YULIA ALEYNIKOVA is a Russian-born author who writes to escape the traps of consciousness, and is inspired by human nature and relationships. She currently lives in Vancouver. Her work has been published in filling Station and in the anthology The Crooked Ledge of Another Day (Ascent Aspirations, 2014).

SHERI BENNING has published two books of poetry: Thin Moon Psalm (Brick Books) and Earth After Rain (Thistledown). Her poetry, essays and fiction have appeared in numerous Canadian and British journals and anthologies, including New Poetries V (Carcanet, 2011). She divides her time between Glasgow, UK, where she completed her PhD, and her family’s farm near Manitou Lake, SK.

WEYMAN CHAN’s second book, Noise from the Laundry (Talonbooks, 2008), was a finalist for the Governor Geneal’s Award for Poetry. His fifth book of poetry, Human Tissue, is forthcoming.

MICHAEL CHRISTIE’s debut collection of stories, The Beggar’s Garden (Harper Collins, 2011), was long-listed for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and a finalist for the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize, and won the City of Vancouver Book Award. Born in Thunder Bay, he lives on Galiano Island, BC, with his wife and two sons. If I Fall, If I Die is his debut novel (McClelland & Stewart, 2015).

VERYL COGHILL of Prince Albert, SK, holds a Creative Writing Certificate with distinction from the Humber School for Writers. She has a book of poetry, Make Me (Thistledown, 2005).

ALEXANDER DANNER writes fiction and comics, and is co-author of the textbook Comics: A Global History, 1968 to the Present (Thames & Hudson, 2014). He serves as president of the Writers’ Room of Boston, a non-profit workspace for writers. Visit TwentySeven- Letters.com.

JAMES DEAHL is the author of 23 literary titles, the four most recent being Two Paths Through the Seasons (with Norma West Linder), North Point, Rooms the Wind Makes and North of Belleville. His daughter SHONA DEAHL is a student at the University of Toronto.

SUE GOYETTE lives in Halifax, NS, and has published a novel and five collections of poetry, the most recent being The Brief Reincarnation of a Girl (Gaspereau, 2015).

GRANT HARDER was born and raised in Prince George, BC, and now calls Vancouver home. When not shooting for magazines such as enRoute, Bon Appétit and Dwell, he can be found hiking in the mountains, riding his bicycle or, most likely, eating sushi.

KEAGAN HAWTHORNE holds a BA in Folklore from Memorial University, where he also studied literature and creative writing. He edited Paragon, Memorial University’s literary journal, and has written for community and college newspapers. His poetry is forthcoming in CV2. He lives in Victoria, BC, where he studies engineering.

CLAIRE KELLY recently came in second place in Prairie Fire’s Banff Centre Bliss Carman Poetry Award. Her fiction chapbook is Ur-Moth (Frog Hollow, 2014). She lives and writes in Fredericton, NB.

SUGAR le FAE (aka Zach Matteson) is a prize-winning poet, translator, teacher, photographer, songwriter and Radical Faerie. His poems, essays and interviews have appeared in numerous journals, including Plenitude and Eleven Eleven. He has an MFA in Creative Writing from UBC and is pursuing a PhD at the Institute for Gender, Race, Sexuality, and Social Justice (UBC).

JOSHUA LEVY is from Montreal. His writing has been published in three Véhicule Press collections; with the Oxford University Press; in Maison- neuve, Queen’s Quarterly, The Dalhousie Review, The Antigonish Review, among others; and his fiction has been broadcast on CBC Radio.

ASHLEY LITTLE is the author of three novels, most recently Anatomy of a Girl Gang (Arsenal Pulp, 2013), which won the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize, was long-listed for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, and has been optioned for television.

ANGELA LONG is an award-winning writer whose work has appeared in numerous Canadian and international publications, including The Globe and Mail, Utne Reader and Poetry Ireland Review. Libros Libertad published her first collection of poems, Observations from Off the Grid, in 2010. She’s working on a collection of travel essays after two years of wandering.

ANDREW MacDONALD won a Western Magazine Award for Fiction, and is a three-time finalist for the Journey Prize. He lives in New England and Toronto, where he’s finishing a novel.

J.R. McCONVEY is a writer based in Toronto. His work has appeared in Joyland, The Puritan, The Dalhousie Review and other journals, and his novella ‘The Last Ham’ was published as an e-book by House of Anansi (2013). He is on Twitter (@jrmcconvey) and at jrmcconvey.wordpress.com.

