Nancy Ballard Nancy Ballard is the author of The Caring One: A Story, A Journal. A Resource Created for Alzheimer’s Caregivers and Loving You: Celebrating the Body Through Art, in which she highlights her pastel essence portraits and stories of those she has drawn. A native San Franciscan, she and her husband reside once again in the same flat they shared while dating in the 70’s. She is a Master Artist of Botanical Illustrations with the San Francisco Botanical Garden Society and the grateful mother of three children and two grandchildren who all see the same moon.
	Chris Berhalter A graduate of the Ohio State University, Chris resides in eastern Ohio, where he serves as Prosecuting Attorney for his home county of Belmont. He resides there with his wife, Vanessa, and their three children on their farm.
	Susan Bowman Susan Bowman was born and raised in Petersburg, Virginia. In 1969 she received a BA in Philosophy from the College of William Mary. Susan worked for the City of Petersburg for almost eight years before answering a call to ordained ministry in the Episcopal Church. Following her ordination to the priesthood in 1986, Susan served as Chaplain in a girls’ group home and then as Pastor for three churches until retiring in 2007.
	Patti Brooks The need to ride and write has dominated Brooks’ life. There were times when she and her husband, Bob, had as many as a hundred Morgan Horses on their farm in East Lyme, CT. Although she has been an avid horse show exhibitor, her real love is competitive distance riding and she has always been game to take on off-beat endeavors with horses. Brooks and her stallion, Peppertime, appeared in TV commercials and were chosen to jump out of a horse-size birthday cake to celebrate the bicentennial of the Morgan Horse. It’s inevitable that horses often trot into Brooks’ writing. She sold her first article to a national magazine at age sixteen and that gave her the incentive to keep writing. Brooks has hundreds of published articles, including Goodhousekeeping. She wrote a monthly column for several equine publications. Her first novel, Mountain Shadows has been chosen as required reading in some NY State high schools. Brooks served as President of the New England Morgan Horse Assn. and has been inducted into the American Morgan Horse Association’s Hall of Fame. Currently she is serving a term as President of the Eastern Competitive Trail Ride Assn. and teaches a fiction writing class at a local community college.
	Jill Cline Jill Cline served as library media specialist for Springport Public Schools from 1979-2008 when she retired. She taught classes in English and writing throughout her career and is currently employed as a free lance columnist by the Jackson Citizen Patriot. Jill loves to read and she writes poetry as well. She hopes to write childrens’ books in the future. Jill also enjoys perennial gardening, word games, long walks with her Great Dane, Cone Dog, and just savoring the change of seasons with her husband, Rick, on their small farm. Jill and Rick have two children: Kara and Eric and two grandchildren: Caden and Troy.
	Shelley Costello Shelley is a native Floridian spending her life in Orlando, Florida. Following Bible College she served for 3 years in Youth and Children’s Ministries. Shelley is known as "The Florida Travel Reviewer" and is author of the popular Florida Travel Reviewer blog. She spends her spare time traveling Orlando and the surrounding area enjoying the sights. She is the Author of Road to Hope, and an award winning photographer for her photograph of the World Trade Center, New York City. Shelley won the Mayor’s choice award for Outstanding Citizen of the Year, served in her city as Ambassador in the Chamber of Commerce, and volunteer for community panels and city development teams....
	Heather Daughtridge Heather is a native North Carolinian and currently resides in Raleigh with her husband and two children. She holds the position of Director of Development at an Episcopal private school. Southern Discomfort is Heather’s first novel. Visit her website at http://www.heathersnovelty.com/.
	K. M. Deal K.M. Deal is a graduate of Oglethorpe University and has worked as a technical and freelance writer. She lived and traveled extensively in the Middle East and currently divides her time between the Florida Panhandle and the North Georgia mountains. The Messenger is her first novel.
	Steven Donkin Steven Donkin was born in Morristown, New Jersey. He received a Bachelor of Science degree in biology from Berry College, and Master’s and Doctoral degrees from the Georgia Institute of Technology. A taste for adventure combined with a short attention span have led him to pursue a variety of careers, including packager in a styrofoam cup factory, house painter, timber tree planter, community organizer with the ill-fated advocacy group ACORN, laboratory research assistant, toxicologist and project manager in a environmental consulting company, college and high school science teacher, and, in 2002, Green Party candidate for Mayor of Washington, D.C He and his wife Julia live in Silver Spring, Maryland.
