masthead
REVIEWERS
Juliana Amir is the author of Midnight Magic. She is currently in the NEOMFA for fiction and has an assistantship with the McDowell School of Law at the University of Akron. In the past she has served as a research assistant for the Hower House, a Victorian mansion, as well as a tutor for the Office of Multicultural Development and the English Language Institute.
Courtney Craggett is a doctoral candidate studying fiction and Chicano/a literature at the University of North Texas. Her fiction appears in Washington Square Review and Mid-American Review and was selected as the Editors’ Choice for the Sherwood Anderson Award. She teaches and writes in Denton, TX where she has served as Contest Coordinator and Assistant Fiction Editor for the American Literary Review.
Kristina Marie Darling is the author of nearly twenty collections of poetry and hybrid prose. Her writing has been honored with fellowships from Yaddo, the Ucross Foundation, the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation, the Hambidge Center for the Arts and Sciences, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, the Vermont Studio Center, and the Ragdale Foundation, as well as artist grants from the Kittredge Fund and the Elizabeth George Foundation. She was recently selected as a Visiting Artist at the American Academy in Rome.
Vladislav Frederick is an Iowa native who studied at Drake University. His poems have been featured in the journals Tenth Muse and Periphery, and his reviews have been featured on iO: A Journal of New American Poetry. Vladislav will be pursuing his Master of Fine Arts in Poetry at the Inland Northwest Center for Writers in Spokane, Washington, in Fall 2014.
Paul French is a poet & critic currently writing out of Denver, Colorado. He received his MFA from New Mexico State University in 2014 and recently completed work on a book length manuscript of poetry, some of which has been featured in journals like Word Riot, Harpur Palate, and Slipstream. Prior to working for AMRI, he served as Managing Poetry Editor for the magazine, Puerto del Sol.
Jane Hawley is a writer from California. She received her BA from the University of Wyoming and is an MFA candidate in Fiction at Texas State University, where she serves as the managing editor of Front Porch Journal. She’s also a part of the editorial board for Anthropoid, a literary collective and magazine of the humanesque. Her fiction, non-fiction, and graphic narratives have been published by Day One, The Pinch, and Memoir Journal.
Daniel Heffner graduated with an MA in poetry from the University of North Texas in 2013. He is a poet, gamer, and writing center supervisor. He has been a volunteer reader for the American Literary Review, and is proud to be the audio-video director for the Kraken Reading Series in Denton, TX. Daniel was once told by acclaimed poet Bruce Bond that by the end of his MA, he was writing some poems that some people might want to publish.
Jack Hill is from Northern California, a current MA student in creative writing at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, the editor of Crossed Out Magazine, and an alum of the Squaw Valley Community of Writers Fiction Workshop. He's been previously published in Being: What Makes A Man, an anthology published by the University of Nebraska Gender Programs, Susurrus, Sacramento News and Review, Suisun Valley Review, Poems for All, Prairie Schooner: Briefly Noted, The Legendary, Full of Crow, and Connotation Press.
Mark Allen Jenkins is a PhD student in Humanities at the University of Texas at Dallas where he serves as Editor-in-Chief for Reunion: The Dallas Review. His poetry has appeared in Memorious, minnesota review, South Dakota Review, and is forthcoming in Every River on Earth: Writing from Appalachian Ohio.
Winnie Khaw is a book reviewer for Necessary Fiction, Fjords Review, The Philadelphia Review of Books, and Nostrovia!Poetry. Her work is featured in After Nyne Magazine, Pirenes Fountain, Magic Lantern Review, Empty Mirror Books, Passages North, Palooka Journal, The Philadelphia Review, Eclectica, AntipodeanSF, Strange FrenZies Anthology, The Daily Satire, Estuary Journal, and the Kungfu Theatre podcast. Beginning summer 2014 she will begin a low-residency screenwriting MFA at Hollins University, and in fall she will be attending Wisonsin Eau Claire as a full time English MA student with a concentration in creative writing.
Davy Knittle's poetry and criticism have appeared recently or are forthcoming from Rain Taxi, Denver Quarterly and Caketrain. His first chapbook, cyclorama, is forthcoming from The Operating System in May 2015. He lives in Iowa City where he is a Teaching-Writing Fellow at the Iowa Writers' Workshop. He co-curates the Human Body Series, a series of monthly poetry readings, with Sophia Dahlin.
Michael Levan received his MFA in poetry from Western Michigan University and PhD in English and Creative Writing from the University of Tennessee. His work can be found in recent or forthcoming issues of Indiana Review, Radar Poetry, Valparaiso Fiction Review, Mid-American Review, Rock & Sling, American Literary Review, and Heron Tree. He is an Assistant Professor of English at the University of Saint Francis and lives in Fort Wayne, Indiana, with his wife, Molly, and son, Atticus.
