Photo of a white woman with freckles and brown hair in front of a floor to ceiling bookshelf.

Founder and Executive Director at Sundress Publications and the Sundress Academy for the Arts; Founding Editor & Consulting Editor of the Best of the Net Anthology and Stirring: A Literary Collection; President of the Board of Directors

Erin Elizabeth Smith (she/her) is the Executive Director of Sundress Publications and the Sundress Academy for the Arts and a 2023 Academy of American Poets Laureate Fellow. She is the author of three full-length collections of poetry, most recently DOWN (SFASU 2020), and the founder of the Best of the Net Anthology. Her work has appeared in The Kenyon Review, Guernica, Ecotone, Crab Orchard, and Mid-American, among others. Smith is a Teaching Professor in the English Department at the University of Tennessee.

Mirror selfie of a tattooed, bespectacled blonde woman in a teal dress with white polka dots.

Managing Editor of Sundress Publications; Treasurer of the Board of Directors; Managing Editor of Doubleback Review

Krista Cox is a poet, activist, and freelancer, and currently pursuing a master’s degree in Clinical Mental Health Counseling. She’s Managing Editor of Doubleback Review, Managing Editor at Sundress Publications, and an Associate Poetry Editor at Stirring: A Literary Collection, as well as on the Board of Directors of Sundress Academy for the Arts. Her poetry has appeared in Columbia Journal, South Dakota Review, Salt Hill Journal, and elsewhere. On the web at www.kristacox.com.
A biracial Asian person sits in front of a teal wall. They have short dark brown hair and are wearing a bumblebee necklace over a black sleeveless turtleneck. They are smiling. 

Staff Director at Sundress Publications

Kanika Lawton is a writer, editor, film scholar, and PhD candidate at the University of Toronto’s Cinema Studies Institute and the Mark S. Bonham Centre for Sexual Diversity Studies. Their research is supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council and they have previously received support from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation’s Sawyer Seminars and the Queer and Trans Research Lab. They are also the recipient of the David Rayside Graduate Award and the Atom Egoyan Cinema Studies Scholarship. Their scholarly work has been published in Spectator and Media Fields. A multiple Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominee in poetry, they have received fellowships from Pink Door, BOAAT Writer’s Retreat, and the Sundress Academy for the Arts and have been published in Vagabond City Literary Journal, Longleaf Review, Glass: A Journal of Poetry, Cosmonauts Avenue, and Parentheses Journal, among others. They are the author of four micro-chapbooks, most recently Theories on Wreckage (Ghost City Press, 2020). Born and raised in Vancouver, British Columbia, they now live in Toronto.

Portrait-oriented selfie of Ashley Elizabeth smirking and wearing a coral pink shirt in 3/4th profile, her long, coiled, dark brown hair over a shoulder and taking up the majority of the background, Her chin rests on her hand.

Chapbook Series Editor at Sundress Publications

Ashley Elizabeth (she/her) is a Pushcart-nominated writer and winner of the 2024 Garden Party Collective Chapbook Contest. Individual poems and essays have appeared in SWWIM, The Hellebore, Rigorous, and Sage Cigarettes, among others. Ashley is the author of A Family Thing (Redacted Books/ELJ Editions, 2024) and chapbooks red line (Garden Party Collective, 2024),  CHARM(ed) (fifth wheel press, 2024), black has every right to be angry (Alternating Current, 2023), and you were supposed to be a friend (Nightingale & Sparrow, 2020). When she isn’t teaching, reading, or working on her next few writing adventures, Ashley works as Chapbook Editor at Sundress Publications and Workshop Coordinator for fifth wheel press. She lives on the original land of the Piscataway (Baltimore, MD) with her partner and their cats.

Acquisitions Editor at Sundress Publications; Associate Poetry Editor at Sundress Publications

Tierney Bailey is a loudmouth, a Libra, a lover of science fiction and poetry, and a dice-collecting gremlin. Currently, Tierney is the Acquisitions Editor and an Associate Poetry Editor with Sundress Publications, a copyeditor at Strange Horizons,, slush reader for PodCastle, Publishing Assistant with Escape Artists Inc., and a freelancer. She has earned a Masters Degree in Writing, Literature, and Publishing from Emerson College. Tierney is most easily found screaming into the void on Twitter as @ergotierney.

Danielle Hanson

Marketing Director at Sundress Publications; Assistant Editor at Sundress Publications; Poetry Editor of Craft Chaps; Managing Editor of Doubleback Books

Danielle Hanson is author of The Night Is What It Eats, (Elixir Press Prize), Fraying Edge of Sky (Codhill Press Poetry Prize), and Ambushing Water (Finalist, Georgia Author of the Year), and editor of Objects in This Mirror (Press 53) and a book of literary criticism. She is Marketing Director for Sundress Publications and the inaugural Poet Laureate of Costa Mesa, CA. She teaches poetry at UC Irvine.

an author photo for Samantha Edmonds, which shows her leaning against a brick wall and smiling in a green dress.

Associate Prose Editor at Sundress Publications

Dr. Samantha Edmonds is the author of the story collection A Preponderance of Starry Beings as well as the chapbooks Pretty to Think So and The Space Poet. Her works appears in The New York Times, Fourth Genre, Ninth Letter, Michigan Quarterly Review, Mississippi Review, Creative Nonfiction, and McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, among others. In addition to serving as the Prose Editor for Sundress Publications, she’s an Assistant Professor in the creative writing program at Berry College and lives in Rome, Georgia.

