Season 23 Mentors and Mentees

Mentor: Allison Blevins

Allison Blevins (she/her) is the queer disabled author of four collections and six chapbooks. Winner of the 2024 Barthelme Prize, the 2023 Lexi Rudnitsky Editor’s Choice Award, and the 2022 Laux/Millar Poetry Prize, Blevins serves as the publisher of Small Harbor Publishing. Learn more at AllisonBlevins.com.

Mentee: Miriam Parrotto

Miriam Parrotto is a writer, poet, and Lego nerd in New Jersey. She holds an MA and MFA. She is an alum of the Tin House Summer Workshop. Her work has received support from Aspen Summer Words and the New York State Summer Writers Institute. She is a mother, dog lover, avid reader, music aficionado, emerging translator, and housebroken.

Mentor: Amy Cipolla Barnes

Amy Cipolla Barnes is an award-winning author of three collections: Mother Figures, Ambrotypes, and Child Craft. She has words at The Rumpus, McSweeney’s, SmokeLong Quarterly, and many other sites. She reads for The MacGuffin and is a Fractured Lit associate editor, Gone Lawn coeditor, Narratively chief submissions reader, and Narratively Academy instructor.

Mentee: Nancy Moreland

Nancy Moreland’s essays are informed by her work as a journalist, travel writer, and researcher. Her writing has appeared in the Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times, House Beautiful, and other publications. She is working on a series of essays exploring identity, belonging, and ways in which the past and present intersect. You can find her at NancyMorelandWriter.com or on Instagram at @nancymorelandwriter.

Mentor: Sari Fordham

Sari Fordham is a writer, professor, and environmental activist. Her memoir Wait for God to Notice was a finalist for the Sarton Women’s Book Award. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, Best of the Net, Brevity, Passages North, West Branch, and Booth, among others. As the founder and former editor in chief of The Roadrunner Review and the former senior editor at Literary Mama, she believes in the power of each person’s story. She currently writes the monthly Substack Cool It: Simple Steps to Save the Planet. She teaches creative nonfiction at SUNY Oswego and lives in upstate New York with her husband and daughter.

Mentee: Hallie Pritts

Hallie Pritts is a Sewanee Writers alum, Chautauqua fellow, former artist in residence in New Zealand, and finalist for the Jeffrey E. Smith Editors’ Prize. Her work has appeared in McSweeney’s, The Missouri Review, LitMag, Off Assignment, and others. She’s a former publicist for a Nashville record label and spent a decade leading a rock band.

Photo credit: Rebecca Chiappelli

Mentor: Ari Koontz

Ari Koontz (they/he) is a queer/trans writer with an MFA from Northern Michigan University, where they served as nonfiction team lead for Passages North. Koontz’s essays about gender, nature, and pop culture have been published in Hayden’s Ferry, BULL, Under the Gum Tree, Alien, and elsewhere, and he has a passion for hybrid and experimental forms.

Mentee: Jesica Kinuyo Bakar

Jessica Kinuyo Bakar is from Northern California and lives in Tiohtià:ke/Montréal, where she studies at Concordia University. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Geist, Hippocampus, The /tƐmz/ Review, and more. She is working on a nonfiction project on the 2023 Lāhainā fires and has received support from the Quebec Writers’ Federation.

Mentor: Laurie Morency

Laurie Morency (she, her, hers) is an education in literacy doctoral (EdD) candidate at Carlow University. Professor Morency is a pedagogy specialist and will soon be a literacy education specialist with a focus on dyslexia. She holds a master of fine arts in creative writing (MFACW) from Chatham University and a bachelor of arts in creative writing and German studies from Wheaton College. Professor Morency has taught English at five colleges across the tristate area: Chatham University, Community College of Allegheny County (CCAC), Carlow University, Duquesne University, and Roxbury Community College. During her graduate studies at Chatham, she served as a graduate writing mentor in the writing center and as a Retain, Involve, Strengthen, Excel (RISE) mentor for freshmen of color. She has worked with the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at Chatham University and Wheaton College. At a summer writing retreat hosted by Chatham’s creative writing MFA program, Professor Morency was pleased to introduce the keynote speaker, Deesha Philyaw, author of the award-winning short story collection The Secret Lives of Church Ladies. Professor Morency is a fiction and nonfiction writer.

Mentee: Lillie Gardner

Lillie Gardner is a writer from Minnesota. Her creative nonfiction has been published in Quail Bell Magazine and Delmarva Review, and she serves as an essay reader for Hippocampus Magazine. As a screenwriter, she’s been a winner at Austin Film Festival and a featured “Screenwriter to Watch” in MovieMaker Magazine. Learn more at LillieGardner.com.

