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REVIEWERS

Brett Belcastro is a writer, teacher, and determined community organizer living in Western Massachusetts and training to be an energy manager at the Center for EcoTechnology. His writing has been published in Cobalt, Tupelo Quarterly, and The Platform Review.

Abby Burns is a queer feminist currently studying prose at University of Notre Dame. Her work has appeared in Entropy, (b)OINK zine, Longridge Review, and elsewhere. Originally from Wisconsin, she is overly fond of beer and cheese curds.

Guia Cortassa was born, lives, and works in Milan, Italy. After working as a Contemporary Art curator, she went back to writing, mainly about culture and arts. Her work appeared, among others, on the Rumpus, where she runs a weekly column, the Quietus, the Intentional, Flash Art and Noisey. You can find her here.

Risa Denenberg lives on the Olympic peninsula in Washington state where she works as a nurse practitioner. She is a poetry book critic; co-founder and editor at Headmistress Press, publisher of lesbian/bi/trans poetry; and curator at The Poetry Café, a site where poetry chapbooks are celebrated and reviewed. She has published seven collections of poetry, most recently the full length collection, “slight faith” (MoonPath Press, 2018) and the chapbook, Posthuman, finalist in the Floating Bridge 2020 chapbook competition.

Margot Douaihy, PhD, is the author of Scranton Lace and Girls Like You (Clemson University Press). Her work has been featured in Colorado Review, The Florida Review, The Madison Review, North American Review, PBS NewsHour, The South Carolina Review, The Wisconsin Review, Tahoma Literary Review, and elsewhere. She is a member of the Radius of Arab-American Writers and Creative Writing Studies Organization. Douaihy serves as editor of Northern New England Review. 

Kelly Lucero is an MA student in English / Linguistics, Literacy, and Composition at New Mexico Highlands University. Her graduate thesis is an exploration of taboo language in American television shows. She is also the editor-in-chief of the New Mexico Review. When Kelly isn’t researching swear words, she spends her time reading and writing fiction and poetry, and taking photographs.

Sarah Senseny is a poet from Indiana who recently received her bachelor’s degree in English from the University of Saint Francis. There, she published, designed, and edited their literary magazine, The Sullivan, for two years. Currently, she works for a theater in Fort Wayne.

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 here.

INTERVIEWERS

Cynthia Atkins is the author of Psyche’s Weathers and In The Event of Full Disclosure. Her work has appeared in numerous journals, including Alaska Quarterly Review, Apogee, BOMB, Cleaver Magazine, Cultural Weekly, Diode, Florida Review, Green Mountains Review, Harpur Palate, Le Zaporogue, North American Review, Rust+Moth, Seneca Review, Tampa Review, Tinderbox, Thrush, Valparaiso Review and Verse Daily. She was formerly the assistant director for the Poetry Society of America and has taught English and Creative Writing, most recently at Blue Ridge Community College, where she curated a quarterly reading series, Lit-Salon. Atkins earned her MFA from Columbia University and has earned fellowships and prizes from Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, The Writer’s Voice, and Writers@Work. Atkins lives on the Maury River of Rockbridge County, Virginia, with artist Phillip Welch and their family. More work and info on her website or on Facebook.

Vi Khi Nao is the author of a novel, Fish in Exile (Coffee House Press, 2016), and The Old Philosopher (Nightboat Books, 2016), a poetry collection. Vi’s work includes poetry, fiction, film, and cross-genre collaboration. She was the winner of the 2014 Nightboat Poetry Prize and the 2016 Ronald Sukenick Innovative Fiction Contest. Find more of her work here.

Octavio Quintanilla is the author of the poetry collection If I Go Missing (Slough Press, 2014). His poetry and translations have appeared, or are forthcoming, in numerous journals including, Fugue, Salamander, Southwestern American Literature, Pilgrimage, RHINO, and others. He is the South Texas regional editor for Texas Books in Review and teaches in the MA/MFA program at Our Lady of the Lake University in San Antonio, TX. You can reach him on Twitter: @OctQuintanilla.

Preeti Kaur Rajpal is a poet who grew up in California's San Joaquin Valley. She first began writing poetry as a student of June Jordan in her Poetry For The People program. She was most recently a Loft Literary Mentor Series Fellow and a Poetry Incubator Fellow with the Poetry Foundation. She tweets at @Kitaab_e_Preet.

Leslie Contreras Schwartz is a writer living in Houston. Her first collection of poems, Fuego, was published by Saint Julian Press in March 2016. Her poetry has appeared or is upcoming in The Collagist, Texas Review, Tinderbox, and other journals. Her personal essays have appeared or are upcoming in Catapult, the Houston Chronicle, and The Toast. In 2017, she was nominated for a Pushcart Prize and was also named a finalist for the Houston Poet Laureate. Schwartz holds an MFA in poetry from Warren Wilson College and a BA in English from Rice University.

Megan Valley is a recent graduate of Notre Dame with a BA in English and the Program of Liberal Studies. She’s a contributor for The Hard Times and is originally from Flint, MI. Occasionally, she’s funny on Twitter @meganevalley.

EDITORS

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.

Elise Matthews has an MA in Creative Writing from the University of North Texas. She’s thinking about PhD programs but not too seriously just yet. She is a writer, adjunct professor, and cat lady. Her fiction can be found at the Dallas Museum of Art, Necessary Fiction, Hobart, and Jersey Devil Press. She has served on staff for American Literary Review and North Texas Review and is caught in the web of Spiderweb Salon.

Founder

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