Associate Poetry Editor at Sundress Publications

Sherrel McLafferty is a first-year doctoral student with Rhetoric and Writing Studies at Bowling Green State University, where she also received her BFA and MFA in Poetry. Her poems have been featured in Requited Journal, Merrimack Review, ArLiJo, and Notre Dame Review. She is currently a poetry editor for Pidgeonholes, Linden Avenue Literary Journal, and Split Lip Magazine.

Rita Mookerjee

Vice President of the Board of Directors; Associate Poetry Editor at Sundress Publications; Nonfiction Editor of Craft Chaps

Rita Mookerjee is an Assistant Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies at Worcester State University. Her research has been funded by the Fulbright Foundation and the National Endowment for the Humanities. She is the winner of the 2023 Steel Toe Books Poetry Award and the author of False Offering (JackLeg Press). A co-founder of Honey Literary, she serves as the Poetry Editor of Split Lip Magazine. Her poems can be found in CALYX, Copper Nickel, Passages North, Poet Lore, and the Offing.

Alexa White

Member of the Board of Directors; Associate Poetry Editor at Sundress Publications; Creative Director at the Sundress Academy for the Arts

Alexa White is a mixed-race, neurodivergent writer and graduate of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, where she earned her BA in creative writing and studio art. While attending, she won the 2022 Bain-Swiggett prize for traditional poetry forms and her poetry and art has appeared in The Phoenix, the school’s literary and arts magazine. Alexa lives in Knoxville, her semi-hometown, and is the Grants Manager at Sundress Academy for the Arts. She takes delight in backroads, quarries, and the last few seconds of sunset and redefines her bedtime nightly.

A photo-portrait of Ada Wofford with a star and moon patterned backdrop.

Associate Poetry Editor at Sundress Publications

By all accounts Ada Wofford is a witch, that’s according to an NPR poll surveying their neighbors (it was never aired due to runtime). They’ve earned advanced degrees in Literature and Library Magic from Rochester and Wisconsin respectively, though they refuse to rest on such pedestrian laurels. They catalog rare books and the such at Between the Covers Rare Books; they are an associate poetry editor at Sundress Publications and the non-fiction editor at Stirring: A Literary Collection. Their writing has appeared in several places such as Autostraddle, The Blue Nib, and McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, and their chapbook, I Remember Learning How to Dive, was published in 2020, a selection of which earned them a Pushcart Prize nomination. Lastly, some people say that they’re the one who actually wrote the YA novel Loops of Willow available at Losgann Press. When away from their books, Ada can be found divining bottle caps and tending to their paper garden.

Sarah Harshbarger

Associate Prose Editor at Sundress Publications

Sarah Harshbarger is a recent graduate of the PhD program at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, where she served as the Managing Editor of Grist. Her work has appeared in Hayden’s Ferry Review, Passages North, The Sewanee Review, and elsewhere.
Dr. Kelsey L. Smoot (Kelz) is a Black transmasculine person with locs, wearing a maroon hat, a white button-down shirt with a dark orange tie. He is smiling, with his hands tucked into his pockets, standing in front of a multicolored art installation with dangling fixtures above his head.

Assistant Managing Editor

Dr. Kelsey L. Smoot (they/he/Kelz) is a gender theorist, an elective Southerner, a writer, and a poet. Their autoethnographic style has become the lens through which they understand and reflect on their experience navigating the US sociopolitical landscape. They are the winner of the 2021 Sad Girls Club Spring Literary Contest, the 2023 The Good Life Review Honeybee Prize, and the Grand Prize Winner of the 2024 Button Poetry Video Contest. He is a Tin House Workshop alum, a Pushcart Prize nominee, a Best of the Net nominee,  and a Best New Poets nominee. Proudly, Kelz is the author of two chapbooks: we was bois together with CLASH! (An Imprint of Mouthfeel Press) and Muse, with Another New Calligraphy. Thrillingly, Kelz’s debut full-length collection of poems, SOULMATE AS A VERB arrives in early 2026 with DOPAMINE/Semiotext(e).
Livia is a white woman with dark brown hair. She is wearing comfortable walking clothes and is standing in front of fishing boats, a small rock wall, and Mount Vesuvius.

Sundress Reads Editor; Assistant Chapbook Editor

Livia Meneghin (she/her) is the author of two chapbooks: feathering and  Honey in My Hair. She is also the Assistant Chapbook Editor and Reads Editor for Sundress Publications. Livia has been awarded recognition from The Academy of American Poets, Breakwater Review, The Room Magazine, the Writers’ Room of Boston, the City of Boston, and elsewhere. Her writing has found homes in Colorado Review, CV2, Gasher, The Journal, Osmosis, and Thrush, among others. Since earning her MFA in Poetry, she teaches writing and literature at the collegiate level. She is a cancer survivor.
Jillian A. Fantin

Assistant Acquisitions Editor

Jillian A. Fantin is a contemporary court jester with roots in the American South and north central England. They are the vessel for transmission of the full-length, hybrid poetry-play THE DOUGHNUT WORLD (fifth wheel press, 2024) and the author of the prose poetry micro-chapbook A Playdough Symposium (Ghost City Press, 2023). With writer Joy Wilkoff, Jillian co-founded and edits RENESME LITERARY, a shortform Twilight-inspired online arts journal. They also serve as the Managing Editor for Sundress Publications’ Best of The Net Anthology and a blog curator for Querencia Press. Connect with Jillian on Twitter (@jilly_stardust) or Instagram (@jillystardust).
white-skinned, dark-haired person smiling. They are wearing a black tank top and silver chain necklace. In the background is a bookshelf.

Assistant Staff Director at Sundress Publications

Isabeau J. Belisle Dempsey (they/them) is a history book co-author, amateur poet, freelance copyeditor, and generally just along for the ride. They hold a BA in International Studies & Spanish, an MA in English Literature & Publishing, and hope to pursue a PhD studying the cultural origins of literary genres. Born and based in Chicago, you can find Isabeau in their local bookstore surreptitiously fixing the shelves—they were once a bookseller and never quite broke the habit.

