| Author | Biography | Book Cover(s) |
|---|---|---|
Barbara Cain | I am a retired clinician having served over 40 years at the University of Michigan`s Psychological clinic. I conducted a private psychotherapy practice for more than 50 years in Ann Arbor. I have published five children`s books, two of which received awards. My publication credits include articles in scientific journals as well as commercial magazines such as The New York Times Magazine, The New York Times Science section, and The Christian Science Monitor among others. |  |
David Calonne | David Stephen Calonne is senior lecturer in the Department of English Language and Literature at Eastern Michigan University. He is author of several works, including R. Crumb: Literature, Autobiography, and the Quest for Self, published by University Press of Mississippi; William Saroyan: My Real Work Is Being; The Spiritual Imagination of the Beats; Diane di Prima: Visionary Poetics and the Hidden Religions; and biographies of Charles Bukowski and Henry Miller. Calonne is also editor of five volumes of uncollected Bukowski stories and essays as well as Conversations with Gary Snyder and Conversations with Allen Ginsberg, both published by University Press of Mississippi. He previously taught at the University of Texas at Austin, the University of Michigan, and the University of Chicago. | |
Cassandra Caverhill | Cassandra Caverhill is a Canadian-American poet and editor. She is the author of the chapbook Mayflies (Finishing Line Press) and a winner of the 2021 AWP Intro Journals Award. Her work has most recently appeared in Atticus Review, Peninsula Poets, Coastal Shelf, Last Resort Literary Review, Reed Magazine, and Into the Void. She is a graduate of Bowling Green State University’s MFA program in Poetry. Cassandra earned a certificate in Editing from the University of Chicago and an honors BA in Drama and Communication Studies from the University of Windsor. Born and raised in Windsor, Ontario, Cassandra lives, writes, and edits with her husband in Ann Arbor, Michigan. |  |
Mary Ceccanese | Mary Ceccanese is the owner and principal consultant of Dynamic Connections LLC. Celebrating almost fifteen years of presenting interactive seminars and workshops to all levels of staff in both for-profit and non-profit organizations, she engages attendees with research-based practices applied to work-life scenarios. She has a BA in Human Resource Administration and recently retired from working at the University of Michigan for more than thirty years. In 2019 she was presented with a University of Michigan Staff Impact Award. In addition, she was one of the 2019 "Top Ten Business Women" in the country of the American Business Women's Association. Mary published her first book for staff titled, YOU Can Create Positive Change at Work, and in 2020 released her first product, High-Quality Connection Cards. |  |
Devika Dibya Choudhuri | Devika Dibya Choudhuri is a Professor of Counseling at Eastern Michigan University. A Professional Counselor (MI/CT), Board-Certified Clinical Mental Health Counselor, Approved Clinical Supervisor, and Certified EMDR Therapist. She has 20 years of clinical experience with refugees, immigrant and multicultural populations, as well as trauma survivors of violence, sexual assault, grief, and loss. Her scholarship focuses on diversity, equity, inclusion, and access issues in counseling, supervision and pedagogy. She served as Director and Chair on the National Board of Certified Counselors from 2009-2015, the Minority Fellowship Advisory Council from 2015-2018, and as President of the Association for Specialists in Group Work in 2020. She is an Editorial Board member of the Journal of LGBT Issues in Counseling, the Journal of Multicultural Counseling & Development, and a Reviewer for Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology. She is a recipient of several awards and a 2015 American Counseling Association Fellow. | |
Amy Clarice | Amy Clarice (formerly Shrodes) (pronouns: She/Her/Hers) is the co-author of the children’s book Lost and Found Cat: The True Story of Kunkush's Incredible Journey. Amy traveled to Lesbos, Greece in 2015 on sabbatical where she discovered Kunkush, shunned by the island cats. While serving in the front lines of the refugee crisis, she cared for Kunkush for more than a month, devising a social media campaign to find his family with a team of volunteers. Shortly after Valentine’s Day, 2016, Kunkush was reunited with his family in Norway. Amy lives in Ypsilanti with her dog Zola on her urban farm, which includes two ferrets, two rabbits, and a flock of hens. She is working on a series of young adult books with a family from Afghanistan that is now living in Germany. |  |
