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Robert J. Begiebing is the author of thirty articles and stories and six books, including an historical New England trilogy of novels spanning 1648-1850. His novel Rebecca Wentworth’s Distraction won the Langum Prize for historical fiction in 2003. The Strange Death of Mistress Coffin was chosen as a Main Selection for the Mystery and Literary Guild Book Clubs. His novels have been favorably reviewed in The New York Times, The Times of London, The Los Angeles Times, Publisher’s Weekly, Yankee Magazine, and Library Journal, among other periodicals. His fiction writing has been supported by grants from the Lila-Wallace Foundation and the New Hampshire Council for the Arts. In 2007, Governor John Lynch appointed Begiebing to the Council for the Arts. He directs the low-residency MFA in Fiction and Nonfiction at Southern New Hampshire University

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Jacquelyn Benson is the author of several critically acclaimed plays including a collection of one-acts, Evening Broadcasts, which premiered at the Players' Ring in Portsmouth this past summer. She is also the book reviewer for Foster's Daily Democrat's weekly Showcase magazine, and recently finished work on My Blues and Greens, a documentary about the life of Czech painter Stanislav Stanek. Her short stories have appeared in Behind the Wainscot and Spectrum. She lives in Hampton.

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Sally Brady is a literary agent, editor, teacher and author. She represents award-winning authors, including Pulitzer winner David Moats, Ernest Hebert, Thich Nhat Hanh, Miriam Weinstein, Kelly Cunnane, and Alan Hirshfeld. Brady has led writing workshops at Harvard University, MIT, Middlesex Community College and Lebanon College, as well as privately for writers including Sebastian Junger, Elizabeth Berg, Caroline Preston, John Sedgwick and Edward Delaney. Brady has published one novel, Instar, one illustrated book of adult humor Sweet Memories, and two books of non-fiction, A Yankee Christmas Vols. I & II, in addition to a number of short stories and essays in House Beautiful, The Boston Globe, Good Housekeeping, Yankee, Woman’s Day and other publications. She is currently working on a memoir of her forty-six year marriage.

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Richard Adams Carey grew up in Connecticut, studied drama and American literature at Harvard, taught school in several Eskimo villages of western Alaska, and has lived in New Hampshire since 1984. His essays and short fiction have appeared in a number of journals and magazines. He is the author of three books of narrative nonfiction: Raven's Children: An Alaskan Culture at Twilight; Against the Tide: The Fate of the New England Fisherman; and The Philosopher Fish: Sturgeon, Caviar, and the Geography of Desire. Raven’s Children was chosen as a New York Public Library Book to Remember, and Against the Tide won the 2001 New Hampshire Literary Award for Nonfiction. He teaches in Southern New Hampshire University’s MFA program in writing and is president of the New Hampshire Writers’ Project board of trustees.

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Maryann Cocca-Leffler is the author and illustrator of more than 40 books for children. She has worked with most major publishers including Random House, HarperCollins, and Scholastic. Three new books will be published this Spring including, Princess K.I.M. and the Lie that Grew and My Dance Recital. Her book, Mr. Tanen’s Ties was the winner of the Indiana Hoosier Book Award and the Florida Reading Award. Her childhood inspired book, Bus Route to Boston won the Parents Choice Award. She holds a BFA in Illustration from the Massachusetts College of Art. Please visit her website at: www.maryanncoccaleffler.com.

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Joni Cole is the author of the acclaimed book Toxic Feedback: Helping Writers Survive and Thrive, which was “strongly recommended” by Library Journal to students, teachers, and workshops. American Book Review reported, “I can’t imagine a better guide to [feedback’s] rewards and perils than this fine book.” Joni is also the creator of the popular” This Day” book series, including Water Cooler Diaries: Women across America Share Their Day at Work (“both fascinating and eye-opening…” Publisher’s Weekly, 2008). Joni is the co-founder of the Writer’s Center of White River Junction, Vermont, and has taught writing workshops for fifteen years. She is a frequent speaker at writing conferences around the country. Her human-interest essays appear in her monthly newspaper column “Life as I Know It,” which runs in newspapers across Vermont.

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Jonathan Crowe is an Assistant Editor at Da Capo Press, a member of the Perseus Books Group, where he acquires and develops nonfiction in the areas of history, biography, travel memoir, and cultural studies, with a close eye to works with an environmental focus and/or written by young authors. Jonathan holds a master’s degree in Publishing and Writing from Emerson College.

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Karen Desrosiers is a freelance writer, teacher, and writing coach living on the seacoast of New Hampshire. She’s the author of Daytrips Quebec, and co-author of A Group of One’s Own: Nurturing the Woman Writer. Ms. Desrosiers is earning an MFA in Fiction Writing at Southern New Hampshire University, and completing her first novel, Tireland.