Lee Anderson

Assistant Editor at Sundress Publications; Assistant Editor at Best of the Net

Lee Anderson is a trans writer with an MFA from Northern Arizona University. Their award-nominated work is published in the Best American Food and Travel Writing 2025 anthology and can otherwise be found in places like Brevity, Salt Hill Journal, and The Rumpus. They are the Managing Editor of Half Mystic Journal and currently live in Chicago with their partner and a cat named Pretzel.

Evelyn stands on a bridge in a public park. She is wearing a green headband and large cloth earrings shaped like strawberries. She is looking off to the left of the camera.

Member of the Board of Directors; Co-Coordinator of Poets in Pajamas

Evelyn Berry (she/her) is the trans, Southern author of Grief Slut (Sundress Publications, 2024) and the chapbook Buggery (Bateau Press, 2020). Her chapbook T4T is forthcoming from Small Harbor Publishing in 2026. She is the recipient of the National Endowment for the Arts Poetry Fellowship and South Carolina Arts Commission Individual Artist Fellowship for Poetry. She is the winner of the BOOM Chapbook Prize, Button Poetry Short Form Contest, Dr. Linda Veldheer Memorial Prize, KAKALAK Poetry Prize, Emrys Poetry Prize, Broad River Prize for Prose, and other honors. She lives in Columbia, SC with her spouse and their pets.
Brendon Blair

Assistant Editor at Sundress Publications

Brendon Blair is a southeastern Appalachia-born writer and editor raised on trailer living and warm Mexican cuisine. With an unhealthy obsession for the disgusting, Brendon weaves the lives of fostered people and wards of the state into poetry and prose. Their work has appeared in Querencia Press and DOGTEETH lit. They live in Nashville, Tennessee, with their partner Shems-Eddine and their two cats, Maple Syrup and Mimikyu.
A black and white photo of a non-binary person with dark hair and dark eyes, looking up, framed by a brick wall in the background and the night sky.

Member of the Board of Directors; Assistant Editor at Sundress Publications; Editor-in-Chief of beestung

Sarah Clark is a mad crip genderfuck two-spirit enrolled Nanticoke editor, writer, and cultural consultant. They are Editor-in-Chief of beestung, Editor-in-Chief and Poetry Editor at ANMLY, Editor-in-Chief at ALOCASIA: a journal of queer plant-based writing, Co-Editor of the Bettering American Poetry series, a former reader at The Atlas Review, and a current Board member and Assistant Editor at Sundress Publications. They have edited folios for publications including the GLITTERBRAIN folio and a folio on Indigenous & Decolonial Futures & Futurisms at ANMLY, folios on Sound Art, “Desire & Interaction,” and a collection of global Indigenous art and literature, First Peoples, Plural at Drunken Boat. They were co-editor of the folio at Apogee Journal, #NoDAPL #Still Here folio, and their series WE OUTLAST EMPIRE and Place[meant]. Sarah is a former Executive Board member at VIDA and former Editor-in-Chief of VIDA Review, where they curated a series of essays by writers outside of the binary, Body of a Poem and the interview series, Voices of Bettering American Poetry. Sarah freelances, and has worked with a number of literary and arts publications and organizations, including the Best of the Net anthology, contemptorary, Curious Specimens, #PoetsResist at Glass Poetry, Apogee Journal, Blackbird, the Paris Review, and elsewhere.

A headshot of Darren C. Demaree smiling in a park during fall with a black t-shirt on that reads "Love Will".

Assistant Editor at Sundress Publications; Co-Editor-in-Chief of Best of the Net; Member of the Board of Directors

Darren C. Demaree is the author of twenty poetry collections, most recently Tongues Out in the Garden of Spectacle (Newcomer Press, 2023).  He is the recipient of a Greater Columbus Arts Council Grant, an Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Award, the Louise Bogan Award from Trio House Press, and the Nancy Dew Taylor Award from Emrys Journal.  He is the Editor-in-Chief of the Best of the Net Anthology and the Managing Editor of Ovenbird Poetry.  He is currently living in Columbus, Ohio with his wife and children.

Tattooed middle-aged white woman with strawberry blonde hair and fair skin smiling while wearing a navy blue sleeveless dress, holding a tubby grey pitbull, and sitting on a couch.

Assistant Editor at Sundress Publications

Dr. Stevie Edwards is an Assistant Professor at Clemson University and Poetry Editor of The South Carolina Review. Stevie’s poems have appeared in Poetry, American Poetry Review, TriQuarterly, The Southern Review, and elsewhere. She is the author of Quiet Armor (Northwestern University Press, 2023), Sadness Workshop (Button Poetry, 2018), Humanly (Small Doggies Press, 2015), and Good Grief (Write Bloody Publishing, 2012). She holds a PhD from the University of North Texas and an MFA from Cornell University. Originally a Michigander, she now lives in South Carolina with her spouse and a small herd of rescue pitbulls.

Assistant Editor at Sundress Publications

Kathleen Gullion is a writer whose work has appeared in The Boiler, X-R-A-Y Magazine, and Coachella Review, and onstage at various theaters in Chicago. She holds a Master of Fine Arts from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She is based in Houston, where she works in medical simulation.

