Elizabeth Crane - Episode #3 "Betty the Zombie"
Elizabeth Crane is the author of three collections of short stories, When the Messenger is Hot, All this Heavenly Glory, and You Must Be This Happy to Enter, and a novel: We Only Know So Much. Her work has also been featured in numerous publications including Other Voices, Nerve, Ecotone, Swink, Guernica, Coachella Review, Mississippi Review, Florida Review, Bat City Review, fivechapters, failbetter, The Collagist, Make, Hobart, Rookie, Fairy Tale Review, Chicago Quarterly Review, Chicago Magazine, the Chicago Reader, Eating Well, and The Believer, and anthologies including Altared, The Show I'll Never Forget, The Best Underground Fiction, Who Can Save Us Now?, Brute Neighbors and Dzanc's Best of the Web 2008 and 2010. Her stories have been featured on NPR's Selected Shorts. She is a recipient of the Chicago Public Library 21st Century Award, and her work has been adapted for the stage by Chicago's Steppenwolf Theater company, and also been adapted for film. She teaches in the UCR-Palm Desert low-residency MFA program and lives in New York City with her husband Ben Brandt and dog Percy. (from elizabethcrane.com)
Elizabeth Crane is the author of three collections of short stories, When the Messenger is Hot, All this Heavenly Glory, and You Must Be This Happy to Enter, and a novel: We Only Know So Much. Her work has also been featured in numerous publications including Other Voices, Nerve, Ecotone, Swink, Guernica, Coachella Review, Mississippi Review, Florida Review, Bat City Review, fivechapters, failbetter, The Collagist, Make, Hobart, Rookie, Fairy Tale Review, Chicago Quarterly Review, Chicago Magazine, the Chicago Reader, Eating Well, and The Believer, and anthologies including Altared, The Show I'll Never Forget, The Best Underground Fiction, Who Can Save Us Now?, Brute Neighbors and Dzanc's Best of the Web 2008 and 2010. Her stories have been featured on NPR's Selected Shorts. She is a recipient of the Chicago Public Library 21st Century Award, and her work has been adapted for the stage by Chicago's Steppenwolf Theater company, and also been adapted for film. She teaches in the UCR-Palm Desert low-residency MFA program and lives in New York City with her husband Ben Brandt and dog Percy. (from elizabethcrane.com)
Aaron Burch - Episode #4 "Scout"
Aaron Burch is the author of the story collection Backswing, (Queen’s Ferry Press, July 2014) and the editor of HOBART: another literary journal. He's also the author of the novella, How to Predict the Weather, and How to Take Yourself Apart, How to Make Yourself Anew, the winner of PANK's First Chapbook Competition. Recent stories have appeared or are forthcoming in Barrelhouse, New York Tyrant, Unsaid, elimae and others. (courtesy Queen's Ferry Press)
Aaron Burch is the author of the story collection Backswing, (Queen’s Ferry Press, July 2014) and the editor of HOBART: another literary journal. He's also the author of the novella, How to Predict the Weather, and How to Take Yourself Apart, How to Make Yourself Anew, the winner of PANK's First Chapbook Competition. Recent stories have appeared or are forthcoming in Barrelhouse, New York Tyrant, Unsaid, elimae and others. (courtesy Queen's Ferry Press)
Molly Tolsky - Episode #5 "The Flyer"
Molly Tolsky is a writer from Chicago currently living in New York. Her work has appeared in Lumina, The Collagist, The Fiddleback, MAKE: A Chicago Literary Magazine, and elsewhere. She daylights as an editor for Kveller.com and moonlights as an editor for the new literary magazine, No Tokens. You can follow her @mollytolsky.
Molly Tolsky is a writer from Chicago currently living in New York. Her work has appeared in Lumina, The Collagist, The Fiddleback, MAKE: A Chicago Literary Magazine, and elsewhere. She daylights as an editor for Kveller.com and moonlights as an editor for the new literary magazine, No Tokens. You can follow her @mollytolsky.
Erin Kahoa - Episode #6 "Moto"
Erin Kahoa spends most his time marking things off his self made “Chicagoan” checklist, i.e. 23) Get doored on a bicycle or 57) Watch the cubs lose. During the day he splits his time between the Route 66 Theatre Company and fretting over his ever approaching thesis deadline. The rest of the time he is an uncle, and an amateur hat aficionado, and a proud member of Chicago’s Live Lit scene.