	Susan Dorsey Susan Dorsey grew up in East Tennessee. She currently resides in the Knoxville area with her husband and two children. Visit her website at www.susandorseybooks.com.
	Ashley Dyson Ashley Dyson graduated from Middlebury College and received an MFA in Creative Writing from George Mason University. She lives in New York with her husband and two children.
	Julie Egert Julie Egert graduated from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale in 1998 with a Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism, and spent the following two years as a reporter. Her career actually began at sixteen with The Milford-Herald News. It was there that she fell in love with the challenge of a deadline and putting her thoughts on paper for a weekly column. She later received certification as a Nurse Aide and now calls herself medication aide/transportation specialist/all-around caregiver to mentally disabled clients. She lives just outside of Houston, TX with her husband, Rick, and a calico cat with an attitude. In her spare time she likes to read mysteries at an alarming rate of speed and annoy her husband and cat with various home improvement projects. She’s also been known to take advantage of being an “airline wife” by flying to London for the day. Visit Julie’s author site at www.julieegertwrites.com.
	Elizabeth Fields Elizabeth Fields grew up in the small town of Los Alamos, California. Dreaming of the big city and bright lights, Elizabeth moved to Los Angeles at the age of 20 and found success as an actress and model. She has been working steadily in the entertainment industry, appearing on television and in film and magazines. At a very young age, Elizabeth found herself drawn to the written word. She is an avid reader and has enjoyed writing since childhood. At five years old, she wrote her first novella complete with illustration of course. She is known by her family and friends for her creative flare, and has always said that there is nothing more exciting than putting your imagination to work. For more information on Elizabeth, please visit Elizabethfields.net .
	Marshall Frank Marshall Frank is a retired police captain from Miami-Dade, Florida. In his thirty-year career, he served in many capacities, including sixteen years in Homicide and CSI. He testified in over one hundred murder investigations and supervised nearly three thousand murder cases. A former symphony violinist as well, Frank is the author of eleven books, seven fiction and four non-fiction, plus writing freelance newspaper editorials and on-line blogs. Over one thousand of his articles have appeared in various newspapers and magazines. He lives in Melbourne, Florida with his wife, Suzanne. http://www.marshallfrank.com/
	Charles Freericks Charles Freericks is a writer, producer, and instructional designer. Originally from Paramus, NJ, he grew up believing that he would one day pitch for the New York Mets, retiring in his thirties when he would pursue automobile design and politics; eventually becoming the first automobile designer to also serve as President of the United States. Unfortunately, he spent most of his formative years watching television instead of studying and was forced to find work doing the one thing he actually knew, TV. A graduate of the George Washington University, he earned a Master’s from the University of Southern California. While attending USC, he took a one-day temp job at CBS, which turned into a twenty-year-long career. After assistant stints at CBS, William Morris, and Interscope, he went on to executive positions back at CBS, as well as at Wilshire Court, NBC, and finally New Line, where he was Vice President of Creative Affairs. After aging out of TV development, he began a new career, writing and designing video and Flash-based training courses at LRN in Los Angeles. He presently develops training at Princess Cruises. He lives in Santa Monica with his wife and two children.
	Jackie Gardner Ms. Gardner has been employed at a nonprofit organization since 1990 and has held a variety of positions, currently Manager of Constituent Support. When not writing, Ms. Gardner enjoys reading, singing, dancing, movies/plays and catering. She also enjoys traveling and spending time with her husband and their two children – a son and a daughter.
	Emily Starbuck Gerson Emily Starbuck Gerson has lived in Austin since June of 2003 and loves the city with a passion. She enjoys everything it has to offer, from the non-stop music scene to the laid-back, pet-friendly attitude, and is a big proponent of keeping Austin weird. Gerson holds a communications degree from the University of Texas at Austin and has a journalism background. Her writing has been published in Envy Magazine, TRIBEZA magazine, TexasMonthly.com, and many other publications and websites.