Mentor: Dawn Raffel

Dawn Raffel is the author of six books, including the nonfiction titles The Strange Case of Dr. Couney: How a Mysterious European Showman Saved Thousands of American Babies and The Secret Life of Objects, an illustrated memoir. She writes across genres and likes combining storytelling strategies with research.

Photo credit: Claire Holt

Mentee: Anne Schuchman

Anne Schuchman is a writer, translator, and doula in Rutherford, New Jersey. Her essays and translations have appeared in The Southern Review, The Massachusetts Review, and World Literature Today, among others. Her work has been supported by Fulbright, NEH, and NJSCA grants. She is working on DISLOCATIONS, an essay collection on grief, memory, and place.

Mentor: Carolyn Roy-Bernstein

Carolyn Roy-Bornstein is the author of four books, most recently A Prescription for Burnout: Restorative Writing for Healthcare Professionals from Johns Hopkins University Press. Her work has been published in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, JAMA, Poets & Writers, The Writer, and many other venues. She lives and writes in Maine and Massachusetts.

Mentee: Madeline Mirasol

Madeline Mirasol teaches writing and literature at a small independent school in south-central Pennsylvania. She loves reading postapocalyptic fiction, memoirs, and poetry, and she loves to write in those genres as well. A classically trained rhetorician, she feels that real the value of writing is in its role for learning, creating new knowledge, and constructing our realities. This position often gets in the way of making writing for others to read as art, but she inhabits the contradiction nonetheless. She is an actively practicing Quaker and student of Mahayana Buddhism. Her current project is a book-length memoir, organized by the geography of the first ten years of her life, tentatively titled MIDWESTERN EXCAVATION.

Mentor: Ogochukwu Bibiana Ossai

Ogochukwu Bibiana Ossai is a Nigerian fiction writer based in Atlanta, and an award-winning poet. She is a PhD fiction graduate from Texas Tech University. Bibiana has an MFA from Long Island University, Brooklyn, where she received the Marilyn Boutwell Graduate Award in Fiction. Her works have been supported by scholarships, including the Hatty Fitts Walker Scholarship from the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown and an Idyllwild Arts Writer’s Week fellowship. Her writings appear in The Kalahari Review, The Dark Magazine, African Writer Magazine, and Flash Fiction Magazine, among others.

Mentee: Korimobi Gboneme

Korimobi Gboneme is a Nigerian American novelist and a member of the Authors Guild. She studied creative writing and business at the University of Maryland, where she participated in the creative writing living-learning program, the Jiménez-Porter Writers’ House. She lives in Maryland, USA, and Lagos, Nigeria, where she coordinates community outreach programs.

Mentor: Chloe N. Clark

Chloe N. Clark is the author of Collective Gravities, Escaping the Body, and more. Her most recent collection, Every Galaxy a Circle, is out now from JackLeg Press. She is also a founding co-EIC of Cotton Xenomorph.

Mentee: Jeff Raderstrong

Jeff Raderstrong is a writer and ghostwriter who helps people feel seen. He’s written, edited, or collaborated with hundreds of leaders on over thirty books and thousands of essays and opinion pieces. His work (under his own name and others) has appeared in places like Time, The Daily Beast, Newsweek, MSNBC, and elsewhere.

Photo credit: Elvira Kalviste Photography

Mentor: Katharine Coldiron

Katharine Coldiron is the author of Ceremonials, Junk Film, Wire Mothers, and Out There in the Dark. Her work as a book critic has appeared in The Washington Post, The Guardian, the Times Literary Supplement, and many other places; as an essayist, in Conjunctions, Ms., Booth, and elsewhere. She and her books have been profiled in three countries on radio and television. Find her at KColdiron.com.

Photo credit: Michael Chylinski

Mentee: Renée Vogt

Renée Vogt’s eclectic professional life has ranged from training rats in a biomedical research lab and ghostwriting a numerology blog to driving a forklift in a manufacturing plant and more. She holds a BS in mechanical engineering from Northwestern University and is pursuing her MFA in creative writing from Alma College. Originally from Memphis, Tennessee, Vogt now lives in mid-Michigan with her husband and their cat.

Mentor: Lacey Dunham

Lacey N. Dunham is the author of The Belles, named a Best Book of 2025 by Library Journal and CrimeReads, and the forthcoming FALL OF THE HOUSE OF GRAYSTONE (2027), both from S&S/Atria. Named a 2025 Writer to Watch by Poets & Writers Magazine, she has received support from the Elizabeth George Foundation and the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities, among others.