Crysta K. Coburn | Crysta K. Coburn has been writing award-winning stories for most of her life. Her first short story was published at the age of sixteen after winning runner-up in a local writing contest. She earned her bachelor's degree in creative writing from Western Michigan University in 2005. She is a journalist, fiction writer, poet, playwright, editor, podcast co-host, and one-time rock lyricist. She served as editor for The Queen of Clocks and Other Steampunk Tales; Cogs, Crowns, and Carriages; and Gears, Ghouls, and Gauges (the latter two with Phoebe Darqueling). | |
Juan Cole | Juan R. I. Cole is Richard P. Mitchell Collegiate Professor of History at the University of Michigan. Cole has devoted his career to understanding the Middle East and the Muslim world more generally, and to critically evaluating its relationship with the North Atlantic states. His most recent book is The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam: A New Translation from the Persian. Among his other recent works are Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires (Bold Type Books, 2018) and The New Arabs: How the Millennial Generation is Changing the Middle East (Simon & Schuster, 2014). He has translated works of Lebanese-American author Kahlil Gibran. He has appeared widely on media, including the PBS NewsHour, ABC World News Tonight, Nightline, the Today Show, Anderson Cooper 360, Rachel Maddow, Chris Hayes' All In, CNN, the Colbert Report, Democracy Now! and many others. He has written about Egypt, Iran, Iraq, the Gulf and South Asia and about both extremist groups and peace movements. He is proprietor of the Informed Comment news and analysis site. Cole conducts his research in Arabic, Persian and Urdu and Turkish as well as several European languages. He knows both Middle Eastern and South Asian Islam. He lived in various parts of the Muslim world for more than a decade, and continues to travel widely there. He has written, edited or translated 21 books and authored over 100 articles and chapters. | |
Rick Coppens | Rick Coppens is a retired sales rep who lives on a small farm in southeastern Michigan with his wife, Kathy, a former Ann Arbor educator. He is a musician, songwriter, and storyteller whose free time includes traveling the country with Kathy and spending time with their five wonderful children and four beautiful grandkids. | |
Dave Coverly | Dave Coverly, a native of Plainwell, Michigan, earned his BS with a double major in Imaginative Writing and Philosophy at Eastern Michigan University in 1987, and received his MA in Creative Writing from Indiana University in 1993. In 2011, EMU awarded him an Honorary Doctorate in Fine Arts. He is the creator of the cartoon panel Speed Bump, which runs internationally in about 400 newspapers and websites, including the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, and the Detroit Free Press. His cartoons have also appeared in The New Yorker, USA Today, The New York Times, Newsweek, Esquire, and were a regular feature in Parade. Speed Bump has been named "Best in Newspaper Panels" by the National Cartoonists Society in 1995, 2003, 2014, and 2022. In 2009 the same organization gave him its highest honor, the prestigious Reuben Award, for "Outstanding Cartoonist of the Year". He has also traveled extensively with the USO, drawing cartoons for wounded soldiers and those stationed at bases in the Middle East. Coverly is also the author and/or illustrator of numerous children's books published by Macmillan, including Sue MacDonald Had a Book (with Jim Tobin), The Very Inappropriate Word (with Jim Tobin), and How to Care for Your Pet T-Rex (with Ken Baker). His chapter book series began with Night of the Living Worms: The Misadventures of Speed Bump & Slingshot, and continued with Night of the Living Shadows, and Night of the Living Zombie Bugs. His most recent cartoon collection is Speed Bump: A 25th Anniversary Collection (IDW). His cartoons are also featured on hundreds of greeting cards with NobleWorks, RSVP (including calendars), American Greetings, and Woodmansterne (UK). He has two daughters, Alayna and Simone, and lives with his wife, Chris in Ann Arbor, Michigan. | |
Tammy Coxen | Tammy Coxen is the founder and Chief Tasting Officer of Tammy's Tastings, where she's been sharing her enthusiasm for food and drink for over 15 years. Since 2011 she has been teaching interactive hands-on cocktail classes to individuals, groups, and companies for events ranging from parties to corporate team building. Starting in 2020 she also took those classes online, exploring the history, stories, and mixing techniques behind some of the world’s most famous cocktails. She is the co-author of the cocktail book Cheers to Michigan, co-host of a regular cocktail segment on Michigan Radio (her local NPR affiliate), and has written for Hour Detroit magazine and other publications. She'll be launching the My Tiny Bottles podcast, where she'll explore her grandmother's legacy of miniature liquor bottles, one tiny bottle at a time. |  |
