Contributors

Caleb is a librarian and aspiring writer that can be seen haunting the Pee Dee region of South Carolina. When he's not in the swamplands or raising his chickens, he can be found masquerading the streets as a superhero. Twitter: octoleal

Calla Smith has been writing since a child, and her early publishing career included several published poems in “Dream Girl” magazine as a teenager. More recently she has self-published her collection of short stories “What Doesn’t Kill You”, and her work has appeared in several literary journals.

Callum Norman is a writer who currently lives in Edinburgh, Scotland. His fiction has appeared in magazines including Horrified Magazine, The Fiction Pool and Horla.

CANDICE KELSEY [she/her] is a poet, educator, and activist currently living in Augusta, Georgia. She serves as a creative writing mentor with PEN America's Prison & Justice Writing Program; her work appears in Grub Street, Poet Lore, Lumiere Review, Hawai'i Pacific Review, and Poetry South among other journals. Recently, Candice was chosen as a finalist in Iowa Review's Poetry Contest and Cutthroat's Joy Harjo Poetry Prize. Her third book releases September '22. Find her @candicekelsey1 and www.candicemkelseypoet.com.

Carly M. Uebel is an emerging writer working in creative nonfiction and experimental flash fiction. They investigate psychological and behavioral intersections between human and non-human animal species, drawing from their research background in primatology and current work as a behavioral therapist. Carly's writing spans themes of sexuality, attachment, matrilineage, and environment. They are working on a forthcoming collection of personal essays, Mellifera, and currently reside in Chicago, Illinois.

Carys Crossen has been writing stories since she was nine years old and shows no signs of stopping. Her fiction has been published by Lunate, Halfway Down the Stairs, FlashBack Fiction, Honey and Lime Lit and others, and her monograph The Nature of the Beast is available from University of Wales Press. She lives in Manchester UK with her husband, their daughter and their beautiful, contrary cat.

Catherine Austen writes novels for children, short stories for adults, and reports for corporate clients. Her books have won the Canadian Library Association’s Young Adult Book Award and the Quebec Writers’ Federation Prize for Children’s Literature. Her stories have appeared in The Fiddlehead, The New Quarterly, and many other journals and anthologies. She is working on her first collection this fall, with financial assistance from CALQ, the Quebec arts council.

Cecilia Kennedy (she/her) taught English composition/literature and Spanish language/literature in Ohio for 20 years before moving to Washington state with her family, which includes a very demanding cat. Since 2017, she has published her stories in literary journals, magazines, and anthologies in the United States, Canada, Ireland, and England. Her work has appeared in Maudlin House, Coffin Bell, Idle Ink, Tiny Molecules, Streetcake Magazine, Wrongdoing Magazine, Rejection Letters, Open Minds Quarterly, Headway Quarterly, Flash Fiction Magazine, Kandisha Press, Ghost Orchid Press, and others. The Places We Haunt (2020) is her first short story collection. Additionally, she thoroughly enjoys being a volunteer adult beverages columnist for The Daily Drunk, a proofreader for Flash Fiction Magazine, and a concept editor for Running Wild Press. Twitter: @ckennedyhola

Cecily Ross is a freelance writer and editor whose work has appeared in the Globe and Mail, The New York Times, Zoomer, Chatelaine, The Literary Review of Canada, ON Nature and other publications. Her novel, The Lost Diaries of Susanna Moodie, is published by HarperCollins Canada. A memoir, Love in the Time of Cholesterol, is published by Viking Canada. She lives and writes in Creemore, Ontario.

Ceinwen Cariad Haydon lives near Newcastle upon Tyne, UK and writes short stories and poetry. She is widely published in online magazines and in print anthologies. Her first chapbook is 'Cerddi Bach' [Little Poems], Hedgehog Press, July 2019. Post-retirement from social work, she is developing practice as participatory arts facilitator. She believes everyone's voice counts.