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Paul J. Durham represents writers, artists, filmmakers, and TV producers. He is the chair of the Entertainment, Media and Publishing practice group at Sheehan, Phinney, Bass & Green, P.A. Durham received his JD from Boston University where he served as Editor for the Boston University Law Review. In addition to practicing law, Durham is an active writer of fiction and screenplays. He lives in Nashua with his wife and children.

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Xujun Eberlein grew up in Chongqing, China, and moved to the United States in the summer of 1988. After receiving a Ph.D. from MIT in the spring of 1995, and winning an award for her dissertation, she joined a small but ambitious high tech company. On Thanksgiving 2003, she gave up algorithms for writing. She has since won a numerous literary awards. Her stories and personal essays have been published in the United States, Canada, England, Kenya, and Hong Kong, in magazines such as AGNI, Walrus, PRISM International, StoryQuarterly, Stand and Kwani. Her debut story collection Apologies Forthcoming won the 2007 Tartt Fiction Award and was published in May 2008. She was recently awarded an artist fellowship in fiction/creative nonfiction by the Massachusetts Cultural Council.

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Tom Eslick is the author of Tracked in the Whites (1998), his first mystery, and Snow Kill, released in May 2000, both through Write Way Publishing; his third, Deadly Kin was published by Viking in September 2003, and his fourth, Mountain Peril, also with Viking, in March 2005. He has taught English for over forty years on both the college and secondary levels. He is also a songwriter and performer with five albums of original songs to his credit. He has given lectures, led workshops and participated in numerous panel discussions through libraries and organizations such as Seacoast Writers, Monadnock Writers, and Bouchercon, the world wide mystery convention. In addition to being an enthusiastic supporter of NHWP, he also is a member of Mystery Writers of America, International Thriller Writers, and The Authors' Guild. Tom lives in Wilmot, NH with his wife of 42 years, Susan. They have two grown sons—Jason, also a songwriter and performer, who teaches English at a private school in Massachusetts, and John, a freelance graphics designer and caricature artist who works in LA. [Photo credit: Susan Wilson]

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Terry Farish is the author of The Cat Who Liked Potato Soup, illustrated by Barry Root and published by Candlewick. The Cat won a Blue Ribbon from the Center for the Study of Children’s Books, as well as NHWP’s award for Outstanding Work of Children’s Literature. Farish is the author of the middle grade novel, Talking in Animal, the YA novel Why I’m Already Blue, and the adult novel If the Tiger. Farish has been a children’s librarian, a writing instructor at Rivier College, and now directs the Connections program for the New Hampshire Humanities Council. Through the organization Amesbury for Africa, she is working with teachers in a western Kenyan village to develop a reading-in-the-home project.

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Jeff Friedman is the author of four collections of poetry: Black Threads, Taking Down the Angel, Scattering the Ashes and The Record-Breaking Heat Wave. His poems and translations have appeared in many literary magazines including American Poetry Review, Poetry, The Antioch Review, The Missouri Review, Manoa, New England Review, Luna, Bloomsbury Review, Literary Imagination, Poetry East, The Forward and The New Republic. He has won two fellowships from the New Hampshire State Arts Council, the Editor's Prize from The Missouri Review and the Milton Dorfman Poetry Prize. He has had residencies at the MacDowell Colony, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts the Vermont Studio Center and Yaddo. He is a core faculty member in the M.F.A. Program in Poetry Writing at New England College. [Photo credit: Martin Desht]

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David R. Godine is the founder and president of David R. Godine, Inc., an independent publishing house located in Boston, Massachusetts. He represents awarding winning authors, including J.M.G. Le Clézio, winner of the 2008 Nobel Prize in Literature.

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Sonja Hakala is the author of two how-to books, Teach Yourself Visually Quilting and Visual Quick Tips Quilting, both from Wiley Publishing. She is the editor of American Patchwork from St. Martin’s Press. Her next book, The Entrepreneurial Writer, will be available in March 2009 from her own publishing company, Full Circle Press. In addition to writing books, Sonja has edited or designed books for numerous authors in the U.S. and Europe, written for newspapers and magazines, and marketed books on a national level. She's currently working with some very cool authors who are publishing their works with Full Circle Press.

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Meredith Hall’s first book, Without a Map: A Memoir was a New York Times Bestseller. Hall is the 2005 recipient of the Gift of Freedom Award, a $50,000 grant from A Room of Her Own Foundation. She also received the Maine Arts Commission’s 2005 Individual Artist Fellowship, and is a MacDowell fellow. Hall won the 2005 Pushcart Prize with her first essay, which was also a “Notable Essay” in The Best American Essays 2005. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Good Housekeeping, The Southern Review, Kenyon Review, Prairie Schooner, and many other journals and anthologies. Hall is working on a novel and a collection of essays, and is a permanent writer-in-residence at the University of New Hampshire.