	Casi McLean Casi McLean has always been fascinated with the written word. Her first story, The Apron String Captain, was published when she was eight years old. She grew up in McLean, Virginia, a suburb of Washington, D.C. and after graduating from the University of Georgia, returned to Virginia to teach English and creative writing. The search for her biological father and the discovery of past secrets rekindled Casi’s passion for writing and inspired her memoir, Wingless Butterfly, Confessions Of A Recovering Jerk-Magnet. The saga chronicles the metamorphosis of a broken child––her struggle to escape the silken chrysalis that cocooned her heart and her lifelong search to find self-worth and true love. Now the mother of two grown sons, Casi lives in Atlanta where she is a motivational speaker and writer, reaching out to empower others to let go of the past, find their own passion, and pursue their dreams.
	M.M. Gornell M.M. Gornell is a lifetime lover of mysteries of all types, and her favorite novelist is P. D. James. Besides reading and writing, she is an avid gardener--with a fondness for roses and fruit trees, and a potter particularly interested in the high-fire reduction process. A long time resident in the Pacific Northwest’s Puget Sound, she now lives with her husband and assorted canines in California’s high-desert.
	Katherine Mercurio Gotthardt A wife and mother, Katherine Mercurio Gotthardt is a poetry and prose writer residing in Western Prince William County, VA, where she enjoys exploring history, art, culture and nature. An advocate for preservation, conservation, education and civic engagement, Gotthardt volunteers for several non-profit organizations. She is a freelance, community writer for the regional News & Messenger newspaper, teaches college English composition online and teaches adult English as a Second Language (ESOL) students. Gotthardt’s poetry and prose have appeared in various online and text journals. Her first book, Poems from the Battlefield, a collection of her Civil War themed poetry, original and archival photos and period quotes, was published in 2009. Gotthardt’s children’s book, Furbily-Furld Takes on the World, was published in 2010.
	Yuliana Kim-Grant Yuliana Kim-Grant received her MFA in Creative Writing Fiction from Emerson College. She lives in New York City with her husband and son.
	Nicole Hardison Nicole Hardison grew up in the suburbs of Kansas City with her two brothers. It was in high school that her love for reading blossomed and thoughts of being an author first entered her mind. After high school, she attended Missouri State University and graduated with a degree in Biology, fueled by her love for nature. She went on to be a chemist at an environmental laboratory. In 2005, she moved to the Ozarks and was blessed with the ability to stay home to raise her children. Once her children were both in school she rekindled her ambition of being an author. After a strange dream and lots of hard work, The Farmhouse Secret was born.
	Doug Hewitt Born and raised in Mt. Clemens, Michigan and the son of a Ford Motor retiree, Doug Hewitt often relies on the Detroit area for his fiction settings. With over 100 short stories published in the realm of speculative fiction, his work has appeared in anthologies such as 100 Wicked Little Witch Stories, Maelstrom, and The Dead Inn. Doug’s first novel, SPEAR, was published in 2002 by Sands Publishing and received critical acclaim from Midwest Book Review. His publication credits have expanded into the chapbook realm, including the thriller Slipstream, which is available at Fictionwise.com along with several of his most popular short stories. Doug is currently working on the next Jack Thigpen novel.
	Lori Hines Lori was President and Owner of Versatile Writing Solutions, providing PR and marketing copywriting services to small businesses. She is currently a contract writer and editor within IBM ITSO. Her publishing credits include the short story “Tragedy in the Pines” published in the 2010 Sisters in Crime, Desert Sleuths Anthology, “How Not to Survive a Vacation.” “Murder at Vulture Mine” was presented at Paganimagination.com in February 2010, and “A Citrus Surprise” was published at Bewilderingstories.com summer of 2010. Awards include honorable mention for “A Glimpse Beyond” in the Desert Dweller Short Story Contest. She is a member of Sisters in Crime, Desert Sleuths Chapter, and the Arizona Archeological Society, Aqua Fria Chapter. Her paranormal mysteries are inspired by experiences as an investigator with Sonoran Paranormal Investigations—a TAPS family member from the Sci-Fi channel Ghost Hunter series.
