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Aurora Whittet started out as a wild red-haired girl in Minnesota dreaming up stories. Today, she has completed the young adult fantasy the Bloodmark Saga trilogy and children’s books Mama’s Knight: A Cancer Story of Love in honor of her own mother and How to Turn Your Mom into a Monster. Whittet is a national award-winning graphic designer and illustrator. How to Turn Your Mom into a Monster won Gold at the 2018 IBPA Benjamin Franklin Award, a 2018 Eric Hoffer Grand Prize Finalist, and received Bronze at the 2018 Moonbeam Awards.
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Ryan Vine’s debut full collection, To Keep Him Hidden, was a finalist for the May Swenson Prize, the New Issues Prize, the Crab Orchard Series, the MVP Prize from New Rivers Press, and — selected by Robert Pinsky — the Dorset Prize. His poems have appeared in numerous publications, including The American Poetry Review, Ploughshares, Poetry Ireland Review, Verse Daily, and on National Public Radio. His chapbook, Distant Engines, published by Backwaters Press, won a Weldon Kees Award and spent time on the Poetry Foundation’s contemporary best-seller list. He has received The Greensboro Review Robert Watson Poetry Prize, McKnight/ARAC Career Development Grants, an Artist Initiative Grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board, a Walter E. Dakin Fellowship in Poetry from the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, and has been a finalist or nominee for numerous other honors, including the Pushcart Prize. Ryan is associate professor, a member of the Honors faculty and Chair of the English Department at the College of St. Scholastica in Duluth, Minnesota.
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Cynthia (C.M.) Surrisi has a BFA, J.D., and an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts in Writing for Children and Young Adults. She is author of picture books and middle grade cozy mysteries that are enjoyed equally by adults: The Maypop Kidnapping, Vampires On the Run, and A Side of Sabotage. Her mysteries have received The Moonbeam Award and been nominated for an Agatha. Her picture book The Best Mother is a Junior Library Guild Selection. She is a member of Mystery Writers of America, Sisters in Crime, National League of American Pen Women, and Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators.
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Lisa M. Bolt Simons has published 38 nonfiction children’s books, mostly with Capstone; two more will be published in 2020. She’s also published four middle grade “choose your path” novels as well as an adult history book. Simons has been the recipient of a McKnight Artist Fellowship for Writers in Children’s Literature Honorable Mention, a Minnesota State Arts Board Grant, an MNSCBWI Writing Mentorship, and a Shabo Award for Children’s Picture Book Writers through The Loft Literary Center. A wife to a fellow reader and a mom of boy/girl twins, Simons also loves to scrapbook and travel when she can.
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Candace Simar is a Minnesota writer with a passion for history and her Scandinavian heritage. Her Abercrombie Trail Series received awards from the Western Writers of America. Shelterbelts is set in Otter Tail County, Minnesota and received finalist awards from the Willa Literary Awards in Historical Fiction. Her Escape to Fort Abercrombie is geared toward readers from age 12-100.
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Bob Showers is a longtime resident of Bloomington, originally from Waterloo, Iowa. A former executive with the Minnesota North Stars, Showers started his second career as an author following 12 years as a stay-home dad with two daughters.
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Sarah Bamford Seidelmann was a physician living a nature-starved, hectic lifestyle until a walrus entered her life and changed everything. She has trained at the Martha Beck Institute and Michael Harner’s Foundation for Shamanic Studies and is author of Swimming with Elephants and Born to FREAK. She lives in Duluth, Minnesota and offers transformational travel, individual healing and coaching sessions, and in-person retreats.
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Nathan Sacks is a professional academic dissertation editor, children’s and young adult book writer, graphic novel translator, and occasional journalist. He was born and raised in Ames, Iowa and currently lives in uptown Minneapolis. He works on fiction, book-length nonfiction, and scholarly writing, and aims to provide fresh and original writing in a variety of genres while maintaining a distinctive authorial voice.
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Yvonne Pearson is a writer and clinical social worker who lives in Minneapolis. Her picture book, Sadie Braves the Wilderness, was published in 2017. She has also published 16 non-fiction books for children. Pearson’s poetry has appeared in Split Rock Review, Talking Stick, Main Street Rag, Wolf Head Quarterly, Open to Interpretation, Chrysalis, Sidewalks, Literary Mama, and other publications. She is a 2018 Loft-McKnight Writing Fellow and has received a Loft Creative Non-Fiction Award, the Shabo Award in children’s literature, and two Minnesota State Arts Board grants. She has also written for newspapers and magazines.
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Karen Pavlicin-Fragnito is an award-winning author, with book topics ranging from children’s fiction, to women’s journals, to guides for military families. She is a sought-after dynamic speaker known for her sense of humor and inspirational insights. She believes in the importance of community and the power of stories to transform lives.
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