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Joseph Hurka is the author of the novel Before, from Thomas Dunne Books, and the memoir Fields of Light: A Son Remembers His Heroic Father, winner of the Pushcart Editors' Book Award. He serves currently as a fiction editor for the Pushcart Prize. Hurka was educated at Bradford College, where he studied with the short story master, Andre Dubus, and at the University of Iowa Writers' Workshop. His short stories have been published in numerous literary journals, and will be published soon as a collection; he is at work on a new novel. He teaches at Tufts University and Emerson College.

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Sarah Anne Johnson is the author of The Very Telling, The Art of the Author Interview, and Conversations with American Women Writers. Her interviews appear in The Writer's Chronicle, Glimmertrain Stories, Provincetown Arts, and The Writer where she is a contributing editor. Her fiction has appeared in Other Voices, and she is the recipient of residencies in fiction from Jentel Artists' Residency Program and Vermont Studio Center. She has taught the Art of the Author Interview Workshop at Bennington College Writing Seminars MFA Program, Lesley University MFA Program, and at literary conferences nationwide.

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Hope Jordan poems have been published in such journals as Many Mountains Moving and Green Mountains Review; her fiction appeared in the anthology Scream When You Burn. A former journalist, her articles have appeared in publications ranging from Business NH Magazine to the Boston Globe. She is a trustee of the NH Writers Project, has a dual degree in English and Magazine Journalism from Syracuse University, and is earning a masters degree in teaching writing from Plymouth State University. She has competed in poetry slams in Boston, New York, and Manchester, NH, was the first official poetry slam master in New Hampshire, and coached the inaugural NH Poetry Slam Team in 2007.

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Brian Jud is an author, book-marketing consultant, seminar leader, television host and president of Book Marketing Works, LLC. Brian has created The Promotional Bookstore, a catalog used by thousands of independent sales reps to sell books on a commission-only basis to non-bookstore buyers. He is the author of How to Make Real Money Selling Books, Beyond the Bookstore. Brian is the editor of the Book Marketing Matters newsletter on special sales topics. Mr. Jud is the producer and host of the television series The Book Authority and has aired six hundred and fifty shows. In addition, he is the author, narrator and producer of the media-training video program You're On The Air. He also wrote and published its companion guides, It’s Show Time and Perpetual Promotion. Visit Brian's web site at: www.bookmarketing.com or email him at: brianjud@bookmarketing.com.

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J. Kates is a poet, literary translator and the president and co-director of Zephyr Press, a non-profit press that focuses on contemporary works in translation from Russia, Eastern Europe and Asia. Mr. Kates is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellowship in Poetry in 1984 and a Translation Project Fellowship in 2006, as well as an Individual Artist Fellowship from the New Hampshire State Council on the Arts in 1995. He is the translator of The Score of the Game by Tatiana Shcherbina and Say Thank You by Mikhail Aizenberg, the translation editor of Contemporary Russian Poetry, and the editor of In the Grip of Strange Thoughts: Russian Poetry in a New Era. He is also the co-translator of three books of Latin American poetry, and has a chapbook of his own poems, Mappemonde, published by the Oyster River Press. He is currently president of the American Literary Translators Association.

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James Patrick Kelly has written novels, short stories, essays, reviews, poetry, plays and planetarium shows. His most recent book, The Wreck Of The Godspeed, was published in August, 2008. He has won the Science Fiction Writers of America's Nebula Award and the World Science Fiction Society’s Hugo Award and his work has been translated into eighteen languages. He writes a column on the internet for Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine and is on the faculty of the Stonecoast Creative Writing MFA Program at the University of Southern Maine. He produces two (count 'em – two!) podcasts: James Patrick Kelly's StoryPod on Audible.com which features him reading fifty-two of his own stories and the Free Reads Podcast where he most recently finished podcasting his novel Look Into The Sun. His Web site is: www.jimkelly.net.

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Susan Kouguell award-winning screenwriter and filmmaker, teaches screenwriting and film at Tufts University, and presents seminars nationwide. As chairperson of Su-City Pictures East, a motion picture consulting company founded in 1990, Susan works with over 1,000 international clients, including the major film studios. Author of The Savvy Screenwriter: How to Sell Your Screenplay (and Yourself) Without Selling Out! (St. Martin’s Press/Griffin), Susan writes for many screenwriting and film publications. Susan wrote voiceover narrations for Miramax Films and over a dozen features for independent production companies. Her short films are in the permanent collection and archives of the Museum of Modern Art and were in the Whitney Museum of American Art Biennial. Susan worked with director Louis Malle on the documentary And the Pursuit of Happiness, and associate produced two features. A MacDowell fellow, Susan received fifteen screenwriting and film fellowships and grants. Susan’s website: www.su-city-pictures.com.