	James Hitt James Hitt is a graduate of North Texas State University and holds a BA in English and history and a MA in history. He taught English and film appreciation in high school and community college for over forty years. He has been a guest speaker at the Gene Autry Museum and Seniors Travel. In addition to his many articles related to film, Mr. Hitt is the author of THE AMERICAN WEST, FROM FICTION INTO FILM (McFarland, 1991), which has been called the definitive monograph on the subject, and WORDS AND SHADOWS (Citadel, 1993), an examination of mainstream American literature and its connection to film. He is also represented in THE LOUIS L’AMOUR COMPANION (Andrews and McMeel, 1992). In 2001, Adventure Books published his novel THE LAST WARRIOR. More recently his work has appeared in Straitjackets Magazine and Tales of the Talisman . In 2009 his short story “The Boy With Too Much Hair” won first place in the OnceWritten.com writing contest.
	Vern Hobbs Freelance writer Vern Hobbs has found the delicate balance between the right and left sides of the brain. His technical articles have appeared in popular sailing magazines for a decade, winning acclaim for detail and accuracy. Meanwhile, Vern’s nautical adventure and travel features have been described as moving, inspirational, and sometimes comical. The great novelist, Thomas Wolfe, once said, “Fiction is fact revealed.” As a fiction writer, Vern follows that philosophy, creating stories that are informative and thought provoking, as well as entertaining. His debut novel, Flying Fish, achieves that goal. A heartwarming story of community survival and personal awakening, Flying Fish also teaches us about things as diverse as commercial aquaculture and real estate fraud. Vern, his wife Sally, and their feline companions live on the Florida coast, and sometimes aboard their 40 year-old sailboat, exploring forgotten bays and islands, always in search of a good story.
	Kurt Kamm Kurt Kamm lives in Malibu. A graduate of Brown and Columbia Law School, Kurt has attended fire training and various academies at CalFire and Los Angeles County Fire. He has used his experience to write novels about the lives of firefighters and paramedics. He has written ONE FOOT IN THE BLACK - A Wildland Firefighter’s Story, RED FLAG WARNING - A Serial Arson Mystery, and CODE BLOOD. He is beginning work on a fourth novel, entitled HAZARDOUS MATERIAL. RED FLAG WARNING received three first place awards in 2010 mystery fiction contests.
	Matthew Kastel Matthew Kastel is a veteran of both minor league and Major League Baseball. A list of the teams and ballparks he has worked at include: Auburn Astros, Maine Guides, Williamsport Bills, Vermont Mariners, Houston Astros, and Citizen’s Bank Park (home of the Philadelphia Phillies). Matt currently is the Manager of Baseball Operations and Events for the Maryland Stadium Authority (Camden Yards, home of the Baltimore Orioles). Nine Inning Murder is Kastel’s first foray into fiction, although he has had several articles published on the business of professional sports management. Matthew currently lives in Frederick County, Maryland with his wife, Karen, and two children, Luke and Grant.
	Travis Charles Kumph Travis Charles Kumph graduated from Stonehill College in May of 2010, where he studied healthcare administration, Spanish, and health sciences. Travis continues to travel to Peru several times a year working with various schools and NGO’s. He has collaborated with a documentary filmmaker to produce a documentary based off of this book. The film follows a group of Stonehill College students to Peru to capture the true significance of these types of service-immersion experiences on both participants and the communities in which they are serving. In addition to coordinating and running service-immersion trips, Travis works at a rehabilitation center for children with developmental disabilities in Southern New Hampshire. Please feel free to contact Travis at tkumph@gmail.com.
	Christopher Law Chris Law was born in 1959 in Glasgow, Scotland. He attended an all boy's Catholic High School and eventually got his degree in Quantity Surveying at Caledonian University in Glasgow at twenty four years old. Chris is married and has five children.
	Donna J. Lehl Donna J. Lehl is a lifelong resident of Michigan who vacillates between the quiet life in quaint northern Michigan small towns and the busyness of suburban Detroit. She obtained bachelors and JD degrees from Wayne State University in Detroit and makes a living as a bankruptcy lawyer. Besides writing and practicing law, she is a mother, a grandmother and a keeper of critters, including a pug and a miniature schnauzer. In earlier incarnations she was a social worker and a motel proprietor. She now looks forward to retirement so that she has more time to travel and to write, possibly combining the two. Her latest project is a study of personalized or vanity license plates as a means of self-expression.
	Patricia Brooks Lemoine Patricia Brooks Lemoine is a Montreal native who had a strict European upbringing in the French suburbs of the city. The only daughter of a French immigrant father and a Montreal native mother of Irish descent, she has been fluent in both French and English since she was a toddler. Working her way through her undergraduate degree, Patricia completed her B.F.A. degree at Concordia University. A music lover, she also rediscovered parts of the city’s music and bar scene while recently completing her law degree at Université de Montréal. She now has a career in the non-profit sector and as a freelance journalist focused on Health, Lifestyle, and Beauty.
