foreign investors. Ben is active in his community, his church, and in politics, and he loves spending time with his family at his ranch in the Sierra Nevada foothills.
Lee Bukowski
Born and raised in a large family in eastern Pennsylvania, Lee Bukowski has always had an interest in reading, writing, and storytelling. She holds a BA in English and Secondary Education from Millersville University and taught seventh grade English and writing for fifteen years. In 2017, she obtained an MFA in English and Creative Writing from Southern New Hampshire University. Currently, she teaches writing at the college level and freelances as a proofreader and editor. When she’s not teaching or writing, she loves reading and traveling, especially visiting her grown daughters in Boston and Fort Lauderdale. Lee lives with her husband in Reading, PA. A Week of Warm Weather is her debut novel.
Linda Murphy Marshall
Linda Murphy Marshall is a multi-linguist and writer with a Ph.D. in Hispanic Languages and Literature and an MFA in Creative Writing. Her writing has been published or is forthcoming in The Los Angeles Review, The Catamaran Literary Reader, The Ocotillo Review, Maryland Literary Review, Under the Gum Tree, Critical Read, American Writers Review, Bacopa Literary Review, Adelaide Literary Magazine, Flash Fiction Magazine, Sip Cup, Hobo Camp Review, and elsewhere. She was runner-up in the 2021 Blue Earth Review Flash Creative Nonfiction Contest. In addition, she is a docent at the Library of Congress, served as Translation Editor at the Los Angeles Review, and is a Trustee at the National Museum of Language.
L.M. Weeks
Like his fictional hero, Torn Sagara, L.M. (“Mark”) Weeks was born in Alaska and practices law in Japan. Mark was Managing Partner of the Tokyo office of global law firm Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP for over ten years. He has represented technology companies worldwide in matters of financing, intellectual property, cross-border mergers and acquisitions, and related disputes. Mark speaks, reads, and writes fluent Japanese; has a black belt in aikido; and is an avid motorcyclist and tournament fly-fisherman.