Celia Lisset Alvarez is a writer and educator from Miami, Florida. She has four collections of poetry, Shapeshifting (winner of the 2005 Spire Press Poetry Award), The Stones (Finishing Line Press 2006), Multiverses (Finishing Line Press 2021) and the upcoming Bodies & Words (Assure Press 2022). Her stories and poetry have appeared in numerous journals and anthologies, most recently in Last Leaves Magazine, dyst, and Blue Mountain Review. She was also the editor of the literary journal Prospectus.

Charles Rammelkamp’s latest poetry collection, The Field of Happiness, has just been published by Kelsay Books. Rammelkamp is Prose Editor for BrickHouse Books. He contributes a monthly book review to North of Oxford and is a frequent reviewer for The Lake, London Grip and The Compulsive Reader. A collection of flash fiction, Presto!, will be published in 2023 by Bamboo Dart Press.

Charlotte Rahme is an Ottawa local writer inspired by history, archaeology, and the interesting people she meets. She has been published in Common Deer Press and North Literary Journal.

Cheryl Snell's poetry collections include chapbooks from Finishing Line Press, Pudding House, and Moira Books. A full length volume, Prisoner’s Dilemma, in collaboration with the late expressionist artist Janet Snell, won the Lopside Press Chapbook Competition. Cheryl’s work has appeared often, online and in print, and has been nominated seven times for the Pushcart and Best of the Net anthologies. Her collection of novels is called Bombay Trilogy, about the India diaspora. She lives with her husband in Maryland, twelve miles from the Capitol.

Chris Klassen lives and writes in Toronto, Canada. After graduating from the University of Toronto with a degree in history and living for a year in France and England, he returned home and worked the majority of his career in print media. He is now living a semi-retired life, writing and looking for new ideas. His work has appeared in Short Circuit, Unlikely Stories, Across the Margin, Fleas on the Dog, Vagabond City, Dark Winter, Literally Stories and Ghost City Review.

Christina Chin is from Kuching, Sarawak, Malaysia. She writes haiku, short poems, paints for art exhibitions, creates meaningful short videos of her poems and art. She has haiku, haiga, senryu, tanka and gogyoshi featured and published both in print and online with several reputable anthologies and journals.

Christina Hennemann, shortlisted for our 1st Anniversary Contest, is a poet and prose writer based in Ireland. Her poetry pamphlet “Illuminations at Nightfall” was published by Sunday Mornings at the River in 2022. She’s the winner of the Luain Press Prize, was shortlisted in the Anthology Poetry Award, and longlisted in the National Poetry Competition. Her work appears in The Moth, fifth wheel, Ink Sweat & Tears, Moria, National Poetry Month Canada, and elsewhere. Twitter: @chr_writer Instagram: @c.h_92 www.christinahennemann.com

A former university instructor, Christine Overall has published books, book chapters, and journal articles in philosophy. Contrary to the expectations of her discipline, some of her publications are based on her experiences as a disabled woman, a mother, and an academic in a field dominated by men. For more than a decade she wrote a weekly column called "In Other Words" for the Kingston Whig-Standard. She is now working on the fifth draft of her memoir, an exploration of the risks, in her life, of choosing to have children and the choice whether to be a care giver. She is also writing short creative non-fiction essays and short fiction.

Originally from Corner Brook Newfoundland and Labrador, Christopher Butt, shortlisted for our 1st Anniversary Contest, is a retired member of the Canadian Forces navigating his way to a life of being a writer. His genres include Science Fiction, Fantasy, weird fiction and the occasional humorous piece. He lives in St. Catharines, and you can find his work on his Wattpad page under the name “Buttster”. His short story collection In The Lair Of The Kraken is published by DarkWinter Press

Christopher Sworen is an aspiring writer currently living in Poland.

Christopher Waldrop is a writer and library assistant living in Nashville, Tennessee with his wife and a horde of wild Dalmatians. He's had work published in the anthologies Static Dreams Volume 2, Feathers 1, a collection of poems about birds, as well as in Unstamatic Magazine, DarkWinterLit, and elsewhere.

Clara Burghelea is a Romanian-born poet with an MFA in Poetry from Adelphi University. Recipient of the Robert Muroff Poetry Award, her poems and translations appeared in Ambit, Waxwing, The Cortland Review and elsewhere. Her second poetry collection Praise the Unburied was published with Chaffinch Press in 2021. She is Review Editor of Ezra, An Online Journal of Translation.