Ashley Hajimirsadeghi

Assistant Editor at Sundress Publications

Ashley Hajimirsadeghi is an Iranian American multimedia artist, journalist, and writer from Baltimore, Maryland. She is the recipient of awards and support from the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa, the Fulbright Program, U.S. State Department, University of Arizona, and Brooklyn Poets. Her creative poems, essays, and fiction have appeared in Passages North, Salt Hill, Salamander, and The Journal, among others. She is the author of the chapbooks cartography of trauma (dancing girl press) and cinephile (Ghost City Press). Previously, she was a film & television critic at MovieWeb. Find her at www.ashleyhajimirsadeghi.com / Instagram: @nassarine

Photo of Angel Leyba, a non-binary person wearing a lavender scarf tied over their head into a bow under their chin and a dark brown puffer coat.

Assistant Editor at Sundress Publications

Angel Leyba is a writer and creative from South Bay San Diego living in Oakland. They are the Social Media Director at Honey Literary and a former Managing Editor at Berkeley Poetry Review. Their words have appeared or are forthcoming in Dialogist, Mercury Firs, Dadakuku, The B’k, Honey Literary, Perhappened Mag, and elsewhere. Find them on instagram @_slutstation2 or twitter @xspacebar

Assistant Editor at Sundress Publications

Brynn Martin is a Kansas native living in Knoxville, where she received her MFA in poetry from the University of Tennessee. She co-hosts Shitty First Drafts, a podcast made for and by writers. Her poetry has appeared in Contrary Magazine, Yes, Poetry, Rogue Agent, and Crab Orchard Review.

Assistant Editor at Sundress Publications

Elisha Mykelti (she/her/hers) is dedicated to musical, dialectical, and innovative poetry that honors time and place, especially the South. Elisha is a 2nd-grade associate teacher and holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in English, with a concentration in Creative Writing from the University of Tennessee. She has been published in Berkeley Poetry Review (Issue 51), and she has hosted “Writin’ Rhythm – A Writers Workshop” for Sundress Publications. She has also been a guest speaker for two poetry writing courses at the University of Tennessee.

Assistant Poetry Editor at Sundress Publications

Saba Syed Razvi is the author of the collections In the Crocodile Gardens and heliophobia, as well as the chapbooks Limerence & Lux, Of the Divining and the Dead, and Beside the Muezzin’s Call & Beyond the Harem’s Veil. Her poems have appeared in journals such as The Offending Adam, Diner, TheTHE Poetry Blog’s Infoxicated Corner, The Homestead Review, NonBinary Review, 10×3 plus, 13th Warrior Review, The Arbor Vitae Review, and Arsenic Lobster, and others, as well as in anthologies such as Carrying the Branch: Poets in Search of Peace (forthcoming), Voices of Resistance: Muslim Women on War Faith and Sexuality, The Loudest Voice Anthology, The Liddell Book of Poetry, Political Punch: Contemporary Poems on the Politics of Identity, The Rhysling Anthology, and Dreamspinning. Her works have been nominated for the 2017 Elgin Award, the Bettering American Poetry Awards, The Best of the Net Award, and the Rhysling Award, have appeared on the 2018 Stoker Award’s preliminary ballot and have received a 2015 Independent Best American Poetry Award. She earned her PhD in Literature & Creative Writing from the University of Southern California in 2012. She is currently working as an Assistant Professor of English and Creative Writing at the University of Houston in Victoria, TX, where in addition to working on scholarly research on interfaces between science and contemporary poetry, she is researching Sufi poetry in translation, writing new poems and fiction, and developing community based-programs to highlight poetry and contemporary literature in the Crossroads region of Texas.

Photo of a south asian woman, Maya, in her room smiling . She is wearing a light pink turtleneck with purple flowers and gold hoop earrings.

Member of the Reader Board

Maya Chandrakasan is a senior at Tufts University studying English and Race, Colonialism and Diaspora studies with a concentration in anti-colonial literatures. She is also an editor of Future Histories literary magazine at Tufts. In her free time she enjoys meditation, ceramics, learning languages, and hanging out with her cat Tatiana.

A black person sitting in front of a field of tulips, smiling widely. They have an afro and wear mint-colored glasses with a navy sweater and gray jeans.

Member of Reader Board

Whitney Cooper holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Eastern Kentucky University, where they served as editor-in-chief of Jelly Bucket, the graduate literary journal run by the university. They also work as a reader for Atlanta Review. A clerical error was made while earning their bachelor’s degree, and they have been passionate about poetry ever since. Their poetry appears in Glassworks Magazine, Stillpoint Literary Magazine, Calliope, Right Hand Pointing, and SHARK REEF. They live in Metro Atlanta with their partner, cat, and miniature schnauzer mix.

Close-up of femme-ish presenting middle-aged woman with asymmetrical, short dark hair, nose piercings, and intense eyebrows in front of hanging plant. She is smiling slightly.

Member of the Reader Board

Beth Couture is the Director of the Counseling Center at University of the Arts in Philadelphia, PA. Her clinical interests include grief and loss, LGBTQIA+ concerns, neurodivergence, existential issues, transitions, and creative concerns. Before working at UArts, she worked in community mental health and with adults with autism. Beth is also a fiction writer. Her novella Women Born with Fur was published by Jaded Ibis Press in 2014, and she has stories in Gargoyle, Drunken Boat, The Yalobusha Review, and other print and online journals. She is currently under supervision for her PTR (Poetry Therapy Registration).

a brown skinned woman with chin length hair stands in front of an indigo colored wall. She is framed in photo from the chest up, smiling for a selfie.

Assistant Executive Director at the Sundress Academy for the Arts; Member of the Reader Board; Assistant Editor at Best of the Net

Sierra Farrare is a short fiction writer from Baltimore, Maryland. In addition to a limited self-published run of her collection, Friday Night Hand Grenade, you can also find her work featured in Pretty Owl Poetry and University of Baltimore’s Welter. You can find her online at sierrafarrare.com.