Ellen Craine | Grief and Loss Expert Ellen Craine is a licensed clinical and macro social worker in the State of Michigan, founder of Craine Counseling and Consulting Group, and has over 25 years of experience working with couples, families, groups, and individuals in a variety of capacities. She has been a divorce and family mediator and parenting coordinator, working with high-conflict parents to improve their ability to co-parent more effectively. She is a relationship and life coach and therapist, incorporating the science of success with her social work experience. Ellen is a #1 International Bestselling author of Women Who Dream, Women Who Empower, and Leading with Legacy. All are in the Kate Butler’s Impact Book Series. Ellen writes on the topics of childhood cancer, her breast cancer journey, the loss of her husband to a brain tumor––and how to rise above the challenges presented by life. She is a Co-Associate Producer of the documentary, Authentic Conversations: Deep Talk with the Masters, written, directed, and produced by LA Emmy-nominated Dr. Angela Sadler Williamson. Ellen is a co-coordinating producer on the documentary, Authentic Conversations: Voices Rise in Unity, also written, directed, and produced by LA Emmy-nominated Dr. Angela Sadler Williamson. This is a documentary about social justice and pays tribute to the civil rights icon, Rosa Parks. | |
Liz Crowe | A Kentucky native and graduate of the University of Louisville living in South Carolina, Liz Crowe lived in Ann Arbor for almost 20 years. Many of Liz’s books take place in southeast Michigan, and one in Ann Arbor specifically. She's spent her time as a three-continent expat trailing spouse, mom of three, real estate agent, brewery owner and bar manager, and is currently a digital marketing and fundraising consultant, in addition to being an award-winning author. With stories set in breweries, on the soccer pitch, inside fictional television stations and successful real estate offices, and even in exotic locales like Istanbul, Turkey, her books are compelling and told with a fresh voice. The Liz Crowe backlist has something for any reader seeking complex storylines with humor and complete casts of characters that will delight and linger in the imagination long after the book is finished. | |
Shutta Crum | Shutta Crum is a long-time resident of Ann Arbor who now divides her time between Ann Arbor and St. Augustine, Florida. She served as a public librarian at both the South Lyon Public Library and the Ann Arbor District Library for more than twenty four years and was awarded the Michigan Library Association Award of Merit as the youth librarian of the year in 2002. She is the author of many middle grade novels, picture books, books of poetry, poems, and magazine articles, including THUNDER-BOOMER! an American Library Association and a Smithsonian Magazine “Notable Book” of the year. She’s won four Royal Palm Literary awards, with a gold for her chapbook When You Get Here (Poems for Adults), and she has been nominated for a Pushcart prize. In 2005 Shutta was invited to read at the White House. In 2010 she presented to students in Japan, hosted by the Dept. of Defense Schools. Now she writes the monthly Wordsmith’s Playground newsletter for writers, blogs for the Florida Writers Association, and writes a column on craft for the OPAP magazine (Of Poets & Poetry) for the Florida State Poet’s Association. Her presentations include author talks, lectures, and workshops for writers, teachers, and librarians. | |
Samuel Damren | Samuel Damren is a lifelong Michigan resident, attorney, and author, his legal career spanning over four decades. Damren earned his undergraduate degree at the University of Michigan in cultural anthropology with a minor in music composition and received his Juris Doctor from Wayne State University. He served as a private mediator and arbitrator focused on commercial litigation representing prominent entrepreneurs and companies in Southeastern Michigan. Damren lectured on prosecutorial ethics at the University of Michigan Law School and served pro bono as a hearing panelist on the Michigan Attorney Discipline Board for over twenty years. Since retirement, he has been contributing periodic commentaries on a variety of subjects with a legal bent to the Detroit Legal News and its family of newspapers in Michigan. Damren is the author of the books, What Justice Looks Like and Wintercut. A twenty-fifth anniversary ebook publication of Wintercut has been released. Damren is also the author of numerous articles in law reviews and historical journals discussing the intersection of legal theories and law with other disciplines and landmark legal cases. He and his wife are members of the Henry P. Tappan Society at the University of Michigan and benefactors of the Dziewiatkowski Awards at the Medical and Dental Schools.They are the parents of three children. Upon returning to Ann Arbor in 2018, they now live two miles from the home he grew up in and on the edge of the same forest that he walked through as a boy. | |