	Peter Lucas Peter Lucas is an award-winning veteran Boston newspaperman. During his career, Lucas’ assignments have taken him across the country and around the world, covering stories from Boston politics and national campaigns to the war in Vietnam, the troubles in Northern Ireland, Cuba, Central America, and the fall of communism in Albania and the Balkans. He covered the riots at the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago, interviewed Fidel Castro in Havana, and was on hand for NATO’s bombing of Serbia in 1999. He has worked as a political reporter and columnist for the Boston Globe and the Boston Herald and has written for the Boston Phoenix. Lucas is Boston born and bred and is a graduate of Boston University. He served in the U.S. Army in Germany. Balkan Caesar is his fifth book and first novel. Lucas and his wife live in Westford, Massachusetts.
	Niall P MacAllister His Irish parents having emigrated from Belfast, Northern Ireland, Niall Patrick Mac Allister was born in Somerset, England. He was schooled in England and Ireland, graduating from the Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin. Pursuing a career in acute health care in the United States, Dr. Mac Allister won some National and International awards, also a United States patent in patient revival equipment. Dr. Mac Allister was Professor at New York University in Buffalo and at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, Virginia – later, Director of Surgical Intensive Care at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore, Maryland. Dr. Mac Allister has published or presented more than one hundred articles and papers and participated in televised teaching courses. Moved by the impact of the prevalent social and economic disparities, moral apathy, the rise in crime, unemployment and disillusion among the young, Dr. Mac Allister founded a nonprofit program, Friendships Without Borders, Inc. www.fwbinc.org engaged in promoting conciliation in areas of conflict and discrimination. Its members have been awarded consultant roles with NATO in the Balkans and other areas of crises.
	Bob Maninger Bob Maninger grew up in Ponca City, Oklahoma, an oil refinery town in the northern sector of the state. He spent twenty years as a teacher and administrator in public and private schools before moving into academia. He is currently an assistant professor at Sam Houston State University in Huntsville, Texas. Bob is published in over twenty academic journals and magazines. His books include the novel Flint and the non-fiction piece The Mathews Family. Bob has two children, Laura and Clay, who have become passionate adventurers in their own way. He enjoys advocating for and living an environmentally sustainable life, gardening, reading, hunting, fishing, and college athletics.
	Sue McGinty Sue McGinty left behind the technical writing world of McGraw-Hill when she moved to Los Osos, a small community on California’s scenic Central Coast. Since then she has penned freelance articles and MURDER IN LOS LOBOS, the first Bella Kowalski mystery novel. A dedicated Sister in Crime, her short fiction has been featured in three anthologies. http://www.suemcginty.com/.
	Doug Menning Doug Menning was born and raised in Rocky River, Ohio. After attending college he moved to the Eastern Shore of Maryland where he lives on a farm with his wife. They have two children. He works as a marketing representative for a sport fishing company.
	Jim Metzger Jim holds degrees in religion from Vanderbilt University (M.A., Ph.D.), Princeton Theological Seminary (M.Div.), and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (B.A.) and has taught at Vanderbilt University Divinity School, Luther College, East Carolina University, and Beaufort County Community College. Although this is Jim’s first novel, he has written an academic monograph as well as several articles and reviews for journals of religion. Jim and his family currently reside in his hometown, Greenville, NC.
	M. Albert Morningstar M. Albert Morningstar is the author of two published short stories before Murder At The PBR , his first novel. He graduated from the University of Maryland and the University of Baltimore Law School where he served as Recent Legislation Editor of the Law Review. He served in the Maryland Legislature from 1983-1987 while practicing law in Frederick, Maryland. He has enjoyed watching and attending the PBR and rodeos for over two decades, traveling to events all over the country. Mr. Morningstar and his wife, Jane, divide their time between Fayetteville, Pennsylvania and Mission, Texas. They have two children and three grandchildren.