A headshot of Adriana Rambay Fernandez with long brown hair, dark eyes, and a solemn expression, wearing hoop earrings and a red wrap, set against the backdrop of blue sky, clouds, sand and ocean.

Member of the Reader Board

Adriana Rambay Fernández is a writer, poet, and artist currently living in Virginia. She holds an MFA from the Bennington Writing Seminars where she was a recipient of the MFA Fiction Prize. She was also a Writers of Immigration and Diaspora Fellow for Jack Jones Literary Arts. Her writing has appeared in the American Literary Review, Hennepin Review, Four Way Review, and elsewhere. Born in New Jersey to Dominican immigrants, her writing explores the nature of absence, loss, and intergenerational wounds. Adriana is currently at work on a collection of short stories and a collection of poetry.

Black and White photo of Em Fullenwider taken by photographer Elysia Perkins

Member of the Reader Board

Em Fullenwider (she/they) is a queer writer/poet born and raised in Texas who received an MFA in poetry from Texas State University. You can find her work in Reverie Magazine. She is currently working on a full-length poetry collection. You can catch them making coffee and crafts or listening to good tunes in their free time.

A black-and-white photo of Ghazal, wearing glasses and looking to the left with a thoughtful, pensive expression. Her hand is curled and her first knuckle is just touching her mouth.

Member of the Reader Board

Ghazal Faridi Haftkhani (she/they) is a Queer Iranian poet, activist for the Woman, Life, Freedom movement, and psychology student. Her work–inspired by her studies, Persian culture, and absurdism–has appeared in multiple publications such as  University of Louisville’s Miracle Monocle Review and Beyond Words Literary Magazine‘s Once in a Lifetime anthology. She was a Markham Talent’s acting category finalist and has been a featured reader at events all across Toronto. They also founded a new literary series called ‘poe-a-tea’ and an upcoming initiative named Baaft to provide a platform for suppressed Iranian artists. You can find her decomposing at Toronto Metropolitan University’s library or posting and lurking on Instagram: @cherry_vvine.

A light-skinned person with shoulder-length, straight, dark brown hair, facial piercings, and tattoos is wearing a partially sheer, floor-length black dress, black boots, and an assortment of jewelry. They are sitting on a patch of grass in the sand with their chin tilted up, their knees drawn up to their chest, and their arms crossed over their knees. A thicket of trees is on the horizon behind them.

Member of the Reader Board

Kyla-Yến Huỳnh Giffin (they/them) is a queer and trans, biracial, Vietnamese American diaspora writer whose work revolves around themes of dreaming, fantasizing, and futurizing, and focuses on topics of diaspora, transness, ecology, colonialism, capitalism, and intergenerational histories. Originally from the Bay Area, CA, they now live in Cambridge, MA. Kyla-Yến’s work has appeared in The Offing, GASHER Journal, For Page & Screen Magazine, Beyond Queer Words, and more. They are a Fiction Reader for Okay Donkey and have been awarded residencies and/or fellowships from the Sundress Academy for the Arts (SAFTA), Collections of Transience, The Hundredth Hill, and Abode Press. You can visit Kyla-Yến’s author page at www.kylayenhuynhgiffin.com, and find them on Instagram @yenshrine.

Member of the Reader Board; Assistant Editor at Best of the Net

Jen Gayda Gupta is a poet, educator, and wanderer who spent the last two years traveling across the country in a tiny camper with her spouse and their dog. She recently traded in her nomadic life for a home without wheels in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Jen’s work has been published in Up the Staircase, Rattle, Whale Road Review, Ballast, The Shore and others. She is an assistant editor at Best of the Net, and works as a reader for Sundress Publications and The Maine Review. You can find her in the woods or @jengaydagupta and jengaydagupta.com.

A Polaroid of Annalisa, a person with short dark brown hair, wearing a blue gingham shirt reading a book outside, smiling.

Member of the Reader Board

Annalisa Hansford’s poetry appears in The West Review, The Lumiere Review, Heavy Feather Review and has received honors from Academy of American Poets and 1455 Literary Arts. They studied poetry with Gabrielle Calvocoressi at the 2024 Kenyon Review Writers Workshop.
Close up photo of a blonde haired woman with tattoos in a black dress.

Member of the Reader Board

Layla Lenhardt (she/they) is a poet with ties to Pennsylvania, but currently living in Indianapolis. She is the author of the full-lenght poetry collection Mother Tongue (Mainstreet Rag 2023). She is the Editor-in-Chief of the (on hiatus) national literary Journal 1932 Quarterly. She was a writer in residence at Sundress’s Firefly Farms in 2022, a judge for the 25th Annual Poetry Super Highway Contest, as well as a Pushcart and Best of the Net nominee. Layla works as a gallery curator and lives with her two cats, Beauregard and Giovanni.
Ariadne Alexis Macquarie reads from a selection of her poems at an open mic event.

Member of the Reader Board

Ariadne Alexis Macquarie (she/they) is an MFA student in Poetry at the University of Kentucky. She is originally from Western North Carolina, but in a past life, she worked as a Wildlife Conservationist in Northern Arizona. Her work focuses on queer and trans narratives within the broader context of life in Southern Appalachia. She is the editor-in-chief of On Gaia Literary Magazine and a poetry reader for the New Limestone Review. She can be found rock climbing, staring off into space, ultralight backpacking, or drinking frightening amounts of espresso. Her poetry can be found in YNST Magazine, The Bitchin’ Kitsch, BRAWL, Loblolly Press, and elsewhere.

Megan sits in front of a paneled wall, tilting her head to the side and smiling at the camera.