Jenna Dawson | As a young mother of two and an Early Childhood Educator, Jenna Dawson has always found play to be the most magical experience persons of all ages can have. She spends much of her days curiously exploring the world with her children, learning and teaching as she goes. | Kindness-Cover.pdf |
Raymond De Young | Raymond De Young is a broadly trained psychologist, planner, and engineer. He is Associate Professor of Environmental Psychology and Planning in the School for Environment and Sustainability at the University of Michigan. He focuses on the process of re-localization, a response to emerging biophysical limits and the consequences of having deeply disrupted the Earth's ecosystems. He applies conservation and environmental psychology to the challenge of helping people envision and adopt behaviors that support an urgent transition to a life lived within local resource limits. Despite what for some people is a dismal forecast, his work is decidedly hopeful. His theoretical and empirical research includes exploring how people pre-familiarize themselves with the coming resource downshift, motivate stewardship, and use nature to restore the mental vitality needed for responding to the lean yet fascinating times ahead. Current projects include examining the psychological foundations of behavioral entrepreneurship and voluntary simplicity, and the benefits embedded in pursuing a low-input agrarian society. | |
Carlina Duan | Carlina Duan is a writer-educator from Michigan, and the author of the poetry collections I Wore My Blackest Hair (Little A, 2017) and Alien Miss (Univ. of Wisconsin Press, 2021). Carlina received her M.F.A. in Poetry from Vanderbilt University. She is currently a Ph.D. Candidate in the University of Michigan’s Joint Program in English and Education and works as the Poetry Editor at Michigan Quarterly Review. Carlina’s poems have appeared in POETRY Magazine, Narrative Magazine, Poets.org, The Rumpus, and other publications. Her writing has been supported with residencies and awards from Tin House, the Academy of American Poets, the U.S. Fulbright Program, Signal Fire Arts, the Hopwood Program, Good Hart Artist Residency, and Willapa Bay AiR. Among many things, she loves river walks, snail mail, and being a sister. | |
Aaron P. Dworkin | Best-selling writer and host of the nationally-broadcast Arts Engines show, Aaron P. Dworkin was President Obama's first appointment to the National Council on the Arts. He is a former dean and current Professor of Arts Leadership & Entrepreneurship at the University of Michigan's School of Music, Theatre & Dance. He is the founder of the Sphinx Organization, with the mission of transforming lives through the power of diversity in the arts. He has collaborated with a breadth of artists including Yo-Yo Ma and Anna Deveare Smith. He has been featured in several publications and received numerous awards including Newsweek's "15 People Who Make America Great” and BET's History Makers in the Making Award. Aaron is a frequent speaker at several universities and conferences and a member of the Recording Academy (GRAMMYs), in addition to serving on the board of multiple art organizations including the Ann Arbor Foundation. He is an avid kayaker, poker player, and boater, having captained multiple crossings of the Gulfstream. He is married to Afa Sadykhly Dworkin, a prominent international arts leader who serves as President and Artistic Director of the Sphinx Organization, and has two awesome sons, Noah Still and Amani Jaise. They reside in Michigan with their two Savannah cats, Mocha and Pekoe, and English Cream Retriever, Rondo. | |
Ashlee Edens | Ashlee Edens has always been a writer; from writing for the teen paper at the Oklahoman to self-publishing two poetry collections since 2017. She is a mother who enjoyed exploring Michigan with her young daughters. She wanted to create the Ann Arbor Adventure series as a way to relive those memories over and over again. Ann Arbor will always have a special place in her heart. | |
Kathrine Edgren | Katherine Edgren's book, Keeping Out the Noise, was published by Kelsay Books in 2022. In addition to her book, The Grain Beneath the Gloss, published by Finishing Line Press, she has two chapbooks: Long Division and Transports. She has appeared in numerous journals including: Coe Review, Moss Piglet, Christian Science Monitor, Birmingham Poetry Review, Peninsula Poets, the Decadent Review, Light, Orchards Poetry Journal, and Barbaric Yawp. She served as a Guest Associate Editor for Third Wednesday, and has a Masters Degree in Social Work from the University of Michigan. Katherine lives in Dexter, Michigan. | |