Rebecca Ligon lives in Akron, Ohio and is a graduate teaching assistant at the University of Akron. She received a B.A. in English in 2013, and she is currently a candidate in the NEOMFA program. Her work has appeared in Catfish Creek, Dressing Room Poetry Journal, and The Quaker, among others. She is a poetry editor for Rubbertop Review, and she is the Interdisciplinary Conference Chair for the Society of Akron Graduate English Scholars.
AprilJo Murphy is a Doctoral Candidate in Creative Writing at UNT. Her essays and fiction have been published/are forthcoming in in Women's Studies Quarterly, Blueline, Sinister Wisdom, Hippocampus and other literary places. She has worked for American Literary Review. If you want, you can follow her writing and see pictures of her dog at www.AprilJoMurphy.com.
JoAnna Novak is the Pushcart-Prize-nominated author of Laps (Another New Calligraphy, 2014) and Something Real (dancing girl press, 2011). She holds an M.F.A. in fiction from Washington University and an M.F.A. in poetry from University of Massachusetts Amherst. Her writing has appeared in journals such as Guernica, DIAGRAM, Conjunctions, Pank, and Joyland. With Thomas Cook and Tyler Flynn Dorholt, she publishes Tammy, a print journal of poetry and prose. She lives in Massachusetts, where she is working on a memoir find her online at http://joannanovak.com.
Clinton Crockett Peters has an MFA in nonfiction from the University of Iowa where he was an Iowa Arts Fellow and is pursuing a PhD in creative writing at the University of North Texas. He is the recipient of North American Review’s Torch Prize for Creative Nonfiction. He has nonfiction appearing in Shenandoah, Green Mountains Review, Hunger Mountain, DIAGRAM, Waxwing, The Dallas Observer, and The Denton Record Chronicle, among others. In previous lives he was an English teacher in Kosuge Village, Japan (population 900), an outdoor wilderness guide, and a radio DJ.
Charlie Riccardelli is a PhD student/teaching fellow in Creative Writing at the University of North Texas. His fiction and articles have appeared in Circa, The Copperfield Review, American Literary Review, Wilde Magazine, Lamplighter, Essay Magazine, and Rivercraft. He writes historical fiction, primarily set in and around his home state of New Jersey. He is currently working on his first novel.
Wesley Rothman's poems and criticism have appeared or are forthcoming in 32 Poems, Crab Orchard Review, Drunken Boat, Prairie Schooner, The Rumpus, and Vinyl, among others. He has worked widely in publishing including Copper Canyon Press and Ploughshares, and now edits Toe Good Poetry. Recent acknowledgement of his work includes a Pushcart nomination and a Vermont Studio Center grant, and he teaches writing and cultural literatures in Boston. http://wesleyrothman.wordpress.com/
Analicia Sotelo received her MFA in Poetry from the University of Houston, where she was a Nonfiction Assistant Editor at Gulf Coast. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in West Branch, Indiana Review, Subtropics and others. She also serves as Prose Editor for the Pebble Lake Review.
Carleen Tibbetts is the author of the e-chapbook a starving music will come to eat the body (FiveQuarterly, 2014). Her work has appeared in Coconut, H_NGM_N, Sink, Jellyfish, inter|rupture, Dusie, Ilk, Big Lucks, Fact-Simile, The Rumpus, The Laurel Review, and other journals.
Robert Torres graduated from the University of North Texas with BA in English: Creative Writing. He runs the Punk Poet Society in Denton and hosts the Free Word on Deep Ellum on Air.
Zach VandeZande is the author of Apathy and Paying Rent (Loose Teeth Press, 2008) and the forthcoming Lesser American Boys (Queen’s Ferry Press, 2016). His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Ninth Letter, Gettysburg Review, Word Riot, Portland Review, Cutbank, Passages North, PRISM International, Slice Magazine, Atlas Review, Necessary Fiction, Crack the Spine, The Boiler, The Adroit Journal, and elsewhere. He likes baking bread, hammocks, and people who bring their dogs.
Jordan Williams writes short fiction and analytical essays. He studied at the University of North Texas, receiving a BA in Creative Writing and MA in Literature. He's dabbled in political podcasting and currently works at UNT, where he helps to plan various conferences, events, and lifelong learning programs. When he's not writing, Jordan plays bass guitar and freelances as a musician in the North Texas area.
