OUR AUTHORS

Our Authors...

Colleen Alles, author of Master of Arts

Colleen Alles is a native Michigander and writer living in West Michigan.  She is a graduate of Michigan State University and Wayne State University, as well as contributing editor for short fiction at Barren Magazine.  When she isn't reading or writing, she's spending time with her family, including a beloved hound, Charlie.  You can visit her online at www.colleenalles.com

 Michael C. Keith, author of The Late Epiphany of a Low-Key Oracle

Michael C. Keith is the author / coauthor of two dozen non-fiction books focused on media subjects and twenty fiction collections.  His most recent story collection is Quiet Geography from Cervena Barva Press.  In addition, he is the author of an acclaimed memoir, The Next Better Place, published by Algonquin Books.  He also is the recipient of several awards for his scholarship as well as numerous nominations for his fiction.  He is professor emeritus at Boston College.

 

Gregory J. Wolos, author of The Green Ray

 Gregory J. Wolos raised two children and spent more than three decades as an educator in upstate New York.  He currently resides with his wife of forty-two years in a small town not far from Boston, Massachusetts.  His daily regimen includes writing, running, and tending grandchildren.  He holds a doctorate from the University at Albany.  More than one hundred of his stories and reviews have been published in various journals and anthologies, and his work has won many awards.  He is the author of three other story collections:  Women of Consequence, Dear Everyone, and The Thing About Men, along with the novel Kika Kongus, The Dead White Males.  For more information, visit his website:  www.gregorywolos.com

Antoinette Carone, author of Hotel of the Siren

Antoinette Carone loves travel, particularly in Italy. Her journal, Ciao, Napoli: A Scrapbook of Wandering in Naples is a memoir of time spent in Naples. She maintains a blog https://italianscrapbook.wordpress.com  Her stories have appeared in Ovunque Siamo, Fudoki Magazine, Foxglove Journal, Ellipsis ‘Zine, Real Women Write: Living on COVID Time (the Story Circle Network anthology for 2020), and The Thieving Magpie.  She lives with her partner Jim Mauro in New York City and Northport, Long Island. 

 

 

Robert Scotellaro, author of Ways to Read the World

Robert Scotellaro’s work has been included in W.W. Norton’s Flash Fiction International, Maryland Literary Review, Gargoyle, Matter Press, New World Writing, Best Small Fictions 2016, 2017, and 2021, Best Microfiction 2020, and elsewhere. He is the author of seven chapbooks, several books for children, and five flash fiction collections. He was the winner of Zone 3’s Rainmaker Award in Poetry and the Blue Light Book Award for his fiction. His flash collection, What Are the Chances? (Press 53), was a finalist for the 2020 Big Other Book Award for fiction. A new chapbook of flash and micro stories, God in a Can, is scheduled for release in 2022 (Bamboo Dart Press). He has, along with James Thomas, co-edited New Micro: Exceptionally Short Fiction, published by W.W. Norton & Co. Robert is one of the founding donors to The Ransom Flash Fiction Collection at the University of Texas, Austin. He lives in San Francisco. Visit him at www.robertscotellaro.com.

 

 

Julie Ann Rea, author of Crazybugs 

Julie Ann Rea’s work has appeared in Roanoke Review, The Intima: A Journal of Narrative Medicine, Drunk Monkeys, and other places. She lives in the Philadelphia area. You can find her on Twitter @phillylitgrl or at https://www.juliereawriter.com/.

Herm Rawlings, author of Follow the Moon, and Family Tradition: An Adventure at Sea

Herm Rawlings enlisted in the Coast Guard at age seventeen and retired twenty years later at the rank of Chief Petty Officer, Hospital Corpsman.  He now works as the Navy Installation Housing Director for the Surface Combat Systems Center, located at Wallops Island, Virginia.  He and his wife Kim have a son, Traise.