He is a three time Moth Slam winner, has a winning record in Write Club, and has been blessed to perform at Adult Education, Bases Loaded, Do Not Submit, Essay Fiesta, Filet of Solo, Funny Ha Ha, Funny Story Show, Grown Folks Stories, Guts and Glory, Here's the Story, Hump Night, Kindling Tales, LitMash, Live Lit on the Lake, The Mash, The Moth (Chicago and New York), Raunch, Ray's Tap Reading Series, Solo in the Second City, Stoop Style Stories, Story Club (North and South), Story Lab, Solo Saturday, That's All She Wrote, This Much is True, Seven Deadly Sins, and Write Club (Evanston and Chicago.) (from arbitrarydistraction.blogspot.com/)
Erin Kahoa spends most his time marking things off his self made “Chicagoan” checklist, i.e. 23) Get doored on a bicycle or 57) Watch the cubs lose. During the day he splits his time between the Route 66 Theatre Company and fretting over his ever approaching thesis deadline. The rest of the time he is an uncle, and an amateur hat aficionado, and a proud member of Chicago’s Live Lit scene.
He is a three time Moth Slam winner, has a winning record in Write Club, and has been blessed to perform at Adult Education, Bases Loaded, Do Not Submit, Essay Fiesta, Filet of Solo, Funny Ha Ha, Funny Story Show, Grown Folks Stories, Guts and Glory, Here's the Story, Hump Night, Kindling Tales, LitMash, Live Lit on the Lake, The Mash, The Moth (Chicago and New York), Raunch, Ray's Tap Reading Series, Solo in the Second City, Stoop Style Stories, Story Club (North and South), Story Lab, Solo Saturday, That's All She Wrote, This Much is True, Seven Deadly Sins, and Write Club (Evanston and Chicago.) (from arbitrarydistraction.blogspot.com/)
James Tadd Adcox - Episode #7 "Leonard"
James Tadd Adcox's debut novel, Does Not Love, is forthcoming this October from Curbside Splendor Press. The Map of the System of Human Knowledge, a collection of stories, is available from PANK Books / Tiny Hardcore Press. He lives in Chicago.
James Tadd Adcox's debut novel, Does Not Love, is forthcoming this October from Curbside Splendor Press. The Map of the System of Human Knowledge, a collection of stories, is available from PANK Books / Tiny Hardcore Press. He lives in Chicago.
Kat Meads - Episode #8 "Dirt, The Last War."
Kat Meads, a native of eastern North Carolina, is an award-winning writer of fiction, drama, nonfiction, and poetry. She received her BA and MFA from the University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill & Greensboro, respectively). She was awarded an NEA grant in poetry and a California Artist fellowship in fiction, as well as two Silicon Valley Arts Council fellowships. Her stories have won awards from Chelsea and Inkwell Magazine, her historical novel For You, Madam Lenin received an IPPY Silver Medal and was a 2012 ForeWord Book of the Year finalist, as was her mystery novel, Senestre on Vacation (written as Z.K. Burrus), in 2011. Her short plays have been produced in Los Angeles, New York, and the midwest. She has been an artist-in-residence at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Yaddo, Millay Colony for the Arts, Blue Mountain Center, Dorland, and the Montalvo Center for the Arts. Ms. Meads also teaches in Oklahoma City University's low-residency Red Earth MFA program.
Ilana Manaster- Episode #9 "The Party We Gave After Nick Got Back from Barbados"
Ilana Manaster has done a lot of stuff, like dress up as different people and invite other people dressed as themselves to come see it. She has performed standup comedy as well. Now she mostly writes fiction and teaches and rears her child. She was born and raised in Chicago, and currently lives in Brooklyn. She moved to New York because of the movie Fame. In her possession are two MFAs, one from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and one from Columbia University. She's tall, too, but not as tall as she thinks she is.
Dr. Reverend Lance Carbuncle - Season 1 Episode #10 "It's Always about the Monkey" AND Season 3 Episode 2 "Teratoma"
The Dr. Reverend Lance Carbuncle is the author of Smashed, Squashed, Splattered, Chewed, Chunked and Spewed, the 2009 Reader's Views Literary Awards Humorous Fiction Winner, Grundish and Askew, and Sloughing Off the Rot. Carbuncle loves to hear from his readers and sometimes even responds. He can be contacted via electronic mail by writing to bonesbarbuncle@lancecarbuncle.com
Ryan DiGiorgi - Episode #11 "Roger"
Ryan DiGiorgi makes things for the internet. He spends most of his time trying to convince large companies to approve his robot jokes. He also writes fiction, edits comedy videos, and eats Chipotle. He is currently co-producing the humorous improv podcast "Hello from the Magic Tavern." To learn more about him, please Google "Ryan DiGiorgi." It's not a super common name.
Tim Jones-Yelvington - Episode #12 "Derrick Mickelson's Cuddle Bed for Wayward Boys"
Tim Jones-Yelvington is a Chicago-based writer, multimedia performance artist, and nightlife personality. He is the author of two collections of short fiction —"Evan's House and the Other Boys Who Live There" (in "They Could No Longer Contain Themselves," Rose Metal Press) and "This is a Dance Movie!" (forthcoming, Tiny Hardcore Press). His work has appeared in Black Warrior Review, Puerto Del Sol, Harpur Palate, and others. From 2010-12, he guest edited [PANK]'s annual queer issue.