Member of the Reader Board

Megan McDonald (she/her) is a current Creative Writing student, a writer, musician, and aspiring screenwriter. She has two cats—Moonie and Midnight—and in her free time, she enjoys reading, watching her favorite dramas while eating her favorite foods, and crocheting. Her dream is to move to Los Angeles after receiving her BA to pursue her career aspirations in TV/film, music, and publishing. You can typically find her in her room writing, reading, or indulging in her all time favorite tv series, Grey’s Anatomy.

An outdoor headshot of Sienna Morgan, a woman with short curly hair, wearing black glasses and a white shirt, smiling.

Member of the Reader Board

Sienna Morgan is a literary artist born, living, and writing in Rocky Mount, North Carolina. Currently a Reader Board Member for Sundress Publications, she is a 2025 Periplus Fellow. She was an emerging poet mentee in The North Carolina Poetry Society’s 2024 Gilbert-Chappell Distinguished Poet Series. She is a 2022-23 recipient of a Pitt County Arts Council at Emerge, Artist Support Grant. She is the author of the poetry chapbook, Palmade Poiēmas: For This Is My Handiwork (self-published, 2023). She was the 2022 Sims Library of Poetry Bookmark Design Contest Winner. In 2021, she served as a guest judge for the Colorism Healing Writing Contest. Her poems, short stories, and essays are published or are planned to be published by Colorism Healing, The Black Light Project, Black Oak Society Magazine, Midnight & Indigo, The Arrow: A Journal of Wakeful Society, Culture & Politics, The North Carolina Poetry Society, and more.

Headshot of Dorie Palmer. They are smiling in front of a lake.

Member of the Reader Board

Dorie Palmer (they/them) is a lifelong reader and has been editing since 2015 with a B.A. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in English Literature and Philosophy. They were born and raised in Wisconsin and currently live in the Washington DC area. In their free time, Dorie loves to analyze obscure media and play Sudoku.

a headshot of Neha Peri. She is standing against a brown deck with trees and grass in the background

Member of the Reader Board

Neha Peri holds a BA in English from Rutgers University. While at Rutgers, she also tutored for the Rutgers Writing Program and completed internships with the Rutgers English Department and the University of Mississippi Press. Her work has been featured in The Anthologist. Currently, she works in academic publishing. In her spare time, she enjoys running, writing, concert-going, reading, and photography.

A black-and-white photo of Binx, a brunette, looking into the camera, one arm resting over their head. Photo credit to to Mary Stathos, 2023.

Member of the Reader Board

Binx River Perino is a genderqueer poet from Texas with an MFA in Creative Writing from Emerson College. A frequent guest reader and assistant editor with various literary journals, their work has appeared in Humana Obscura, Tyger Quarterly, Hooligan, Door is a Jar, and elsewhere. Based in Chicago, they serve on the Board of Readers with Sundress Publications and as the Editor-in-Chief of The Pill Magazine.

A white woman in a black dress and glasses looking at the camera.

Member of the Reader Board; Assistant Editor at Best of the Net

Robin LaMer Rahija is originally from Kansas City but has lived in Kentucky for over a decade. She received her MFA from the University of Kentucky, where she is currently the Department Manager Associate in the Department of English. In 2010, she co-founded and edited Rabbit Catastrophe Press, a handbound, feminist, book arts micropress, which closed in 2020. In 2015, she co-founded Workhorse Writers Collective, a publishing and education platform for poets outside of academia. Her poems have appeared in Puerto Del Sol, FENCE, Guernica, and elsewhere. Inside Out Egg, her first full-length book, will be published by Variant Lit in 2024.

Delaney S. Saul smiles at the camera. She has straight brown hair, blue eyes, and long bangs that brush her eyebrows. She wears a mottled purple top, a gold necklace, and a ruched silk headdress. Her earrings are little burning houses.

Member of the Reader Board

Delaney S. Saul is a writer, editor, and lover of the Pacific Northwest. She is the Associate Editor of the young adult literary journal Voyage YA by Uncharted and a reader for Sundress Publications. She holds an MFA in fiction writing from the Stonecoast MFA Program and is the former Editor-in-Chief of the print literary journal Stonecoast Review. She has done additional work for other publications including Reductress, Carve, and Earshot Press. Her fiction has been featured in Gone Lawn, The Molotov Cocktail, Fast Flesh, and Barrelhouse, among others. Delaney lives in Washington State with her husband and their three-legged dog, Patricia Arquette.
Heather Takenaga smiling and reading a book in the shade.

Member of the Reader Board

Heather Takenaga is a poet and writer born and raised in Riverside, CA. She is currently writing short stories and poetry. When she is not volunteering, she is drooling for cat cuddles, moonlit walks, and a reading vacation.
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Member of the Reader Board

Iris Yu is from Cleveland, Ohio. Her work can be found in GASHER Journal, Sine Theta Magazine, and HAD, among others. She is currently an undergraduate at Columbia University. Recently, she has been pickling many watermelon rinds.

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Staff Director at Sundress Academy for the Arts

Rachel Mekdeci (she/her) is a foul-mouthed, mixed-race, Caribbean-immigrant Taurus with a bleeding heart passionate for the arts. As an undergraduate Literature student at the University of Tennessee, she takes every opportunity to write about queer literature and intersectional feminism. Her number one mission in life is to further the reach of the arts and maybe own a house?

A light-brown skinned woman is wearing a black, faux-leather off the shoulder dress with matching circular gold earrings and a choker necklace. Her locs are styled in an up-do and she is smiling directly into the camera wearing glasses with a black and white frame and a full face of makeup including light pink lipstick.