	Ross Murphy A graduate of Va Tech (71), Ross serves as the Acquisitions Editor for Aberdeen Bay. In addition to his two novels You Will Never Dance Alone and Dancing with Devils, Ross is the editor of an anthology of Aberdeen Bay's author's works titled Bay Time Stories. After a seventeen year sojourn living in the Republic of Ireland, Ross now resides in Manassas, Virginia with his wife Pam.
	Betsy Hamlet Nichols A summa cum laude graduate, university professor, and Fulbright scholar, Betsy Hamlet Nichols grew up in Lanett, Alabama, where it was her mother's stories of her own childhood in Hawthorne, Florida, that fed the author's imagination and inspired the writing of When Summer was in the Meadow. At home in Statesboro, Georgia, Ms. Nichols and her husband, Jim, himself a published writer, have traveled extensively. Ms. Nichols, in partnership with her niece Sylvan Baker, is currently working on a collection of ghost stories from around the world.
	Clint Pearson Clint Pearson holds a bachelor’s degree in English literature from California State University, Bakersfield (sigma cum laude) and an M.D. from the University of California, San Diego. He completed his residency in family practice and is a member of the American Academy of Family Physicians. A former long-distance runner and rock climber, he struggles with multiple sclerosis on a daily basis and now moves about in a power chair. Yet, he continues to write and lecture, remaining a dedicated father as well as a full-time practicing physician.
	Ursula Pearson Ursula Pearson holds a bachelor’s degree in liberal studies from California State University, Bakersfield (cum laude) and is a graduate of M.L. Sultan Technikon in Durban, South Africa. Now a citizen of the United States, she is the tireless mother of twins, an advocate for the disabled, and an avid food critic.
	Lisa Pell An award-winning former newspaper, television, and radio journalist, Lisa has spent most of her career in the communications business. Born in North Carolina, she was raised in Virginia, is a graduate of George Mason University, and attended Harvard Business School. She is a member of the National Press Club and the Project Management Institute. Lisa has strong roots in the Appalachian mountains of Virginia, and has lived in West Virginia and Tennessee. Connoisseurs of well-told stories, Rock ‘n’ Roll music, impressionist art, golf, oysters, and fun people, Lisa and her husband live in the Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C.
	Daniel Pouesi Daniel Pouesi grew up and attended Samoa College in Samoa. A freelance writer and documentarian with a background in cultural anthropology and studio art, Daniel runs KIN, a small, home-based outfit that specializes in video and book production for the Pacific Island community. Married with three children, Daniel lives in the City of Carson, California, where he is currently working on Flip-Flops, the second installment to his Samoan family saga trilogy.
	Mike Rabon Oklahoma native and musician Mike Rabon is the founding member of the 1960’s musical hit group, “The Five Americans.” He has co-written five national chart records the titles are: Western Union, I see the Light, Sound of Love, Zipcode, and Evol not Love. Mike and his group as well as his gold record awards are presently showcased at the Oklahoma History Center and have their own glassed contained exhibit along with other notable contributors to Oklahoma rock and roll music such as B.J Thomas, Hanson, Leon Russell, JJ Cale and Gary Busey. Mike was also recognized in 2008 by the Oklahoma State Senate and was awarded special recognition and distinguished alumni status by Southeastern Oklahoma State University. He has earned a Master’s Degree in Administration from Southeastern Oklahoma State University and resides in Hugo, Oklahoma.
	James Rahn James Rahn's stories and articles have appeared in several magazines. He taught fiction at the University of Pennsylvania for fifteen years and has an MFA from Columbia University. In 1988 he started the Rittenhouse Writers' Group. RWG may be the longest-running fiction workshop in America. Many members have published short fiction and novels. They have also received grants from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Pew Foundation, and the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, among others. James Rahn lives with his wife and nieces in Philadelphia.
	Michael A. Smith Michael A. Smith is a native Montrealer and graduate of both Anglophone Montreal Universities: McGill (Law) and Concordia (Business). An avid traveler, he has spent time living in Europe (Antibes), Latin America (Mexico), and Asia (Singapore), but has always called Montreal home. Having grown up and spent the majority of his life in the west side of Montreal, he has personally been to every place in this guide at least one time. Son of an immigrant French teacher and Anglophone father, he is perfectly at ease in both official languages of Canada, though he considers himself more of a native English speaker. He is currently engaged to his co-author Patricia Brooks Lemoine.