Emma Smith-Stevens - Episode #13 "Greyhounds"
Emma Smith-Stevens' fiction has appeared in Conjunctions, Subtropics, Joyland, Wigleaf, and elsewhere. Originally from New York City, she lives in Hudson, NY. You can follow her on Twitter @ESmithStevens.
"Greyhounds" was originally published in Web Conjunctions.
"Greyhounds" was originally published in Web Conjunctions.
Ian Belknap - Episode #14 "Dave Boobs"
Ian Belknap is Founder and Overlord of WRITE CLUB (writeclubnation.com), the world's greatest competitive reading series, now in four U.S. cities. He's the Dean of Mean at Chicago's live magazine show, Paper Machete, and he's a recurring cast member of the Pleasure Town podcast. Mr. Belknap is co-editor with Lindsay Muscato of Bare-Knuckled Lit: The Best of WRITE CLUB, available on Amazon.
Michael Gerhard Martin - Episode #15 "Even the Dust"
A native of rural Pennsylvania, Michael Gerhard Martin holds an MFA from The University of Pittsburgh and teaches writing for Babson College and the Johns Hopkins University Center for Talented Youth. He won the 2013 James Knudsen Prize from UNO and Bayou Magazine for his story about bullying and gun violence, "Shit Weasel Is Late For Class." His fiction has been shortlisted for the Hudson Prize, The Nelligan Prize, and the Iowa & Simmons Prizes, and his work has appeared in Bayou Magazine, The Ocean State Review, and Junctures. His first book, Easiest If I Had A Gun, was just published by Braddock Avenue Books.
Myke Johns - Episode #16 "Hills Like Times New Roman"
Myke Johns is a public radio producer in Atlanta where he also co-anchors the city's chapter of WRITE CLUB, a combative philanthropic live literary bloodsport which bests any poetry reading you care to name by a good twenty decibels.
He co-edited the anthology Tender Bloodsport, Vol. 1 for Deer Bear Wolf Press. His work has appeared in the Bitter Southerner, Creative Loafing, Used Gravitrons, Scene Missing Magazine, and The Tusk.
He co-edited the anthology Tender Bloodsport, Vol. 1 for Deer Bear Wolf Press. His work has appeared in the Bitter Southerner, Creative Loafing, Used Gravitrons, Scene Missing Magazine, and The Tusk.
Toni Ann Johnson - Season 3 Episode 4 "Time Travel"
Toni Ann Johnson won the Humanitas Prize and The Christopher Award for her Disney/ABC screenplay, "Ruby Bridges," the story of the young girl who integrated the New Orleans Public School system. Johnson won a second Humanitas Prize for her screenplay "Crown Heights," a film for Showtime Television about the Crown Heights Riots. Short fiction has appeared in The Emerson Review, Elohi Gadugi Journal, Red Fez, ArliJo, and Soundings Review. Johnson's novel REMEDY FOR A BROKEN ANGEL, was released in 2014 and nominated for an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work - Debut Author.
Celena Cipriaso -- Season 3 Episode 6 "The What If Drink"
Celena Cipriaso has written for ABC’s All My Children and is currently co-writing two screenplays with Civilian Studios. Her pilot “Evolved” was a Finalist in the Creative World Awards, and her spec of The Walking Dead, “Little Children” was a Semi-Finalist in the Creative World Awards and also in the top 10% of the Austin Film Festival TV competition. Her pilot “Sober City” had a staged reading produced by the Asian American Film Lab, and “Evolved” was part of a night of staged readings produced by F*ck It Club in NYC. She’s served as a reader for the Nantucket Film Festival as well as a judge for the Asian Film Lab’s 72 Hour Shootout. As a playwright, her work has been performed in various venues in New York City and throughout the Northeast. She’s also freelance journalist that’s written for CNN, The Root, Slate, Draft, Arts America, Film Buff, Bitch, Intel, and Women on Writing. Celena was a regular contributor and columnist for Film Buff as well as the Film Editor for Arts America. She was also the Co-Editor of the popular online magazine, The Beer Sessions. Other publishing credits include Seal Press’s anthology P.S. What I Didn’t Say, the Harper Collins anthology Yell-Oh! Girls, Growing Up Asian American, Word Riot, and The Legendary.
Erika Price -- Season 3 Episode 8 "Security"
Erika Price is a writer and social psychologist in Chicago. Erika has performed in live lit events around the city, including Write Club, The Paper Machete, Essay Fiesta, The Skewer, and Cassandra. Her work has been published in The Rumpus, The Toast, Literary Orphans, and has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize.
Robert Duffer -- Season 3 Episode 10 "Blindspot"
Robert Duffer is the Autos editor at the Chicago Tribune. He teaches creative writing at Columbia College Chicago. He has kids.