Annie Won is a poet, yoga teacher, and medicinal chemist who resides in Somerville, MA with her two adorable fuzzy Maine Coon cats. Annie is particularly interested in somatic spaces of mind, body, and page and creative opportunities within these domains. She is a Kundiman Fellow and her chapbook with Brenda Iijima, Once Upon a Building Block, is forthcoming from Horse Less Press this summer. Her work has appeared in Shampoo and RealPoetik.
Laurie Saurborn Young is the author of Carnavoria (H_NGM_N Books), and a chapbook, Patriot (Forklift, Ink.). Her second book of poems, Industry of Brief Distraction, is forthcoming from Saturnalia Books in 2015. Visit her at www.lauriesaurborn.com.
INTERVIEWERS
Kallie has poems published in, or forthcoming from, PANK, Paper Darts, ILK, Black Warrior Review, Salt Hill, and Tupelo Quarterly. She is currently living in Kansas where she edits mojo magazine and Kenning journal.
Lois P. Jones has work forthcoming or published in Cider Press Review, Eyewear andPirene's Fountain, as well as several anthologies including Wide Awake: Poetry of Los Angeles and Beyond (The Pacific Coast Poetry Series) edited by Suzanne Lummis and Tupelo Press/30 Days. Some publications include Narrative, American Poetry Journal, Tupelo Quarterly, The Warwick Review, Tiferet and other journals in the U.S. and abroad. Lois’s poems have won honors under judges Kwame Dawes, Fiona Sampson, Ruth Ellen Kocher and others. New Yorker staff writer, Dana Goodyear selected “Ouija” as Poem of the Year in the 2010 competition sponsored by Web del Sol. She is the winner of the 2012 Tiferet Poetry Prize and the 2012 Liakoura Prize and a multiple Pushcart nominee. Her poem was long-listed in the 2015 National Poetry Competition organized by The Poetry Society (London 1909). Lois is Poetry Editor of Kyoto Journal, host of KPFK’s Poets Café (Pacifica Radio) and co-host of Moonday Poetry.
Sebastian H. Paramo's work has appeared or is forthcoming in The North American Review, Tampa Review Online, Lunch Ticket, The Oklahoma Review and elsewhere. He is an editor for the online journal, The Boiler. He received his MFA from Sarah Lawrence College. He was recently awarded a residency at the Vermont Studio Center. He currently resides in Dallas, TX.
Danielle Susi is the author of the chapbook The Month in Which We Are Born (dancing girl press, 2015). Her writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Knee-Jerk Magazine, Hobart, and The Rumpus, among many other publications. She received her MFA in writing from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago and Newcity has named her among the Top 5 Emerging Chicago Poets. Find her online at daniellesusi.com
EDITORS
Melissa Studdard is the author the novel Six Weeks to Yehidah and other books. Her works have received numerous awards, including the Forward National Literature Award and the International Book Award. Her first poetry collection, I Ate the Cosmos for Breakfast, was released in September 2014. She serves as a reviewer-at-large for The National Poetry Review, a professor for Lone Star College System, a teaching artist for The Rooster Moans Poetry Cooperative, and an editorial adviser for The Criterion. Her first year of interviews conducted as host of Tiferet Talk radio were collected and released in book form as The Tiferet Talk Interviews. Learn more at www.melissastuddard.com.
Kyle McCord is the author of five books including You Are Indeed an Elk, But This is Not the Forest You Were Born to Graze (Gold Wake, Forthcoming 2015) and Gentle, World, Gentler (Ampersand Books, Forthcoming 2015). He has work featured in Boston Review, Denver Quarterly, Gulf Coast, Ploughshares, TriQuarterly and elsewhere. He’s received grants or awards from the Academy of American Poets, the Vermont Studio Center, and the Iowa Poetry Association. He’s the 2012 recipient of the Baltic Writing Residency. He is the co-curator of the Kraken Reading Series and co-edits iO: A Journal of New American Poetry. He teaches in Des Moines, Iowa.
Megan Turner's fiction has appeared in journals such as Witness, Rio Grande Review, Spark, Grasslimb, and Atticus Review. She is a graduate of the MFA Program for Poets and Writers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Originally from Baltimore, Maryland, she now lives in New York. For more information, visit her at MeganRTurner.com.
Elise Matthews recently received an MA in fiction from the University of North Texas. She’s thinking about PhD programs but not too seriously just yet. Her fiction appears in Hobart, Necessary Fiction, and Jersey Devil Press. She has served on the staff of American Literary Review and North Texas Review.
Dillon J. Welch is an MFA candidate in Poetry at NYU. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in CutBank, Front Porch Journal, inter|rupture, Jellyfish, Phantom Limb, Pinwheel and other journals. He is Poetry Editor for the online quarterly, Swarm. Find him here.