Literary Arts Director at Sundress Academy for the Arts

Denise R. Ervin is a creative writer hewn from the streets, classrooms, and boardrooms of Detroit. She has spent two decades as a teaching artist, performing poetry around the country, and leading workshops for the likes of Midnight & Indigo and University of Michigan. Her work has been published or is forthcoming in Vagabond City Lit, Harbinger Asylum, Third Wednesday Magazine, and others. She is a Graduate Fellow for The Watering Hole and a semifinalist for America’s Next Great Author. When she’s not serving as a Program Manager for a local youth writing organization, Denise is working on several novel projects and her first full-length poetry manuscript, tentatively titled Palimpsest.

Image is a headshot of Bleah Patterson looking directly at the camera.

Development Director at Sundress Academy for the Arts

Bleah Patterson is a queer, southern poet from Texas. Much of her work explores the contention between identity and home and has been featured or is forthcoming in various journals including Electric Literature, Pinch, Grist, The Laurel Review, Phoebe Literature, The Rumpus, and Taco Bell Quarterly.

Photograph of Caroline Webster standing in front of a brick building

Lead Grant Writer at Sundress Academy for the Arts

Caroline Webster lives and works in Raleigh, NC. She is a graduate of Davidson College, where she earned a BA in English and Classical Studies and wrote a lot of poems about slugs. She likes to sing and watch squirrels from her back porch.

Cavar, a genderless white person with short, dark-blonde hair, glasses, and several visible facial piercings, smiles at the camera. They are wearing an orange shirt beneath a green, black, and white patterned jacket, and are standing in a thicket of deep green leaves.

Fall 2025 Writer in Residence at Sundress Academy for the Arts

[sarah] Cavar is the author of Failure to Comply (featherproof books, 2024) and Differential Diagnosis (Northwestern University Press, 2026). They edit manywor(l)ds.place and have had work featured in Electric Lit, The Rumpus, Split Lip Magazine,The Offing, and elsewhere. Cavar holds a PhD in Cultural Studies from the University of California: Davis, and can be found online at www.cavar.club, @cavar on bluesky, and at librarycard.beehiiv.com.

Chief of Operations at Firefly Farms

Raised in Oak Ridge, TN, Joseph Minarick received his Bachelor of Science in Political Science from Excelsior College in Albany, New York. He enlisted in the Army in 1999 and commissioned as an Armor Officer in 2004. He is currently the Plans Officer for the 278th Armored Cavalry Regiment, headquartered in Knoxville. Minarick’s interests in Appalachian history and sustainable development led him to co-found Firefly Farms with Dr. Erin Elizabeth Smith in 2012.

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Co-Editor in Cheif at Best of the Net Anthology

Shipra Agarwal is a doctor-turned-writer from India, pursuing an MFA in fiction from Arizona State University, where she is the recipient of the Glendon and Kathryn Swarthout Award in Writing. Her work exploring the weaponization of shame in collectivist cultures has been published in Witness Magazine and The Rumpus, nominated for the PEN/Robert J. Dau Prize and the Pushcart Prize, shortlisted for the First Pages Prize and the Iron Horse Long Story Prize, and supported by a Tin House Summer Workshop scholarship, the Kenyon Review Writers Workshop, a residency at the Sundress Academy for the Arts, an Anaphora Arts scholarship, and a fellowship at the Authentic Voices Program. Shipra is working on a novel-in-stories.
Black-and-white headshot of Clayton Bradshaw-Mittal with a short beard and short hair from the shoulders up smiling in a suit with no tie.

Managing Editor at Best of the Net Anthology

Clayton Bradshaw-Mittal (they/them) writes queer, working-class stories, essays, and poems. Winner of the Plaza Short Story Prize, their creative work can be found in Story, Third Coast, The Masters Review, Fairy Tale Review, Hole in the Head Review, F(r)iction, South Carolina Review, and elsewhere. Other writing appears in The Rumpus, Barrelhouse, and additional journals. A MASS MoCA Fellow and alum of the Vermont Studio Center and Tin House Winter Workshop, they teach Creative Writing at Gannon University.
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Poetry Coordinator at Best of the Net Anthology

Sarah A. Chavez (she/ella/they), a California mestiza living and working in the PNW, is the author of the poetry collections like everything else we loved, (Porkbelly Press), Halfbreed Helene Navigates the Whole (Ravenna Press Triple Series), Hands That Break & Scar (Sundress Publications), and All Day, Talking (dancing girl press). Recent writing projects have received a 2025-2026 Tacoma Artists Initiative Award, as well as residencies at Dorland Mountain Arts Colony, the Macondo Writers Workshop, and The Writer’s Colony at Dairy Hollow. Her in-process project, In the Face of Mourning was awarded a 2023 Scholarship & Research grant from the University of Washington Tacoma’s (UWT) School for Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences. Chavez teaches creative writing and Latinx/Chicanx-focused courses, facilitates community writing workshops in and around Tacoma, WA, and serves as the poetry coordinator for Best of the Net Anthology. Some of their writing can be found in Diode, Thimble Magazine, Painted Bride Quarterly, Cider Press Review, & The Museum of Americana: A Literary Review.

Black and white author photo of Carlo Matos.