Clyde Liffey lives near the water.

Colin James has a couple of chapbooks of poetry published. Dreams Of The Really Annoying
from Writing Knights Press and A Thoroughness Not Deprived of Absurdity from Piski's Porch Press
and a book of poems, Resisting Probability, from Sagging Meniscus Press.

Collins Aguilar is an Asheville based writer and current master's candidate at Queens University. Her fiction and poetry have appeared in The Angle Street Review, Touchstone Journal, After the Pause, Unleash Press, and The Rising Phoenix Review.

Courtenay Gillett is a corporate content creator, short fiction, and poetry writer usually found at her desk, engulfed in the latest horror podcast drops for the week while she whips up new copy. Originally from Kansas but took a hop, skip, and a jump over to Northwest Arkansas in 2017 and has not looked back since. She resides with her partner Timothy, doggo Arya, and kitty Athena – they all seem to put up with her pretty well, so it must be a good fit. Courtenay's aspirations for the future include living in a hut in the forest and dancing under the moon more frequently, ultimately rising enough in notoriety to be known as the local witch woman.

Craig Izard is a musician, published songwriter and attorney. He lives in Birmingham, AL, USA.

Craig Kirchner thinks of poetry as hobo art, loves storytelling and the aesthetics of the paper and pen. He has had two poems nominated for the Pushcart, and has a book of poetry, Roomful of Navels. After a writing hiatus he was recently published in Decadent Review, Wild Violet, Last Leaves, Literary Heist, Ariel Chart, Cape Magazine, Flora Fiction, Young Ravens, Chiron Review, Valiant Scribe, Borderless Crossings, The Main Street Rag, Dear Booze, and several dozen other journals.

D A Angelo is a UK-based poet with work in Sage Cigarettes, Flights of the Dragonfly, Impspired, The Amazine and Petrichor Mag. New work is forthcoming in Autumn Sky Daily, A Thin Slice of Anxiety, Moss Puppy, SurVision and Skipping Stone Review.

Damian Anastasia Onyinyechi is a creative writer and blogger who loves to tell stories and infuses a witty style into her writing. Her stories are usually fiction but can feature non-fiction works based on real events or past life experiences. When she's not writing, she's watching a movie, drawing, reading a book or two (biased to Mythology and crime novels), or designing. What each hobby does for her, aside from relaxation, is serve as an avenue to recharge her creative side. Feeding her mind with ideas. In her spare time, she runs a personal movie blog which is her journal for movies she has seen. There's also a design blog where she shares her design ideas and stories with others, and finally a WordPress blog where she updates readers on new stories or life events. Check out her blogs: stasiascolumn.wordpress.com
thewittyreview.medium.com
stacemelda.medium.com

Damon Hubbs: gardener / casual birder / lapsed tennis player / author of the chapbooks "Coin Doors & Empires" (Alien Buddha Press) and "The Day Sharks Walk on Land" (Alien Buddha Press) / recent work appears/is forthcoming in Dreich, Cutbow Quarterly, Broken Antler, Crab Apple Literary, Eco Punk Lit, and elswhere. On the bird @damon_hubbs

Dana Brewer Harris is a voiceover artist, British tv fan, and lover of every dog everywhere. She currently lives in New York City and writes about things that frighten her. Her work has appeared in Atticus Review and the Stanford Writer’s Spotlight. She’s on Twitter @DBrewerHarris

Daniel A. Rabuzzi (he / his) has had two novels, five short stories, twenty poems, and nearly 50 essays / articles published (www.danielarabuzzi.com). He lived eight years in Norway, Germany and France. He has degrees in the study of folklore & mythology and European history. He lives in New York City with his artistic partner & spouse, the woodcarver Deborah A. Mills (www.deborahmillswoodcarving.com), and the requisite cat. Tweets @TheChoirBoats

Danila Botha (she/her/hers) is a Jewish fiction writer based in Toronto, Canada. She’s had two collections of short stories published, Got No Secrets, and For All the Men (and Some of the Women) I've Known, which was a finalist for the Trillium Book Award, the Vine Award for Canadian Jewish Literature and the ReLit Award. She has a new collection coming out with Guernica Editions, called Things that Cause Inappropriate Happiness in 2024. She’s also the author of the novel Too Much on the Inside, which won a Book Excellence Award for contemporary fiction. She has a new novel coming out in 2025 called A Place for People Like Us. Danila teaches Creative Writing at the Humber School for Writers and at University of Toronto's School of Continuing Studies.

