Alejandro Varela is a writer based in New York. His work has appeared in The Point Magazine, Boston Review, Harper's Magazine, The Rumpus, Joyland Magazine, The Brooklyn Rail, The Offing, Blunderbuss Magazine, Pariahs (an anthology, SFA Press, 2016), the Southampton Review, The New Republic, and has received honorable mention from Glimmer Train Press. He is a 2019 Jerome Fellow in Literature. He was a resident in the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council’s 2017–2018 Workspace program and a 2017 NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellow in Nonfiction. Alejandro was an associate editor at Apogee Journal from 2015 to 2020. His graduate studies were in public health. His first book, The Town of Babylon, was out 3/22/2022 and was longlisted for the 73rd National Book Awards. His second book, The People Who Report More Stress, is forthcoming (Astra House, 2023). Twitter: @drovarela, Instagram: @alejandrovarela.work

Cyrus Dunham is a writer & organizer living in Los Angeles. He is the author of A Year Without a Name, a finalist for the Lambda Literary Awards. He is a member of the California Coalition for Women Prisoners and the DROP LWOP Coalition.

Author of the memoir The Magical Language of Others (Tin House Books, 2020), winner of the Pacific Northwest Book Award, and the poetry collection A Lesser Love (Louisiana State University Press, 2017), winner of the Pleiades Press Editors Prize for Poetry. Her co-translation of Yi Won’s The World’s Lightest Motorcycle is forthcoming from Zephyr Press. Her poems, translations, and stories have appeared in Boston Review, Los Angeles Review of Books, Chicago Review of Books, Slate, and World Literature Today. Koh is the recipient of the Virginia Faulkner Award and fellowships from the American Literary Translators Association, Jack Straw Writers Program, Kundiman, MacDowell, Napa Valley Writers’ Conference, and Vermont Studio Center. She is the editor of Pleiades: Poetry by Korean American Women. Koh earned her MFA at Columbia University in New York for Creative Writing and Literary Translation. She is completing her PhD at the University of Washington in Seattle for English Language and Literature on Korean and Korean American literature, history, and film.

Gabrielle Bates is the author of Judas Goat, forthcoming from Tin House in January 2023. Originally from Birmingham, Alabama, she currently lives in Seattle, where she works for Open Books: A Poem Emporium and co-hosts the podcast The Poet Salon. A Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Fellowship finalist, her poems have appeared in the New Yorker, the Academy of American Poets Poem-a-Day, Ploughshares, and elsewhere. She teaches occasionally through Hugo House and the University of Washington Rome Center.

Jamil Jan Kochai is the author of 99 Nights in Logar (Viking, 2019), a finalist for the Pen/Hemingway Award for Debut Novel and the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature. His short story collection, The Haunting of Hajji Hotak and Other Stories (Viking) was published in July 2022. He was born in an Afghan refugee camp in Peshawar, Pakistan, but he originally hails from Logar, Afghanistan. His short stories have appeared in The New Yorker, Ploughshares, Zoetrope, The O. Henry Prize Stories, and The Best American Short Stories. His essays have been published at The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times. Kochai was a Stegner Fellow at Stanford University and a Truman Capote Fellow at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, where he was awarded the Henfield Prize for Fiction. Currently, he is a Hodder Fellow at Princeton University.

Jeanne Thornton is the author of the novel The Dream of Doctor Bantam and the collection The Black Emerald, both shortlisted for the Lambda Literary Award. She is the editor, with Tara Madison Avery, of We're Still Here: An All Trans Comics Anthology, the co-publisher of the independent press Instar Books, and the writer and the illustrator of the webcomics Bad Mother and The Man Who Hates Fun. Her work has appeared in Wired, n+1, and The Evergreen Review.

Khadijah Queen is the author of six books of poetry, most recently Anodyne (Tin House Books, 2020), which Ilya Kaminsky called “dazzling.” Her other books include I'm So Fine: A List of Famous Men & What I Had On (YesYes Books 2017), a finalist for the National Poetry Series, which was praised in O Magazine, The New Yorker, Los Angeles Review, and elsewhere as “quietly devastating,” and “a portrait of defiance that turns the male gaze inside out,’ Conduit (Akashic / Black Goat 2008), Black Peculiar (Noemi Press 2011) and Fearful Beloved (Argos Books 2015). Her verse play Non-Sequitur (Litmus Press 2015) won the Leslie Scalapino Award for Innovative Women's Performance Writing. The prize included a full staged production of the play at Theaterlab NYC from December 10 - 20, 2015 by Fiona Templeton's The Relationship theater company.  Individual poems and prose appear in Poetry, Fence, Tin House, American Poetry Review, Buzzfeed, Gulf Coast, Poor Claudia, The Offing, jubilat, Memoir, Tupelo Quarterly, DIAGRAM, LitHub, New Delta Review, The Force of What's Possible and elsewhere. Her 2019 op-ed on poetry and disability, co-edited with Jillian Weise,  appeared in The New York Times. 

