Spotlight

JUSTINE NORTON-KERTSON is an author from Oregon. Their pilot teleplay horror series, Red Flag, was a 2025 Outstanding Screenwriters Competition semi-finalist, and they’re a winner of the 2026 Cai Emmons Short Fiction Contest. Their work has appeared in Utopia Science Fiction Magazine, Rulerless, Jupiter Review, Sley House, and the anthologies Solarpunk Creatures and Of Dread, Decay, and Doom. They’ve also edited anthologies including Bioluminescent: A Lunarpunk Anthology, and 2022 …Read More

CHARLES R. COOKE is an author based in North Shore, Texas, where heat, industry, and proximity to questionable decisions tend to sharpen perspective. He writes character-driven crime fiction that lives between violence and restraint, loyalty and self-preservation, and the small moments people insist do not matter until everything depends on them.

Cooke has spent decades thinking about these characters. Not casually. Deliberately. The kind that follows you through notebooks, …Read More

MAËLLE DOLIVEUX is a French and Swiss illustrator who has lived all over the world, from New Jersey to New Zealand. She has graduated from the MFA Illustration as Visual Essay program at the School of Visual Arts in 2013. In her spare time she enjoys chess-boxing, loose-rope walking, and making up fake hobbies for herself in her biographies. She is also the cofounder of Beehive Books, as well …Read More

LEE O’BRIEN (he/they) is an associate agent at Looking Glass Literary. Lee is interested in middle grade, young adult, and adult books in a range of genres, from fantasy to thrillers to romcoms. He’s especially looking for stories with a strong commercial hook or a compelling high-concept, and loves anything full of twists and turns, an unforgettable cast of characters, or a mystery he can’t put down. He’s actively …Read More

Founded in 1995, Tachyon Publications LLC is a publisher of smart science fiction, fantasy, and horror, as well as the occasional mystery, memoirs, young adult, and literary fiction. We champion the creative storytelling of authors who inspire us through intelligent prose and imaginative worlds. Our titles are consistently unique, thought-provoking, and entertaining; our books have received the Nebula, Hugo, World Fantasy, Sturgeon, Mythopoeic, Locus, Grand Prix de l’Imaginaire, Endeavor, …Read More

Allan Kaster is a child of the Sputnik era. Raised, mostly, in San Antonio, Texas, he traveled the world as an Air Force brat. Sharing and trading comic books with other kids in Germany is a fond memory of his childhood. He started reading sci-fi novels when he was ten-years old. Not surprisingly, science was always his favorite subject in school. He graduated from Texas A&M University with …Read More

David Steffen is an editor, software developer, and cross-stitcher. He is most well-known for editing Ignyte Award-winning online zine Diabolical Plots and The Long List Anthology and for administering the Submission Grinder. He has restored an old mill to working order, gone skydiving, and worked as a model (one of these things is not true), but his favorite hobby is collecting more hobbies.

What is the origin story for …Read More

Shane Hawk is a Cheyenne and Arapaho horror writer and high school history teacher from California whose work has been featured in numerous anthologies and the stage. He is the co-editor of Never Whistle at Night, a groundbreaking anthology showcasing Indigenous horror stories that challenge and redefine the genre. Hawk’s writing is inspired by family lore, cryptid sightings, and the haunting legacy of colonialism. When he’s not crafting spine-chilling …Read More

ETHAN PRICE is a visual artist living in Kentucky. His work implements a delicate handling of drawing and painting, punctuated by various textured overlays to create a body of work that evokes mystery, decay, and the passage of time.

His work has been featured in publications like Infected by Art, and has shown in a variety of galleries across the US including Arcadia Contemporary, Arch Enemy Arts, and Nucleus …Read More

DAPHNE TONGE is the founder and CEO of Illumicrate, the UK’s first specialist book subscription box. She is also the founder and MD of Daphne Press, a science fiction and fantasy publisher. She’s judged for book prizes and is an event chair. Previously, she was an award-winning book blogger. She lives in London, but is Chinese-Filipino born and was raised in Manila.

Tell us about your book subscription …Read More

Her imagination, creativity, and thirst for learning have been near-constant companions, but artist/illustrator CHRISTINE MITZUK didn’t initially consider working as an artist. Her career started after college while working as a production artist and graphic designer at a few design and marketing firms for about seven years. She gained insight into client work and procedures to help a project flow along. As a freelance artist she uses several of …Read More

VIRGINIA LEE is an artist, illustrator and sculptor based on Dartmoor, England where she was raised in a creative household immersed in myth and fantasy art. She has illustrated several books for children, including the Greek myth of Persephone and the Russian fairy tale ”The Frog Bride”. She provided illustrations for The Enchanted Lenormand Oracle , StoryWorld cards, and The Secret Histories: Mermaids and Hobgoblins books. She also worked …Read More

M.M. OLIVAS is an alumna of the 2022 Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers’ Workshop and the 2023 Under the Volcano Writers Residency. Her short fiction has appeared in several publications, includingUncanny Magazine,Weird Horror Magazine,Apex, andBourbon Penn. As a trans, first-generation Chicana, she explores the intersection of queer and diasporic experiences in her fiction. She currently resides in the San Francisco Bay Area, earning her MFA in creative writing at …Read More

Tell us about your magazine, The Deadlands. When was it founded, and who’s on the publishing team?

The Deadlands is a spec-fic/literary zine all about death. It launched in May 2021. In late 2020 I (Sean Markey) brought the idea to E. Catherine Tobler (Elise), whom I knew from when she was the editor in chief of Shimmer, which had closed down a few years before. The publisher of …Read More

MICAELA ALCAINO is a book cover designer and illustrator who relocated from her home in Sydney, Australia to London, UK in 2013. Her career has been marked by significant achievements, including being named one of The Bookseller’s Rising Stars in 2021 and winning the prestigious Designer of the Year title at the British Book Awards in 2022, with a subsequent nomination this year in 2024. She was also a …Read More

CHRIS MCGRATH was born in the Bronx and has lived in and around NYC his whole life. At an early age he became interested in art, especially science fiction and fantasy. After graduating from The School of Visual Arts in NYC, Chris gave guitar lessons for several years before beginning his career in 2001. Since then he has done covers for #1 New York Times best selling authors such …Read More

What is the mission statement of your organization?

We are Authors Against Book Bans.

We stand united against the deeply unconstitutional movement to limit the freedom to read. We unequivocally support the availability of diverse voices on our library shelves, in our schools, and in our culture. We pledge to band together against the oppression of literature, to speak when our voices are silenced, to go where our bodies …Read More

WANG JINKANG(1948-), a Chinese science fiction writer, senior engineer, and multiple Yinhe Award winner. He spent several years in a countryside commune, before being sent to work in an iron foundry and a diesel engine plant. This unique experience sparked his interest in science and engineering, and in 1978, he entered Xi’an Jiaotong University for further studies. Later, he became a petroleum engineer in Nanyang Oilfield. At the age …Read More