Photo credit: Carletta Girma

Mentee: Cori McKenzie

Cori McKenzie is a fiction writer and an assistant professor of English language arts education in St. Paul, Minnesota. She is obsessed with birds, floods, grief, and the state of Iowa. You can read her short fiction in The Greensboro Review, Great Lakes Review, and Hoxie Gorge Review.

Mentor: Elyse Durham

Elyse Durham is the author of the novel Maya & Natasha (Mariner). She is an Elizabeth George grantee, and her fiction has appeared or is forthcoming in Cimarron Review, The Cincinnati Review, Image, and Wigleaf. She lives in Kalamazoo, Michigan, with her husband, who is a Greek Orthodox priest.

Mentee: Emma Schramm

Emma Schramm is an Atlanta-based writer currently studying for a degree in English. Specializing in historical fiction, she is seeking publication for her debut novel set during the polio epidemic in the 1950s United States. She has been recognized by the Alliance for Young Artists & Writers, receiving a Silver Key Award for her work.

Mentor: Albert Liau

Albert Liau is an editor, writer and educator—as well as a podcast and audiobook enthusiast. His stories have been described as “deeply felt and written with precision” by Ben Loory and as “capturing moonlight in Ziploc bags” by Jack Cheng. Liau holds an MFA in writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts and a PhD in biophysics from UC Berkeley. Currently a prose editor at The Adroit Journal, Liau previously was a short fiction editor at CRAFT, where he contributed to the column Art of the Opening.

Mentee: M. Anne Kala‘i

M. Anne Kala‘i works across genres to knit connective tissue between disparate places and communities. Her fiction was longlisted for the DISQUIET Prize, shortlisted for the Cheshire Novel Prize, and a finalist for the Mānoa Journal Writing Contest in Fiction. Her work has appeared in Hawai‘i Pacific Review, San Pedro River Review, and other publications.

Mentor: Linda Masi

Linda N. Masi is the author of the award-winning novel Fine Dreams. She holds an MFA in creative writing and a PhD in English, creative writing focus, from Texas Tech University. Some of her other works have been anthologized and appear in Tupelo Quarterly, Locomotive, and elsewhere. She has expertise in developmental editing.

Mentee: Lily Rong

Lily Rong is a Thai Chinese writer, born in Thailand and raised in the United States. She has been a lifelong fan of magic, dragons, dark lords, spaceships, and all things fantastical. Outside of writing, she enjoys data analysis, gaming, reading, and learning languages. She holds a PhD in experimental psychology, where her research focused on how mainstream and heritage media shape Asian Americans’ ethnic identity and self-esteem.

Mentor: Chital Mehta

Chital Mehta’s manuscript HAVE YOU SEEN ROMIT? won the 2025 James Alan McPherson Prize for the Novel, judged by R. O. Kwon. Her book is scheduled for release in 2026 by the University of Nebraska Press. She is an alum of Tin House and VONA. She holds an MFA from Lindenwood University. She lives in Delaware, where she is working on her next novel and a collection of short stories based on Asian immigrant themes.

Mentee: Amy Olassa

Amy Olassa is from India and lives in the Bay Area. She received her MFA from Saint Mary’s College of California. She was a Tin House summer scholar and a fellow at the San Francisco Writers Grotto. Her short fiction has been featured in the Oyster River Pages, Aster(ix) Journal, Jellyfish Review, and Flash Frog.

Mentor: Jola Naibi

Jola Naibi is the author of Terra Cotta Beauty, a collection of short stories that captures the essence of life in the city of Lagos. Her work has been featured in Afreada, midnight & indigo, Thriving Writers, Isele Magazine, and lϙúnlϙún. Her short poetic essay entitled “there are things that your privilege will not let you see” was featured in Grub Street Literary Magazine and received an award from Columbia University. She is the host and coproducer of Tokunbo, a limited podcast series featuring conversations with Nigerian storytellers in the diaspora.

Mentee: Jennifer Celeste

Jennifer Celeste is a Dominican American writer born and raised in New Jersey. She earned a master’s degree in English with a creative writing concentration and is currently pursuing an MFA in creative writing with a fiction concentration. Her writing can be found in Inquiries Journal, Santa Fe Writers Project, Rigorous, and OJAL Art.

Mentor: Davi Schweizer

Davi Schweizer is the founder of Troublemaker Firestarter. They have two poetry collections (one forthcoming from Querencia Press, Echo Decay with Kith Books). Their poems have appeared in Bullshit Lit, MEMEZINE, Burial Magazine, and other places. They have an MFA in fiction from Southern New Hampshire University. Learn more at DaviSchweizer.com.