KATHY MEZEI is Professor Emeritus, Dept. of Humanities, SFU, and Life Member, Clare Hall, Cambridge. Recent publications include The Domestic Space Reader, edited with Chiara Briganti (U of T, 2012) and Translation Effects: The Shaping of Modern Canadian Culture, edited with Sherry Simon and Luise von Flotow (McGill-Queen’s, 2014).

ÉMILE NELLIGAN was born in Montreal in 1879. He was an early follower of Symbolism, and had his fi poems published at the age of 16. In 1899, he suffered a serious mental illness from which he never recovered. In 1903, his collected poems were published in French to great acclaim. He died in 1941, and is considered one of the greatest poets of French Canada.

ANGELA REBREC studies creative writing at Kwantlen Polytechnic University in Surrey, BC. Her work has been published in filling Station, Pulp Magazine and Misfit Lit. Apart from writing, she works as a longshoreman, sings in an all-women’s choir, and moms her three children. Occasionally she gets some sleep.

AL REMPEL’s books of poetry are This Isn’t the Apocalypse We Hoped For (Caitlin, 2013) and Understories (Caitlin, 2010). His poems have appeared in The Malahat Review, CV2, Grain and The Best Canadian Poetry 2011. He enjoys collaborating on video poems; visit alrempel.com.

RODNEY ROBERTSON grew up in Sydney, NS, and now teaches and writes in Vancouver. His poems have appeared in The Antigonish Review and The White Wall Review and have been set to music. He recently wrote the libretto for Rita Ueda’s short opera One Thousand White Paper Cranes for Japan, performed in Halifax, Toronto, Vancouver and Singapore.

NABEN RUTHNUM won the 2013 Journey Prize, and writes the monthly Crimewave column in the National Post.

BEVERLEY SHAW lives and writes on the South Shore of Nova Scotia. Her fiction and poetry have appeared in various North American literary magazines, including The Antigonish Review and Pottersfield Portfolio.

ALISON SMITH is the author of the poetry collections The Wedding House (Gaspereau, 2001) and Six Mats and One Year (Gaspereau, 2003). Her work has also appeared in Guernica, Fjords Review and The Malahat Review. She lives with her family in rural Nova Scotia.

NICK THRAN’s third collection of poems is Mayor Snow (Nightwood, 2015). His previous collection, Earworm (Nightwood, 2011), won the Trillium Book Award for Poetry.

TROY TYMOFICHUK has had poetry appear in several Canadian journals, including The Antigonish Review, The New Quarterly and The Capilano Review. He teaches in Toronto.

PADMA VISWANATHAN’s first novel, The Toss of a Lemon, was published in eight countries, a bestseller in three, and short-listed for several awards. Her 2014 book, The Ever After of Ashwin Rao, was a finalist for the Scotiabank Giller Prize. She is also a playwright, journalist and translator. Canadian by birth, she now lives in Arkansas.

AARON WANNAMAKER is a graduate from MacEwan University’s Professional Writing program. He and his classmates self-published an anthology of student writing, The PROWlers (Vulpine, 2013), which included his non-fiction piece about his conversion to Islam. When not writing, he’s gaming, cooking or building LEGO. He writes on his blog muslisms.com.

JOHN SIBLEY WILLIAMS is the author of eight poetry collections, most recently Controlled Hallucinations (FutureCycle, 2013), and serves as editor of The Inflectionist Review. A four-time Pushcart nominee, he is the winner of the Nancy Dew Taylor Poetry and the HEART Poetry Awards. He lives in Portland, OR.

SAINT JAMES HARRIS WOOD, before his fall from grace, was on the road with his gothic blues band The Catastrophe, where he picked up a heroin smoking habit that led to his present ignoble prison digs. He likes mail (S.J.H. Wood T30027, PO Box 8101, CMC-6324, San Luis Obispo, CA, 93409, USA).

CATRIONA WRIGHT has an MA in Creative Writing from the University of Toronto. Her writing has appeared in various publications, including Riddle Fence, The New Quarterly, PRISM international, Grain and Prairie Fire. A selection of her poems won the 2014 Matrix LitPop Award.

GENEVIEVE ZIMANTAS is an aspiring poet and academic from Montreal. A sometime substitute teacher and full-time wildflower enthusiast, she has just moved to Halifax to complete an MA in English Literature. Recent work has been published in Driftwood Press and A Narrow Fellow.