Dave Cline writes fiction and software from atop the lowliest mountain in the Northwest US. The software for money, the fiction for fun, although someday he wishes that reversed (at which point he will no doubt cease writing code).

Dave Cuzzolina is a published, award-winning fiction writer and former journalist. His published fiction includes: “Off the Hook” by The Dark City Crime and Mystery Magazine, “First One’s the Hardest” by The Dark City Crime and Mystery Magazine, “Loose Ends” by Propertius Press Short Story Anthology, “The Girl Who Liked Cats” by Short Circuit and “The Debtor” by Short-Story.me. He has captured honorable mentions in both the Lorian Hemingway Short Story Competition and the Annual Writer’s Digest Writing Competition in the Genre Short Story category.

David Estringel is a Xicanx writer/poet with works published in literary publications like The Opiate, Azahares, Cephalorpress, DREICH, Somos en escrito, Ethel, The Milk House, Beir Bua Journal, and Drunk Monkeys. His first collection of poetry and short fiction Indelible Fingerprints was published April 2019, followed Blood Honey and Cold Comfort House (2022, little punctures (2023), and Blind Turns in the Kitchen Sink (scheduled for late 2023). David has also written six poetry chapbooks, Punctures, PeripherieS, Eating Pears on the Rooftop, Golden Calves, Sour Grapes, and Blue. Connect with David on Twitter @The_Booky_Man and his website www.davidaestringel.com.

David Larsen is a writer who lives two miles from the border with Mexico in West Texas. His stories and poems have been published in more than forty literary journals and magazines including Cholla Needles, The Heartland Review, Floyd County Moonshine, Aethlon, Oakwood, Change Seven, The Literary Heist, Coneflower Cafe, El Portal, The Raven Review, Canyon Voices and Mobius.

David Pratt’s poetry and short fiction have been published in over 100 journals in the United States, Canada, Britain, and Australia, His op-eds have appeared in national newspapers in Canada and the United States. He is the author of Apprehensions of van Gogh (Hidden Brook Press, 2015), and Nobel Laureates: The Secret of Their Success (Branden Books, 2016). He lives in Kingston, Ontario, Canada.

Born in 1964 in Liverpool, England, David didn't find his voice until his youth. He spent years thinking he was nobody and being treated as such, including a period of homelessness in the desperate Thatcher Years. However, he papered over the scars and found understanding and belief through words. He has been published and performed widely on the BBC, The Tate, galleries and pubs and everything in between. Now a resident in Turkey, he has continued his literary career. His poems and writings are autobiographical, while others are topical.

David Richard Beasley lives in Simcoe Ontario. Born Canadian he lived in Europe and Manhattan for 40 years, has a PhD in political economics, worked for years at the New York Public Research Libraries where he was the president of the union of library workers. He has written over a score of books in all genres including biographies of Canada’s first novelist, of North America’s greatest actor, of the great artist Clay Spohn, of the curator Douglas MacAgy, a major force behind modern art, historical novels of WWII in Burma, and many other entertaining social novels, short stories, novellas. His Episodes and Vignettes; an Autobiography. Sarah’s Journey, the story of a slave escaping to Upper Canada in 1820, won a literary prize and From Bloody Beginnings; Richard Beasley’s Upper Canada won a Brag Medallion. He was awarded the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Medal for his writings. See www.davuspublishing.com.

Dawn is a two-time heart transplant recipient and trauma survivor. Her work has most recently appeared or is forthcoming in Insider Magazine, Blue Villa Magazine, Open Secrets, Remington Review, Alchemy Spoon, and Wishbone Words. You can find her online at www.dawnlevittauthor.com or on Twitter/X @2HeartCore4U.

