Author: Author's Answer

Amy Poeppel is the author of SMALL ADMISSIONS and LIMELIGHT. Her third novel, MUSICAL CHAIRS, will be out this July 2020 with Emily Bestler Books/Simon and Schuster. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Rumpus (Funny Women), Belladonna Comedy, and Working Mother. She lives in New York City and Frankfurt, Germany.

Colleen Oakley is the critically acclaimed author of Before I Go, Close Enough to Touch, You Were There Too and the forthcoming The Invisible Husband of Frick Island (May 2021). Colleen’s novels have been translated into 21 languages, optioned for film and longlisted for the Southern Book Prize twice. A former magazine editor for Marie Claire and Women’s Health & Fitness, Colleen’s articles and essays have been featured in The New York Times, Ladies’ Home Journal, Women’s Health, Redbook, Parade, Woman’s Day, Fitness, Health, Marie Claire and Martha Stewart Weddings. A proud graduate of the University of Georgia’s school of journalism, Colleen currently lives in Atlanta with her husband, four kids, and the world’s biggest lapdog, Bailey.

Mary Pauline Lowry is the author of the novel The Roxy Letter and is a regular contributor to O Magazine. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, The New York Times Magazine, The Millions, and other publications.

Vanessa Hua is a columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle and the author of A River of Stars and Deceit and Other Possibilities. A National Endowment for the Arts Literature Fellow, she has also received a Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers’ Award, the Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature, and a Steinbeck Fellowship in Creative Writing, as well as awards from the Society of Professional Journalists and the Asian American Journalists Association, among others. She teaches at the Writers’ Grotto, Warren Wilson MFA Program for Writers, and elsewhere.

Julia Claiborne Johnson grew up on a farm in Tennessee, and as so often happens, went from there to working in magazines in New York City. After marrying a tv-comedy-writer, she moved to Los Angeles and had two children. Her first novel, Be Frank with Me, a national bestseller, was one of six finalists for the American Booksellers Association’s Best Debut of 2017. The audiobook, performed by Tavia Gilbert, won an Audie Award for Best Female Narrator. Her second novel comes out in January from Custom House/Harper Collins.

Kerry Kletter holds a degree in literature and is the critically-acclaimed author of the young adult novel The First Time She Drowned. She has an extensive background in theater, having appeared in film, television, and onstage. She lives in Los Angeles and adores her friends, her partner David, dogs, neuroscience, funny people, Montauk, surfing, and French fries. East Coast Girls is her first adult novel.

Bianca Marais is the author of two novels, Hum If You Don’t Know the Words and If You Want to Make God Laugh. She holds a Certificate in Creative Writing from the University of Torontos School of Continuing Studies where she now teaches creative writing. Before becoming an author, she started a corporate training company and volunteered with Cotlands, where she assisted care workers in Soweto with providing aid for HIV/AIDS orphans and their caregivers. She champions the Own Voices movement in her country of birth, South Africa, where she runs various programs through the Eunice Ngogodo Own Voices Initiative to encourage and empower women of colour to tell their own stories. She resides in Toronto with her husband (Stephen), her golden retriever (Muggle) and her cat (Wombat).

Michael J. Spivey, Ph.D., is the author of Who You Are: The Science of Connectedness and The Continuity of Mind. After 12 years as a psychology professor at Cornell University, Spivey moved to the University of California, Merced to help build their Cognitive Science Program. His research uses eye-tracking, computer-mouse tracking, neural network models and dynamical systems theory to explore how a mind emerges from the interaction of brain, body, and environment. In 2010, Spivey received the William Procter Prize for Scientific Achievement from the Sigma Xi Scientific Research Honor Society.

Aimee Liu is the author of Glorious Boy (May 2020), as well as the bestselling novels Flash House, Cloud Mountain, and Face, and the memoirs Gaining: The Truth About Life After Eating Disorders and Solitaire. She is the editor of Alchemy of the Word: Writers Talk About Writing, and Restoring Our Bodies, Reclaiming Our Lives: Guidance and Reflections on Recovery from Eating Disorders. Her articles have appeared in The Los Angeles Times, Ms., Cosmopolitan, Self, Glamour, The Los Angeles Review of Books and other publications. Her novels include a Literary Guild Super Release and have been published in more than twelve languages and serialized in Good Housekeeping. She’s received a Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers award and special mention by the Pushcart Prize and teaches in Goddard College’s low-residency MFA in Creative Writing Program at Port Townsend, WA.