Laura Warrell is a graduate of the Creative Writing Program at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. She has attended residencies at the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference and the Tin House Writer's Workshop, and she has taught Creative Writing and Literature through the Emerging Voices program at PEN America Los Angeles, at Writing Workshops Los Angeles, and at academic institutions in Los Angeles and Boston. She currently writes and teaches in Los Angeles. Her writing has been published in the Los Angeles Review of Books, Huffington Post, The Rumpus, The Writer, and Post Road Magazine. Sweet, Soft, Plenty Rhythm is her first novel.

Morgan Thomas is a writer from the Gulf Coast. Their work has appeared in The Atlantic, American Short Fiction, the Kenyon Review, and elsewhere. They’ve received support from the Bread Loaf Work-Study Program and the Fulbright Foundation. They are currently a Southern Studies Fellow in Spartanburg, South Carolina.

Paul Tran is the author of the debut poetry collection, All the Flowers Kneeling, (Penguin Poetry, 2022). A recipient of the Ruth Lilly & Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Fellowship from the Poetry Foundation and a Discovery/Boston Review Poetry Prize, their work appears in The New Yorker, The Nation, Best American Poetry, and elsewhere.

For their writing and teaching, Paul has received support from Kundiman, Voices of Our Nations Arts Foundation, Poets House, Lambda Literary Foundation, Napa Valley Writers Conference, the Home School, Vermont Studio Center, the Conversation Literary Festival, Palm Beach Poetry Festival, Miami Writers Institute, Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Lighthouse Writers Workshop, the Eliza So Fellowship (from Submittable, Plympton, and the Writer’s Block), Bread Loaf Writers Conference, Diasporic Vietnamese Artist Network & Djerrasi Artist Residency, the Soze Foundation, the Luminary & Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, the Regional Arts Commission of St. Louis, Kenyon Review Writers Workshop, and the National Endowment for the Arts.

Ru Freeman is a Sri Lankan born writer and activist whose creative and political work has appeared internationally, including in the UK Guardian, The Boston Globe, and the New York Times. She is the author of the short story collection, Sleeping Alone (Graywolf Press, 2022), and Bon Courage: Essays (Etruscan Press, 2023) andthe novels A Disobedient Girl (Atria/Simon & Schuster, 2009), and On Sal Mal Lane (Graywolf Press, 2013), a NYT Editor’s Choice Book. Both novels have been translated into multiple languages including Italian, French, Turkish, Dutch, and Chinese. She is editor of the anthology, Extraordinary Rendition: (American) Writers on Palestine (OR Books, 2015 and Interlink, 2016), a collection of the voices of 65 American poets and writers speaking about America’s dis/engagement with Palestine, and Indivisible: Global Leaders on Shared Security (Interlink, 2019).

Sasha taqwšəblu LaPointe is from the Upper Skagit and Nooksack Indian Tribes. Native to the Pacific Northwest she draws inspiration from her coastal heritage as well as her life in the city. She writes with a focus on trauma and resilience, ranging topics from PTSD, sexual violence, the work her great grandmother did for the Lushootseed language revitalization, to loud basement punk shows and what it means to grow up mixed heritage. With obsessions revolving around Twin Peaks, the Seattle music scene, and Coast Salish Salmon Ceremonies, Sasha explores her own truth of indigenous identity in the Coast Salish territory. Sasha holds a double MFA from the Institute of American Indian Arts in creative nonfiction and poetry. Her memoir Red Paint has received starred reviews from Kirkus and Shelf Awareness and was named “Best new book of the month,” by Time Magazine. Red Paint was featured on Nylon’s list of most anticipated books of 2022 and has received praise from Ms. Magazine, The LA Times, and Bust Magazine. Red Paint is available through Counterpoint Press. Her collection of poetry Rose Quartz is forthcoming from Milkweed in 2023.

At Neon Literary, Kent D. Wolf represents boundary-pushing fiction but he would never turn away a more commercially-inclined project as long as the writing shines. He has a particular weakness for literary novels that incorporate genre elements—fantasy, sci-fi, horror. He loves to be unsettled by out-of-the box literary thrillers, and wildly appreciate edgy, voice-driven coming-of-age tales. His dreams for non-fiction remain ambitious: serious, immersive journalism with a strong sense of place and story, compelling memoirs, behind-the-scenes looks at fascinating subcultures, and killer essay collections. His authors include National Book Award finalist Carmen Maria Machado (Her Body and Other Parties), NYT-bestselling essayist Samantha Irby (We Are Never Meeting in Real Life), New York Times Notable novelist Martin Seay (The Mirror Thief), and Korea's most celebrated fiction writer Kim Young-Ha (Diary of a Murderer)