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Joni Praded is editorial director of Chelsea Green Publishing Company, whose books on progressive politics and sustainable living include national bestsellers, environmental classics, exposés, and practical advice on green living.  Over her 25-plus years in publishing, Joni also worked at environmental book publisher Island Press, and was longtime director and editor of Animals Magazine—which covered wildlife, the environment, and animal issues. Her articles on national and international wildlife issues, emerging environmental concerns, and eco-travel have appeared in numerous national magazines. Early in her career, she held editorial positions at Little, Brown and Company and Boston Magazine.

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Peter E. Randall is founder and president of Peter E. Randall Publishers based in Portsmouth, NH. The publishing house was the recipient of three 2008 New England Book Awards. Randall has been involved with publishing since graduating from the University of New Hampshire as a history major. Before he began his own publishing company, he was editor of a weekly newspaper, and for seven years edited New Hampshire Profiles magazine. Since 1974, he has authored 14 books ranging from collections of photographs and travel guides, to local history.

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Lorin Rees is an agent with the Helen Rees Literary Agency in Boston, which represents such leading authors as Michael Hammer, Alan Dershowitz, Jack Welch, and many others. His books and authors include Words that Work by Frank Luntz, Blood Makes the Grass Grow Green by Johnny Rico, and the forthcoming Travel Writing by Peter Ferry. The agency acquires fiction, including literary and genre fiction, and nonfiction, including business, current affairs, memoir, and humor.  

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Rebecca Rule, a.k.a. The Moose of Humor, tells and gathers stories in New England, especially New Hampshire.  Her books include The Best Revenge:  Short Stories; Could Have Been Worse:  True Stories, Embellishments, and Outright Lies; and, most recently, Live Free and Eat Pie: A Storyteller’s Guide to New Hampshire.  She writes a book review column for three New Hampshire newspapers, the Concord Monitor, Nashua Telegraph, and Portsmouth Herald.  Her humor column "Moose Tales" appears in the Pawtuckaway Forum, an on-line newspaper.  She also hosts the NH Authors Series on NHPTV.  Her web site is: www.mooseofhumor.com. [Photo credit: Sofia Piel]

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Jim Schley (www.jimschley.com) has been co-editor of the quarterly New England Review, production editor at University Press of New England, and editor-in-chief of Chelsea Green Publishing Company, and he’s now managing editor for Tupelo Press. He has edited more than a hundred and twenty books on a wide variety of subjects. He has an M.F.A. from Warren Wilson College and is a member of the journalists’ collective Homeland Productions. His own books include a poetry chapbook, One Another and a collection of poems, As When, In Season.

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Rebecca Sinkler is a former editor of The New York Times Book Review. She was born and raised in Philadelphia, where she graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1975. Before joining The New York Times, she worked as a reporter and literary editor at the Philadelphia Inquirer. Ms. Sinkler moved to New Hampshire in 1998, although she has been visiting Squam Lake since childhood, from the time she first attended Rockywold Camp. From 1997 to 2007, she served as president of the Friends of the Library in Sandwich. Ms. Sinkler continues to write from Sandwich, where she lives with her husband, David.

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Lissa Warren is vice president, senior director of publicity and acquiring editor at Da Capo Press, a member of the Perseus Books Group. The author of The Savvy Author’s Guide to Book Publicity, she teaches at Emerson College and in Boston University’s publishing certificate program. Her poetry has appeared in many literary journals, and she’s a poetry editor for Post Road.

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Susan Wheeler, co-author with Rebecca Rule of True Stories: Guides for Writing from Your Life and Creating the Story: Guides for Writers, has had stories published in The North American Review, Willow Springs, The Bradford Review, and other literary magazines. She has written for newspapers and television and been an assistant producer at Channel 11 in Durham. At UNH, she taught creative nonfiction, fiction and freshman English. Recently retired, she now teaches writing courses for the Writers Resource Center at the Dover Adult Learning Center. With Maggie Moore, Director of the Resource Center, she also edits manuscripts and mentors writers in individual conferences.

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Susan Zizza, a veteran journalist with more than 20 years of experience, has served as editor, reporter, and photographer for the News and Sentinel, Colebrook Chronicle, Lancaster Herald and Northern New Hampshire Magazine. Her work has also appeared in New Hampshire ToDo, Vermont Life, Sports Illustrated, and the Boston Herald. She was selected as Editor of the Year and Spot Photographer of the Year by the New Hampshire Press Association. Now a freelance writer and photographer, Zizza has spent most of 2008 touring northern New England with her book, Turn of the Twentieth, which showcases the unique images of a young woman artist and photographer born in 1891. Zizza and her husband, Mark, have been residents of Colebrook, New Hampshire, where they raised two sons, since 1977.

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