Literary Stars

Vincent Chu is the author of the debut story collection Like a Champion. His fiction has appeared in Muumuu House, STILL Magazine, East Bay Review, and elsewhere. He is a Headlands Center for the Arts Affiliate Artist and has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize. He earned his BA from UCLA and lives in San Francisco.

J. Bradford DeLong is an economic historian and professor of economics at the University of California, Berkeley and served as a deputy assistant secretary of the U.S. Treasury during the Clinton administration. In addition to authoring Slouching Towards Utopia: An Economic History of the 20th Century, he also writes an economics blog at braddelong.substack.com. He lives in Berkeley.

Camper English is an award-winning cocktails and spirits writer who has covered the craft cocktail renaissance for over 15 years, contributing to more than 50 publications around the world including Popular Science, Saveur, and Whisky Advocate. In Doctors and Distillers, English reveals how and why the contents of our medicine and liquor cabinets were, until surprisingly recently, one and the same. He is based in San Francisco.

Karen Joy Fowler is the New York Times bestselling author of seven novels and three short story collections. Her latest novel, Booth, is a startling portrait of a country in transformation and a vivid exploration of the family behind the infamous John Wilkes Booth. Fowler and her husband live in Santa Cruz.

Since childhood, Deven Greene has been interested in science. After receiving a Ph.D. in biochemistry, she obtained her M.D. degree and trained as a pathologist then turned writer The Erica Rosen MD trilogy—Unnatural, Unwitting and now Unforeseen—draws on her medical training and experience to create three suspenseful novels. Deven lives in the San Francisco Bay area.

Meredith Jaeger is the USA Today bestselling author of The Pilot’s Daughter, The Dressmaker’s Dowry and Boardwalk Summer. She was born and raised in Berkeley. Jaeger holds a BA in modern literature from the University of California, Santa Cruz, and she currently lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with her husband and two children.

Kathy Joseph recounts the more than 400 years of characters who paved the way for modern electricity in The Lightning Tamers: True Stories of the Dreamers and Schemers who Harnessed Electricity and Transformed Our World. Joseph holds degrees in physics, engineering, and science from the University of Chicago, Penn State, and the University of Utah. She lives near San Francisco with her husband and two children.

Bruce Lewis was an award-winning crime reporter for several California daily newspapers, including the Contra Costa Times. His debut novel, Bloody Paws—The Plight of the Homeless Human Strays, was the winner of a Maxy Award for best mystery novel of 2021. Book 2, Bloody Pages—Haunted by a Family Secret, is a novel dealing with intergenerational violence. Book 3 in the series, Bloody Feathers—Death of the Cardinal, focuses on rare bird preservation. He is a member of the California Writers Club—Mt. Diablo Chapter.

Tucker Malarkey is a national best-selling author who has most recently published Stronghold, a conservation thriller about the plight of the salmon across the Pacific Rim. Tucker is a graduate of Georgetown University, and earned a master’s degree at the Iowa Writers Workshop. She has lived all over the world, working as a teacher, literary journal editor, journalist, researcher and documentary film editor/story consultant.

John McCormick is descended from five generations of Napa Valley residents. His book, Chinese in Napa Valley, uncovers the forgotten contributions of the Chinese people in California’s most famous wine region. He holds degrees from the University of California, Berkeley and Harvard University. After a career in technology in Silicon Valley, he and his wife now own Lamorinda Music, in Lafayette, where they also live.

Isidra Mencos is the author of Promenade of Desire—A Barcelona Memoir. She holds a PhD in Spanish and Latin American Contemporary Literature from the University of California, Berkeley. Her essays and articles have been published in Diálogo, WIRED, and Chicago Quarterly Review, among others. Originally from Spain, Isidra lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Jessica O’Dwyer is an award-winning author of Mother Mother and Mamalita: An Adoption Memoir. Her writing has appeared in the New York Times, San Francisco Chronicle, Scary Mommy and MUTHA. O’Dwyer has also worked as an art museum publicist and earned an MFA from Antioch Los Angeles. She now lives in Marin with her husband and two young adult children.

Ingrid Rojas Contreras is the award-winning author of The Man Who Could Move Clouds, a memoir about daughter and mother, who both lost their memories and embarked on a journey to relearn their family history.  Her essays and short stories have appeared in the Los Angeles Review of Books, Electric Literature, and Guernica, among others. She is a Visiting Writer at Saint Mary’s College. 

Amy S. Peele, RN, is the best-selling author of Cut, Match, and Hold, medical mysteries with a side of humor. Before becoming a writer Amy enjoyed a fascinating 35-year career in the organ transplant field which provides an authentic backdrop to her books. Her books have reached bestseller status and gained national recognition with such awards as the NYC Big Book Award. Peele lives in Marin County with her husband.

John Schembra spent a year with the 557th Military Police Company in Vietnam in 1970.  After returning home, he became a police officer with the Pleasant Hill Police Department, retiring after nearly 30 years of service. Schembra’s latest thriller, The List, won the 1st place award in the Public Safety Writers Association 2021 writing competition, his ninth writing award. Schembra lives with his wife in Northern California.

Terry Tierney is the author of the ‘60s road novel Lucky Ride, a poetry collection, The Poet’s Garage, and the novel, The Bridge on Beer River (July 2023), all published by Unsolicited Press. His stories and poems have appeared in in over seventy literary journals, including Ghost Parachute, Fictive Dreams, Rust + Moth, and Typishly.

Meghan Joyce Tozer, a former lyric soprano and music historian, is the author of Night, Forgotten.  After graduating from Harvard University and earning a Ph.D. from the University of California, Santa Barbara, she moved to San Francisco’s East Bay where she lives among the redwoods with her husband, their two young children, and their dog. 

Anna Voloshyna is a Ukrainian-American chef and author of the highly-acclaimed cookbook BUDMO! Recipes from a Ukrainian Kitchen. Voloshyna completed the San Francisco Cooking School’s rigorous Culinary Arts program and has been featured in top food publications like The New York Times, The Wallstreet Journal, and The Washington Post.

Dallas Woodburn is the author of the short story collections How to Make Paper When the World is Ending and has received the Cypress & Pine Short Fiction Award, and the international Glass Woman Prize. Her writing has appeared in many publications including Zyzzyva and The Nashville Review.  She lives in Fremont with her husband and two young daughters.