Nadxieli Nieto is the Executive Editor at Flatiron Books. Nieto was previously the Program Director for Literary Awards at PEN America, Managing Editor of the award-winning literary fiction annual NOON, and Associate Editor at Visual Arts Press, and is on the board of Latinx in Publishing. Her authors at Flatiron include María Amparo Escandón, John Manuel Arias, Rasheed Newson, Wendy Chin-Tanner, Erica Berry, and Ben Austen. She is drawn to innovative, language-driven work in fiction, and idea-driven, researched nonfiction on culture, feminism, immigration, and the environment. Authors she’s previously edited and published include Carmen Maria Machado, Lilliam Rivera, Yuri Herrera, Danielle Evans, Leslie Jamison, Laura van den Berg, Rion Amilcar Scott, Stephen Graham Jones, Helen Phillips, and Amber Sparks.

Prior to joining Ayesha Pande Literary in 2015, Serene Hakim worked at Laura Gross Literary Agency in Boston. Serene holds an M.A. in French to English translation from NYU and a B.A. in French and Women’s Studies from the University of Kansas. Born to Lebanese immigrants in the Midwest, she grew up straddling cultures and languages and still feels like a third culture kid. Serene loves to read a variety of genres but is particularly drawn to fiction with strong female voices, both YA and adult fiction and non-fiction with international themes, and LGBTQ and feminist issues. She is always on the lookout for great YA sci-fi and fantasy, realistic YA, and anything that gives voice to those whose voices are underrepresented and/or marginalized. She is especially interested in stories dealing with the Middle East and the variety of immigrant experiences out there. Specifically, she’s looking for writing that explores the different meanings of identity, home, family and parenthood/motherhood. When she’s not reading, she can usually be found trying a new recipe while simultaneously balancing a toddler on her hip. @serenemaria

Sonali Chanchani began her career in publishing at Kaya, an independent press dedicated to publishing authors from the Asian diaspora. In 2015, she joined Folio Literary Management, where she represents character-driven upmarket and literary fiction with a strong, distinctive voice. In particular, she’s drawn to smart women’s fiction; quirky, heartfelt family stories; nuanced psychological mysteries; and rich, atmospheric historical projects with a touch of magical realism. On the nonfiction side, she’s interested in narratives and collections that illuminate some aspect of our society or culture — especially reported narratives in the areas of race, class, gender, and politics. She is a member of the Association of American Literary Agents, where she serves on the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee.

Suzi F. Garcia is the author of the chapbook, A Home Grown Fairytale, Bone Bouquet 2020. She is the Co-publisher of the award-winning independent press, Noemi, and, along with José Olivarez, is a Poetry Editor for Haymarket Books. In addition, Suzi is the Review Manager for the Lambda Literary Review, which has been serving the queer literary community for over 30 years.

Vanessa Chan is the Malaysian author of THE STORM WE MADE (Jan. 2024), a novel, and THE UGLIEST BABIES IN THE WORLD, a story collection — both forthcoming from Scribner/Marysue Rucci Books. Her novel will be published in eighteen languages worldwide. Vanessa’s other work has been published in Electric Lit, Kenyon Review, Ecotone, and more, and she has received scholarship support from the Sewanee, Bread Loaf, and Tin House writers’ conferences. You can find her at www.vanessajchan.com.

Vivian Lee is a writer and senior editor at Little, Brown. Her booklist includes Matthew Salesses' The Hundred-Year Flood and Disappear Doppelgänger Disappear (PEN/Faulkner Finalist), Viet Dinh's After Disasters (PEN/Faulkner Finalist), Naima Coster's Halsey Street (Kirkus Prize Finalist), and Natalia Sylvester’s Everyone Knows You Go Home (International Latino Book Award winner in fiction). Her writing can be found at The Los Angeles Times, Eater, ELLE.com, Catapult, and more. She graduated from the University of California, Irvine with a BA in Literary Journalism and from the New School University in New York with a MFA in Creative Writing (Non-Fiction). She is a 2018 PW Rising Star Honoree. Originally from Los Angeles, she now resides in Queens.

aureleo sans is a flamingo.  She is also a Colombian-American, non-binary, queer, formerly unhoused poet and writer with a disability, who resides in San Antonio, Texas. She is a VONA alumnus, a Periplus fellow, and a creative nonfiction associate editor at jmww. She was named the second-place winner of Fractured Lit's 2021 Micro Fiction Contest, a longlister for the 2021 CRAFT Short Fiction Prize longlist and a semi-finalist for the 2021 American Short Fiction Halifax Ranch Prize. Her work has been published in Passages North, HAD, Shenandoah, Electric Literature and elsewhere.  She is a 2022 Pushcart Prize nominee and a 2022 Best Microfiction nominee.  Find aureleo on Twitter @aureleos.