Ron Eglash | Ron Eglash grew up in California during the 1960s, where a mix of bohemian scientists and social activism inspired his undergraduate studies in cybernetics. Following a masters in systems engineering, he briefly worked in the silicon valley’s chip manufacturing industry, and then returned for a doctorate in the History of Consciousness program at UCSC. Encouraged by his advisor Donna Haraway to “stay in touch with your inner scientist”, Eglash began an investigation of fractal patterns in aerial photos of African villages. A postdoctoral Fulbright in West and Central Africa allowed him a year to conduct ethnographic research, where he documented how indigenous concepts of recursion created fractal patterns throughout African design practices. His book African Fractals: Modern Computing and Indigenous Design became a TED talk with over 1.5 million views; a simulation used in math and computing education; and a broad influence in black studies. Fractals inspired by Eglash’s work now appear in black literature such as Nnedi Okorafor’s Binti; in AfroFuturist arts, and even in contemporary African architecture. His most recent work, “Generative Justice,” develops an alternative economic theory. “Both the political right and political left” Eglash explains “are focused on value extraction: socialism to the state and capitalism to corporations.” His alternative model would keep value in unalienated forms at the grassroots, and circulate it rather than extract it--a process he maintains is already happening with the rise of makerspaces, urban agriculture and the “artisanal economy”. His work in this area examines how digital fabrication, AI and other innovations can be used to nurture and sustain generative justice. | |
Amy Emberling | Amy Emberling has been an avid food lover and baker since her childhood in Nova Scotia, Canada. After high school, she moved to Cambridge, MA, and received her bachelor’s degree from Harvard University. She then followed her passion for food and learned to cook and bake at L’ecole de Gastronomie Francaise at the Ritz Hotel in Paris, France and Michigan restaurants. In 1999 she received her MBA from Columbia University. Amy came to Zingerman’s Bakehouse when it opened in 1992 as one of the original bakers on the staff of eight. She soon became the first manager of the bread bakery, and then the manager of the pastry kitchen. In 2000, Amy became Managing Partner at Zingerman’s Bakehouse. She is the co-author of the cookbook Zingerman’s Bakehouse. As well as teaching at BAKE! Amy presents for ZingTrain on business practices. A few of the Bakehouse items she is personally responsible for developing are the Old School Apple Pie, Buenos Aires Brownies, and our Gingerbread Coffee Cake. In addition to developing items, Amy is a promoter of classic bakery favorites from many cultures and has brought traditional standards to the Bakehouse such as Paris Brest, Hummingbird Cake, and Dobos Torta. Amy lives in Ann Arbor with her husband Geoff, their two grown children, Jake and Ruby, daughter in-law Emily and grandson Miles. |  |
Ann S. Epstein | Ann S. Epstein writes novels, short stories, memoir, craft essays, and book reviews. Her awards include a Pushcart Prize nomination for creative nonfiction, the Walter Sullivan prize in fiction, and an Editors’ Choice selection by Historical Novel Review. Her stories and nonfiction work appeared in over 30 publications. In addition to writing, she has a PhD in developmental psychology and MFA in fiber art. Why “asewovenwords.com” as a domain name? Weaving and writing have much in common. The texture and pattern of cloth are like the formal structure of a story. A fabric’s colors evoke emotion, as does a narrative’s tone. Both deal in images, concrete or abstract. Weaving the many layers of a complex twill is like creating characters with complexity and depth. Facing an empty loom or a blank page, the artist conjures something from nothing and releases it to the world. | |
Sarah Erdreich | Sarah Erdreich was born in Birmingham, Alabama and grew up in Ann Arbor, Michigan. She earned her B.A. in Creative Writing and Literature at the University of Michigan and her M.A. in Publishing at Emerson College. Sarah’s first book, GENERATION ROE: INSIDE THE FUTURE OF THE PRO-CHOICE MOVEMENT, was published by Seven Stories Press in 2013. Her essays about motherhood, reproductive rights, and healthcare have appeared in numerous publications, including Slate, HuffPost, and Romper. Her essay “The Day I Decided to Walk into a Psych Ward” was Slate’s most-popular story for 2022. https://womensmediacenter.com/shesource/expert/sarah-erdreich |  |
| Author | Biography | Book Cover(s) |