 

John Sheirer, author of Too Wild, Uncorrected, Fever Cabin, Positively Toward the Negative, The Oldest Male Kindergarten Teacher in America

John Sheirer (pronounced “shy-er”) lives in Northampton, Massachusetts, with his wonderful wife Betsy and happy dog Libby. He has taught writing and communications for 27 years at Asnuntuck Community College in Enfield, Connecticut, where he also serves as editor and faculty advisor for Freshwater Literary Journal (submissions welcome). He writes a monthly column on current events for his hometown newspaper, the Daily Hampshire Gazette, and his books include memoir, fiction, poetry, essays, political satire, and photography. Find him at JohnSheirer.com.

 

Jessica Barone, author of Eternal Night, Shadow Cast, Dark Ascension, Dragon Slayer, and Once Upon a Blue Moon

Jessica has always had a taste for the supernatural.  At a young age, she expressed an interest in vampires that resulted in her removal from the Brownies!  The interest persisted (although a career in the Girl Scouts was quite out of the question), and she began to write her first novel, Eternal Night, at the age of 13.  More novels followed the first, and Eternal Night saw its first printing in 2000.

Jessica credits her Sicilian grandmother's stories of the old country as her earliest source of inspiration.  Tales of ancient crypts, eyeless corpses, and headless factory workers were told while sitting around the kitchen table sipping coffee.  Today Jessica is a mother who tells stories to her own child, (more subdued than those of her grandmother), but has kept her love of the supernatural alive by watching scary movies, melodramatic Netflix shows, and reading endless amounts of slightly disturbing novels in her spare time.  You can find her at:
 https://jessicabaronewriter.blogspot.com/

 

Joel Reeves, author of Odd Birds

Joel Reeves is a teacher and author living in Northwest Lower Michigan with his family and guard animals, Big Chungus and Penguin.  His short stories have been published in several anthologies including Tales of the Unanticipated and Return to Deathlehem.  His rollicking fantasy Quillogy, Of Quills and Kings, Walpole Unbound, and Dreams, Schemes, and Spiny Machines— featuring a demented demon hedgehog with a vision—was recently published by Double Dragon Press.  His screenplay, Midnight Dreary, a biographical drama about Edgar Allan Poe, was a winner in the WILDsound screenwriting competition.  

Maritza Garcia, author of Purretry

 

Maritza García tragically passed away due to complications after surgery on September 14, 2019, as her book was being prepared for publication. In addition to writing poetry, Maritza García was a scientist for twenty years, owned her own business, and worked as a K-12 teacher. She held multiple patents all over the world and spoke Spanish and Russian. She enjoyed painting, singing, and playing piano, and she had the opportunity to sing backup for Elizabeth Von Trapp at Woosley Hall and to sing with the Gold Tones Choral Group. She was active at her church and held many board and committee positions, serving as Deacon, Sunday school teacher, USS Representative, and Bible study leader. During the last year of her life, Maritza studied creative writing at Asnuntuck Community College in Enfield, Connecticut. She was beloved by her instructors and fellow students, just as she touched everyone she knew throughout her life.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YV1_yqqeWsI&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR2tY8cDls4Sxh8u6YryaXRfFrDcnbU0zzslqlKImXAkHqaFvtOIZnM-6g8

Bob Thurber, author of If You'd Like to Make a Call, Please Hang Up

Bob Thurber is an old “unschooled” writer with no degrees in anything. Born in 1955 and raised in abject poverty, Bob graduated high school by the skin of his teeth, then spent his early adult years working menial jobs while reading obsessively and studying the craft of fiction. He served a lengthy apprenticeship, writing nearly every day for twenty years before submitting his work for publication. Since then his stories have received a long list of awards and citations, among them The Marjory Bartlett Sanger Award and The Barry Hannah Fiction Prize. Selections have appeared in over sixty anthologies and hundreds of publications, including Esquire. Bob is the author of Paperboy: A Dysfunctional Novel and three other collections of stories. He resides in Massachusetts where, despite vision loss, he continues to write every day. Visit him at BobThurber.net.

Trisha Hall-Muller, author of All The Feelings All At Once

Trisha Hall-Muller lives in Connecticut with her two children (the miracle minions that bless this book).  She holds a B.S. in Elementary Education and works as a teacher.  In her spare time, she enjoys Facebooking, vacationing in Old Orchard Beach, Maine, spending time with her family, and advocating for Autism Awareness.  This is her first (and hopefully not last) book.