Debbie Smith likes to play with words to capture life’s moments from on and off her front porch in a place called Paris, Ontario.

Deborah Blenkhorn is a writer and teacher living on Bowen Island in British Columbia, Canada. Some of her stories have been published in Blank Spaces Magazine, Queen's Feminist Review, and This Island, We Celebrate (a collection of Howe Sound regional writing). She's done several book reviews for the Canadian Literature periodical journal, and several entries for the Encyclopedia of Literature in Canada.

Debra Zannelli was raised in Cumberland, Rhode Island. She lived in Salem, Connecticut with her husband for twenty-four years, working for eighteen years at Chelsea Groton Savings Bank. While working at the bank, she earned a business degree from Mitchell College. In 1996, Debra was diagnosed with a non-cancerous brain tumor. During her recovery, she wrote her first novel, Dark Night of the Soul. Returning to work, she put her book aside and did not pursue her writing career. When her husband was transferred to Newport, they moved to Exeter, Rhode Island, where she continued her education. After receiving a certificate as a teacher’s assistant, she was hired by the Exeter/West Greenwich School District. Retiring, she once again found time to return to her first passion. She still lives in Rhode Island with her husband of forty-four years. She has one adult son. Debra enjoys hiking with her dog Boots, traveling and writing.

Dennis Stein lives in Brockville, Ontario, not far from the scenic Thousand Islands. He has lived in Eastern Ontario for most of his life, and he and his wife love to mold their backyard into a slice of paradise on weekends. Stein enjoys writing in a variety of genres, and regularly writes historical and human interest articles for several local publications. He has published several novels, including two series, and is currently working on several large projects for younger readers.

Deryck N. Robertson lives and creates in Peterborough/Nogojiwanong,
Ontario, where he is an elementary educator. Work has appeared with
The Minison Project, Orchard Lea Press, Loft Books, and forthcoming
with Vital Minutiae Quarterly. His first chapbook, All We Remember,
was realeased by Alien Buddha Press in 2021. He is the EIC of Paddler
Press and has a couple of songs on Spotify. When not writing, he can
usually be found drinking maple roast coffee around a campfire or in
the stern of his canoe in Algonquin Park. You can find him online
@Canoe_Ideas, @PaddlerPress, and deryck.ca.

Devonne Brown is a West Virginia author, teacher, and mother of twin boys. She has taught English from Shakespeare to basic Reading in a career that spans closer to a half than a quarter of a century. A scary “Warhorse English Teacher,” she has divided her professional time between alternative and traditional schools in West Virginia, North Carolina, and in the UK. Her first book, Norris Tales, the Adventures of an Awful Housecat, an anthology of anecdotes and short stories revolving around family tyrant Norris, a cat of unusual presence and demeanor. Her upcoming historical fiction in women’s literature, In the Time of the Sonnets: 127 -154, explores the tale of Shakespeare’s Dark Lady, and is on track for publication in February 2023.

Diana writes domestic noir novels. She has been writing since she was a child and her dad inspired her to write. She lives with her husband, and German Shephard Rottweiler. A mother of two grown up children, she is also a proud grandmother. She has been writing since she was a child. Her first novel ‘’Sticks and Stones’’ was self-published in 2005. Her second novel ‘’It Won’t Happen Again’’ was self-published last year on Amazon. It is a fictional story about a woman called Martha (a victim of domestic violence). Her daughter and best friend tell her to leave, but it takes a catalytic event to change her life forever. Diana joined a playwright group, where she was part of a group of amateur writers. ‘’The Kingswood Beast’’ premiered at The Corby Cube.

Diana Raab, MFA, PhD, is a memoirist, poet, workshop leader, thought-leader and award-winning author of fourteen books. Her work has been widely published and anthologized. She frequently speaks and writes on writing for healing and transformation. Her latest memoir is Hummingbird: Messages from My Ancestors, A memoir with reflection and writing prompts (Modern History Press, 2024). Raab writes for Psychology Today, The Wisdom Daily, The Good Men Project, Thrive Global, and is a guest blogger for many others. Raab lives in Southern California. Visit her at: https:/www.dianaraab.com.