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Emilio DeGrazia

Emilio DeGrazia, from Winona, is a writer, teacher, and editor. In 1977 he founded Great River Review, now with the University of Minnesota. His...
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Connie Wanek

Connie Wanek lived for over a quarter century in Duluth, Minnesota. She is the author of 10 books, including Rival Gardens: New and Selected...
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Damone Bester

Damone Bester is a two-time award-winning author whose debut novel Mendel received both a BookFest Award and a Black Excellence Award for Outstanding Fiction....
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Dave Kenney

Dave Kenney is the author of nearly two dozen books, all historical non-fiction, covering topics ranging from World War II to the movie industry....
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Debra J. Stone

Debra J. Stone is a Jerome Hill Arts Fellow in Literature 2023-25, a Minnesota State Arts Board grant recipient, and The Loft Mirrors and...
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Erin Makela

Erin Makela is a writer, middle school teacher, and theater enthusiast. While she calls Worthington, Minnesota home, Makela is always looking for her next...
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David Hakensen

David Hakensen is the author of the biography Her Place in the Woods: The Life of Helen Hoover. He is a strategic communications consultant...
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Jokeda Bell

Jokeda "JoJo" Bell is the executive director and the director of exhibitions and programming for the African American Interpretive Center of Minnesota (AAICM). Her...
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Leslie Adrienne Miller

Leslie Adrienne Miller’s collections of poetry include Y, The Resurrection Trade, Eat Quite Everything You See, Yesterday Had a Man In It, Ungodliness, and...
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Varla Ventura

Varla Ventura is an author, traveler, rotten botanist, and lover of the strange. She has written several books on bizarre and freaky things, from...

Paula Cisewski

Paula Cisewski’s fourth poetry collection, Quitter, won the Diode Editions Book Prize. She is also the author of The Threatened Everything, Ghost Fargo (Nightboat Poetry Prize winner, selected by Franz Wright), Upon Arrival, and several chapbooks, including the lyric prose Misplaced Sinister. She has been awarded fellowships and residencies from the Jerome Foundation, the Minnesota…
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Tom Combs

Tom Combs’ 25 years as an Emergency Medicine physician provided the foundation for his unforgettable characters and riveting plots. His emotional engagement arises from having helped those facing illness, trauma, and tragedy. Combs is a Minneapolis native and a University of Minnesota Medical School graduate. He did his internship at HCMC and three years EM…
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Abby Cooper

Abby Cooper lives in Minnesota with her miniature poodle, Louis, and a whole bunch of books. A former teacher and school librarian, her favorite things in the world (besides writing) are getting and giving book recommendations and sharing her love of reading with others. In her spare time, she likes eating cupcakes, running along the…
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John Coy

John Coy is the author of young adult novels, the 4 for 4 middle-grade series, and nonfiction and fiction picture books including Night Driving, Two Old Potatoes and Me, Hoop Genius, Game Changer, Their Great Gift, and My Mighty Journey: A Waterfall’s Story. He has received numerous awards for his work including a Marion Vannett…
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Rachel L. Coyne

Rachel Coyne, a novelist and poet, is a graduate of the Perpich Center for Arts in Minnesota and Macalester College. She is a devotee of Pablo Neruda, a lover of Don Williams songs, and collects vintage editions of Jane Eyre. Her published works include the novels The Patron Saint of Lost Comfort Lake and Whiskey…
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Kirstin Cronn-Mills

Kirstin Cronn-Mills is a writer and teacher who lives in North Mankato with her family. She’s published both fiction and nonfiction for young adult readers. Three of her books have been finalists for the Minnesota Book Awards. Her novel, Beautiful Music for Ugly Children, won the American Library Association’s Stonewall Book Award in 2014.
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James Dawes

James Dawes is the author of The Novel of Human Rights; Evil Men, winner of the International Human Rights Book Award; That the World May Know: Bearing Witness to Atrocity, Independent Publisher Book Award Finalist; and The Language of War. He has written for or appeared as the feature guest on media outlets ranging from…
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Emilio DeGrazia

Emilio DeGrazia, from Winona, is a writer, teacher, and editor. In 1977 he founded Great River Review, now with the University of Minnesota. His first short story collection, Enemy Country, was followed by a novel, Billy Brazil. Then came more stories, Seventeen Grams of Soul, the novel A Canticle for Bread and Stones, essay collections…
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James Densley

Dr. James Densley is Professor of Criminal Justice at Metro State University and co-founder of The Violence Project Research Center, best known for its work on gun violence prevention. Densley has received global media attention for his work on gangs, criminal networks, violence, and policing. He is the author or co-author of seven books, including…
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Andrew DeYoung

Andrew DeYoung is the author of The Exo Project, the winner of the 2018 Minnesota Book Award for Young Adult Literature. He lives in Saint Paul with his wife and two children.
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