Mentee: Tiffany Edwards

Tiffany Edwards is an Oakland-based writer and urban planner. Her stories and essays have been featured in Roi Faineant Press and at the San Francisco Litquake Festival. Her work features queer characters in wild situations, and when she isn’t writing she is likely wrangling her two small dogs or learning a new hobby.

Mentor: Kristen Witucki

Kristen Witucki is the author of two books: The Transcriber, a Gemma Open Door Book for Young People, and Outside Myself, her first novel. Her shorter fiction and nonfiction have appeared in Brain, Child; Literary Mama; Exceptions: The Art and Literary Journal for Students with Disabilities; Wordgathering; and LightHouse Interpoint, the literary blog of LightHouse for the Blind and Visually Impaired in San Francisco. She works as the curriculum and content editor for Learning Ally’s College Success Program for students who are blind or visually impaired, as a teacher for VISTAS Education Partners, and as a mentor for New Jersey’s EDGE Program, and, during the pandemic, she worked as a homeschooling mother. She lives with her husband and three children in Highland Park, New Jersey, and is beginning to dabble in poetry.

Mentee: Nicole Baute

Nicole Baute’s fiction has been published in The New Quarterly, Wigleaf, Prairie Fire, and Southern Humanities Review, among others, and in 2018 she won the Pinch Literary Award in Fiction. She holds an MFA from the University of British Columbia and has worked in journalism and communications and as a writing teacher. She’s lived in Toronto, New Delhi, and Hong Kong, and currently calls Washington, DC, home.

Mentee: MaryAnna Dunn

MaryAnna Dunn lives and writes near Charlottesville, Virginia, just inside the Blue Ridge Mountains. Her poetry has appeared in Tar River Poetry, Beltway Poets, Reed Magazine, and other journals. She is the author of the chapbook Letters to Littles Mills.

Mentee: Laura A. Ring

Laura A. Ring is the author of Field Notes Recovered from the Expedition to Devil’s Peak (MWC Press), winner of the 2020 Foster-Stahl chapbook competition. Her poems have appeared in Four Way Review, Trampset, Tupelo Quarterly, and RHINO, among other places. Born in Vermont, she lives in Chicago.

Mentee: Jahidul Alam

Jahidul Alam, born where rivers braid through Bangladesh’s green, writes from Louisiana and Mississippi’s muddy breath and tidal grief. A diasporic voice shaped by monsoon memory and protest, his poetry speaks from the fault lines of exile, nature, and empire. His poetry has appeared in journals such as Southwestern Review, Prachya Review, Thin Air Online, and FERAL: A Journal of Poetry and Art. With a PhD in English from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, he maps the wounds of land and power, where nature speaks, and silence learns to resist. He teaches British and Anglophone literature at Jackson State University.

Mentee: Sofia Rose Smith

Sofia Rose Smith is a queer Xicana Irish writer, facilitator, and Voices of our Nations alum. Her poems and essays have been published by AK Press, Glass Poetry Press, The Acentos Review, and Transgress Press. Her writing explores the landscape of grief, the body, queerness, the impacts of violence, joy, and motherhood. She lives in Los Angeles.

Mentee: Kara Douglass Thom

Kara Douglass Thom’s poetry has appeared in Sport Literate, Lucky Jefferson, and other journals and anthologies. She has written ten books for children, including her first middle-grade novel with verse, Sweet, Tart (Candlewick Press, 2026). She is a freelance writer and a bookseller at Excelsior Bay Books. She lives in Chaska, Minnesota, on Dakota Land.

Photo credit: Christina Gandolfo

Mentee: Christa Fairbrother

Christa Fairbrother, MA, is a disabled poet currently serving as poet laureate of Gulfport, Florida. She’s had poetry in Crannog, Epiphany, Pleiades, and Salamander, among others, and was a Pushcart Prize nominee. She is the poetry editor at Phylum Press. Find her at ChristaFairbrotherWrites.com, on Instagram at @christafairbrotherwrites, or on Bluesky at @christafairbrother.

Mentee: Bridget Kriner

Bridget Kriner (she/her) is a community college professor of English and women’s and gender studies. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Shore, Variant Literary, New Delta Review, like a field, and Rattle (Poets Respond). She is a supporting editor at Trio House Press and a reader at Chestnut Review and Only Poems! Learn more at BridgetKriner.com or on Instagram at @bridgetakriner.

Photo credit: Adrianne Mathiowetz

Mentee: Val I. Vanderburgh

Val I. Vanderburgh is a poet based in Colorado, USA. The written word seizes upon them, extracting its essence from their life, similar to their táltos ancestors. When not writing (or agonizing about writing), Vanderbaugh can be found with a cat on their lap, a pan on the range, or a soccer ball at their feet.