Ross Anderson is a freelance journalist, based in Port Townsend, who focuses his work on Northwest maritime culture, the marine sciences, regional history and geography.  Previously, he worked 30 years at the Seattle Times where, at various times, he served as chief political writer, editorial writer and a political columnist. He has won a number of awards, including a 1990 Pulitzer for his work covering the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill.   More recently, his occasional waterfront columns for the Port Townsend Leader have won several statewide journalism awards.  

Author Mary Buckham is a national speaker who teamed up to create the highly successful Break Into Fiction® Template Teaching Series, which is now out in a book, Break Into Fiction: 11 Steps to Building a Story that Sells. Join Mary as she shows you how to plot a strong story in two-days that will hum with potential.
 
Two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, Jon Franklin, who participated in a two-day Plotting Retreat with Mary, wrote a cover comment for their new book: “These writers know their business and, what¹s more, know how to explain it. Break into Fiction® is solidly grounded in storytelling fundamentals, but then goes much farther into the practical detail that determines whether your book will bring a check or a rejection slip.”

Susan Landgraf’s work has appeared in more than 150 publications. A writer and photographer, Landgraf’s chapbook, Other Voices was published this summer by Finishing Line Press.  Her poems have appeared in Poet Lore, Nimrod, Rattle, The Laurel Review, Third Coast Review, Pikeville Review, Interim, Ploughshares, Cincinnati Poetry Review, and The Aurorean. A former journalist, she taught at Shanghai Jiao Tong University in China in 2002 and 2008 through an exchange program with Highline Community College where she teaches writing, literature, and media classes.

Kathie Meyer is the arts and entertainment editor for Jefferson
County’s highest circulating newspaper, The Leader. She has been writing articles, essays, reviews and columns for 20 years, and her work has appeared in several national and regional publications including Northwest Travel, Open Spaces, Quilter’s Newsletter Magazine, Art Papers and Western American Literature. She believes in the power of negative ions and a good night’s sleep as fuel for the creative mind.

Wendy Chapman has been successfully teaching writing workshop classes to English as Second Language students at Hamilton International Middle School in Seattle since 1993. Her students, in collaboration with 826 Seattle , have had their writing professionally published into four books.  When Wendy’s not teaching, she’s writing, traveling, or dancing.

Margaret D. McGee, a writer, teacher, and leader of spiritual workshops and retreats, is author of Haiku – The Sacred Art: A Spiritual Practice in Three Lines and Sacred Attention: A Spiritual Practice for Finding God in the Moment (both from SkyLight Paths). Her haiku have been published in journals such as The Heron’s Nest, bear creek haiku, and Wisteria. Her website, www.IntheCourtyard.com, hosts a forum to write and share haiku in response to the sacred writings of world religions.

Carol Fischbach has used collage as a tool for personal growth for many years.  She is a Soul Collage™ facilitator with a degree in communications and does freelance writing for local newsletters and publications.  Carol has a corporate background in marketing and public relations as well as being a bead artist.  She has lived in Port Townsend for the past five years and can be reached at dreambead@aol.com.

 

Barbara Sjoholm is an award-winning writer whose travel essays have appeared in The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, Slate, and Smithsonian. She writes frequently about Scandinavia and the North Atlantic and is the author of The Pirate Queen about her travels from Ireland to Iceland and The Palace of the Snow Queen: Winter Travels in Lapland . She has taught at Field’s End, Hugo House, and the Port Townsend Writers’ Conference. www.barbarasjoholm.com

                         Terry Persun has published four novels, two poetry collections, and six poetry chapbooks. His short stories and poems have appeared in such magazines as the Wisconsin Review, Kansas Quarterly, Pendragon, Hiram Poetry Review, Late Knocking, Oracle and many others. His technical articles have been published in dozens of business-to-business trade magazines. He owns and operates an advertising and PR business from his home in Chimacum, WA.