Crystal K. is a queer trans writer, chapbooks editor at Newfound, and author of the novel Goodnight. Their flash stories have appeared in Gertrude, Passages North, Peach Mag, [PANK], Hobart, ANMLY, and elsewhere. Lev has attended the Tin House Workshop and been nominated for Best of the Net. They write RPGs at Feverdream Games.

Endria Isa Richardson is a black, malaysian, and gay american writer from Worcester, Massachusetts. Endria writes about ghosts, monsters (including the monster of white supremacy), and the catastrophic failure of systems that are supposed to keep us safe. Her essays have appeared most recently in Black Warrior Review, Alpinist, and Backpacker, and her speculative fiction is in Lightspeed, Clarkesworld, FIYAH, Nightmare, and other fantastic/al magazines. Her work has received notable mentions in the Best American Essays and Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy anthologies, and a runner-up award from the Black Warrior Review nonfiction contest. She is a graduate of the Viable Paradise and VONA workshops. In her past life, Endria was a prison abolitionist lawyer. She is currently at work on a collection of short stories, and a novel. You can see more of her work at www.endriarichardson.com.

Heather Quinn (they/them) is an essayist and photographer living in Saint Paul with their husband and two children. A Minnesota native, they spent most of their childhood and early adulthood in Southern California, and their work frequently features the desert landscape around the Salton Sea in the southeastern corner of the state. They earned their MFA from Portland State University, and they were a 2019–2020 Loft Mentor Series fellow and a 2021 McKnight Artist Fellow. They are working on a memoir, This is How You Disappear, about the California desert and their father’s suicide. Find them on Instagram @heatherfquinn and at heatherfquinn.com.

Kyle Carrero Lopez was born to Cuban parents in northern New Jersey. He co-founded LEGACY, a production collective by and for Black queer artists, and is the author of MUSCLE MEMORY, the chapbook winner of the 2020 [PANK] Books contest. His recent publications include Prolit, Best New Poets 2021, Poem-a-Day, and The Cincinnati Review. He holds an MFA in Poetry from NYU, where he was a Goldwater Fellow. Find him at kylecarrerolopez.com and on Twitter @kycarrerolopez.

Liam Morrissey was born and raised in Chicago. He has spent most of the past decade living in Los Angeles and working in film and television production. He is currently a second year MFA candidate in fiction at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop where he teaches courses on literature and creative writing.

Maggie Nye is a writer and editor living in Bloomington, Indiana, and a forthcoming MacDowell fellow. Her work has appeared in Passages North, Pleiades, and SmokeLong Quarterly, among other places. Her first, yet unpublished novel was a finalist in Red Hen Press, Autumn House Press, and Steel Toe Books contests. She is presently working on her second novel: a strange, radical re-writing of the Medusa myth.

Marta Balcewicz lives in Toronto. Her fiction appears in Catapult, Tin House online, Washington Square Review, and other places. Her debut novel, Big Shadow, is forthcoming from Book*hug Press in spring 2023. You can find her at martabalcewicz.com and on Instagram @wiczcraft. (Photo by Angela Lewis.)

Miriam Ho Nga Wai (she/her) is a writer, editor and architect from Hong Kong. She has lived across southeast Asia and western Europe, and now lives in a multi-generational household in Toronto. She is a co-editor of The Site Magazine (www.thesitemagazine.com), an award-winning journal of architecture, place-making and cultural criticism, and a fiction reader at Guernica. She is hard at work on a short story collection and a novel in the stolen hours before her child wakes up.

Sam Heaps is a genderqueer writer, visual artist, and organizer, currently living in Philadelphia where they teach writing. They have published in Communion Arts Journal, Entropy, Taco Bell Quarterly, and many other brave journals and anthologies. They are a 2022 VCCA Fellow. Heaps' debut PROXIMITY is forthcoming from CLASH Books January 2023.

Sara Elkamel is a poet and journalist living between Cairo and NYC. She holds an MA in arts journalism from Columbia University and an MFA in poetry from New York University. Her poems have appeared in The Yale Review, MQR, Four Way Review, The Cincinnati Review, The Adroit Journal, Poet Lore, Poetry London, Best New Poets 2020, Best of the Net 2020, among others. She is the author of the chapbook “Field of No Justice” (African Poetry Book Fund & Akashic Books, 2021).

Shakeema Smalls is South Carolina.  Her work has been published in a variety of outlets including Blackberry: A Magazine, Tidal Basin Review, The Fem, The Pittsburgh Poetry Review, Radius Lit, Free Black Space, Vinyl Poetry and Prose, and Rigorous, among others.

Urvashi Bahuguna is a poet and essayist based in the Bay Area. She is the author of Terrarium (The (Great) Indian Poetry Collective) and No Straight Thing Was Ever Made (Penguin, 2021).