	Christina Solak-Goodwin Christina Solak-Goodwin has been a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor for the past fourteen years, five of those in her own practice. She also is a Registered Nurse and adjunct professor in the Social and Behavioral Sciences department at the University of Southern Maine. Currently, Mrs. Solak-Goodwin works as a psychiatric nurse at Mid Coast Hospital in Brunswick, Maine, in their Partial Hospital Program. She lives in Auburn, Maine, with her husband of twenty-one years and their three children.
	Don Stanford Following his discharge from the army, Don worked at several jobs before attending the University of Southwestern Louisiana; then worked in several fields until beginning his career with the State of Louisiana, retiring as public relations manager for child support. He is married to Carol Richard Stanford. They reside near Opelousas, LA and are the parents of three and the grandparents of seven. He teaches a weekly Bible study at the Palace Café in Opelousas. Don’s well-received novel, Southern Kingdom, the opening novel in the Blythington Family Saga, was his first published novel. He has completed a third novel in this series and is currently working on another.
	Ken Tangvik A native and long-time resident of Boston, Ken Tangvik is a professor at Roxbury Community College. A specialist in multi-cultural fiction, he has traveled extensively throughout Latin America. Ken is also a co-founder of the Hyde Square Task Force, a Boston-based, award-winning non-profit that engages at-risk teens in arts, college prep and community organizing.
	Pendelton C. Wallace Penn Wallace threw off the bonds of his career as a software engineer in the spring of 2012 and started a new life as an author and charter boat skipper. He is taking his 60-foot Samson C-Breeze ketch, Victory, on new adventures in Puget Sound and the Sea of Cortez. Penn currently lives near Seattle with his youngest daughter, a geriatric chocolate Labrador retriever and two feline terrorists. He has been a commercial fisherman and a restaurateur . He sailed the waters of Puget Sound and Western Canada for over thirty years, but now will set sail for the warm blue waters of the Baja California to retrace his magic summer with Papa. As always, he is working on his next book.
	Jim Waltzer A freelancer for 22 years, Jim Waltzer has written 600+ features, mostly for regional magazines. Rutgers University Press published his nonfiction Tales of South Jersey in 2001, and Five Star Mysteries published his first novel, Sound of Mind, in 2007. The Battle of the Century , his account of the promotion of boxing champion Jack Dempsey, is due from Praeger Publishing in May 2011.
	Jill Williams A graduate of Sarah Lawrence College, Jill has lived in many places including West Hartford, New York City, Hollywood, Mexico City, Vancouver (Canada) and currently Sedona, Arizona. She has been a recording artist (Jill Williams, RCA Victor), a Broadway show writer (RAINBOW JONES), a broadcaster (CBC Radio), a performance poet (THE NATURE SONNETS, Gival Press, 2001; A WEAKNESS FOR MEN, Woodley & Watts, Inc., 2004), a pet photographer (HOW TO PHOTOGRAPH PETS AND ANIMALS, HPBooks, 1983), a creative writing instructor (Vancouver Community College), and, most recently, a rug muralist (http://aberdeenbay.com/www.sedonarugpaintings.com). She has also been a love addict.
	Dave Winter Dave Winter began writing seriously as a securities analyst and in the writing of investment strategy pieces. He holds a B.S. in Finance from the University of Illinois, an MBA from Loyola University in Chicago and holds the Chartered Financial Analyst designation. He has taught Bible and Christian history at various churches and that, along with a lifelong interest in history, led Dave to delve into important periods in the history of Western Civilization that marked momentous turning points. He resides in Scottsdale, Arizona. The Fall and Rise is Dave’s first novel.
	Stephen G. Yanoff Stephen G. Yanoff is the former New York City manager and vice-president of a major high-risk insurance company. He is a published playwright and the winner of several prestigious playwriting contests. He has also served as the playwright-in-residence at the University of Texas. He holds a bachelor's, master's, and doctorate degree from the Texas A & M University system. Currently, he resides in Austin, Texas, and teaches part-time at St. Edward's University. Aside from writing, he is a Texas Hold 'Em poker champion, and an avid organic gardener. All visitors to his blog are welcome to join the fun.
	Andy Zhang Andy Zhang was born in mainland China during the Cultural Revolution. Prior to coming to the United States in 1996, Andy had his work published by several major newspapers in China. Memories of an Eastern Sky is his debut novel.