Fiction Coordinator at Best of the Net Anthology

Carlo Matos is a bi+/poly author who has published 13 books of poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, and scholarship. He is the author of Book of Tongues: The Dead Letters of Pedro & Ines (a collaboration with the poet Amy Sayre Baptista), which is forthcoming from FlowerSong Press. His first novel, As Malcriadas or Names We Inherit (New Meridian, 2022) was featured by the literary scholar Vamberto Freitas in the oldest daily paper in Portugal last summer. His poems, stories, essays, and reviews have appeared in such journals as Hobart, Rhino, PANK, DMQ Review, Modern Drama, and Diagram, among many others. His books have been reviewed in such places as Kirkus Reviews, Boston Review, Iowa Review, and Portuguese-American Journal. Carlo has received grants and fellowships from the Disquiet International Literary Program (Portugal), CantoMundo, the Illinois Arts Council, Fundação Luso-Americana, Instituto Camoes, the Sundress Academy for the Arts, and the La Romita School of Art (Italy). He is also a winner of the Heartland Poetry Prize in poetry. Carlo is also a founding member of the Portuguese-American writers collective Kale Soup for the Soul and co-edited one of the first anthologies dedicated to Portuguese American and Portuguese Canadian writing. He currently lives in Chicago, is a professor at the City Colleges of Chicago, and is a former MMA fighter and kickboxer. Most days you can find him riding his motorcycles all over the Chicagoland area. Follow him on Instagram @carlomatos8. Check out his blog at carlomatos.blogspot.com.
Femme-presenting person with navy curly hair and large-framed glasses sits in front of a pale wall with a bookshelf.

Assistant Fiction Coordinator at Best of the Net Anthology

Heather Leigh (they/them) is a queer, disabled, Chicago-based professor, editor, and writer. They have worked with the editing team of Uncanny Magazine, as a fiction and poetry editor for Curbside Splendor, and as managing editor of Lacerta Publications. Their most recent publication, “Netflicks and Chill,” was published in CultureCult’s limited print anthology, Bloodlet. They are currently working on completing a collection of flash and short stories composed of a mashup of literary and various speculative fiction genres that critique modern society and culture. Spoiler: Someone usually dies at the end.
An Asian American person wearing a dark shirt stands in front of a brick wall and smiles.

Nonfiction Coordinator at Best of the Net Anthology

Descended from ocean dwellers, Ching-In Chen is a genderqueer Chinese American writer, community organizer and teacher. They are author of The Heart’s Traffic: a novel in poems (Arktoi Books/Red Hen Press, 2009) and recombinant (Kelsey Street Press, 2018 Lambda Literary Award for Transgender Poetry) as well as chapbooks to make black paper sing (speCt! Books) and Kundiman for Kin :: Information Retrieval for Monsters (Portable Press at Yo-Yo Labs, Leslie Scalapino Finalist). Chen is co-editor of The Revolution Starts at Home: Confronting Intimate Violence Within Activist Communities (South End Press, 1st edition; AK Press, 2nd edition) and currently a core member of the Massage Parlor Outreach Project as well as a Kelsey Street Press collective member. They have received fellowships from Kundiman, Lambda, Watering Hole, Can Serrat, Imagining America, Jack Straw Cultural Center and the Intercultural Leadership Institute as well as the Judith A. Markowitz Award for Exceptional New LGBTQ Writers. They are currently collaborating with Cassie Mira and others on Breathing in a Time of Disaster, a performance, installation and speculative writing project exploring breath through meditation, health and environmental justice. They teach in the School of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences and the MFA program in Creative Writing and Poetics at University of Washington Bothell and serve as Writer in Residence at Hugo House.

Laura Page leaning against a brick wall with the woods in background.

Visual Arts Coordinator at Best of the Net Anthology

Laura Page lives and works in Eugene OR. She studied English and Writing at Southern Oregon University and is the author of Dove, Coyote, (Ghost Peach Press, 2020). Laura has worked as a literary editor, a poet, and in more recent years, an artist, visually collaborating with writers and small presses in the poetry community.

Hannah Olsson

Managing Editor at Craft Chaps

Hannah Olsson holds a double BA in Cinema and Creative Writing English from the University of Iowa. During her time in Iowa, Hannah was the president of The Translate Iowa Project, an organization devoted to publishing translated poetry, drama, and prose. Her work, both in English and Swedish, has been featured in boundless, earthwords magazine, InkLit Mag, and the University of Iowa’s Ten-Minute Play Festival, among others. Hannah enjoys works that tell stories of ordinary, distorted wonders.

A photograph of a woman with dark hair wearing a grey jacket standing next to a brick wall.

Fiction Editor at Craft Chaps

Sohini Basak is a freelance editor and writer from India, and currently the poetry editor at Words Without Borders. Her first poetry collection We Live in the Newness of Small Differences was awarded the inaugural International Beverly Manuscript Prize and published in 2018. She studied literature and creative writing at the universities of Delhi, Warwick, and East Anglia, where she received the 2015 Malcolm Bradbury Grant for Poetry. Other honours include a Toto Funds the Arts writing award (2017) and a Vijay Nambisan Sangam House fellowship (2022).

Prose Editor, Doubleback Books

Rebecca Youé is a professional editor from Worcestershire, England. She has a degree in English and American Literature from Keele University and has worked in the publishing industry since graduating in 2012. In 2020 she was a reader for the Highland Book Prize. She is working on her first novel in her spare time.

Bethany Milholland

Poetry Editor, Doubleback Books
Bethany Milholland graduated with a BFA in Creative Writing from the University of Evansville in 2021. She currently works as a conflicts analyst at an international law firm. She is a lover of short stories, poetry, and cats.

Assistant Prose Editor, Doubleback Books

Bayleigh Kasper recently graduated from the University of Evansville with a creative writing degree, where she was the co-Editor-in-Chief of The Evansville Review. She dreams of owning a tiny home in her native Colorado where she can adopt cats, make music, write, and eat very judge-worth amounts of chocolate without actually being judged.

Aslan sits in a wooden chair and plays an acoustic guitar in front of a tapestry.

Coordinator, Poets in Pajamas

Aslan Gossett is an MFA candidate and instructor at the University of North Carolina–Wilmington. They serve as poetry editor for Ecotone and are the coordinator for Sundress Publication’s Poets in Pajamas Reading Series. As well as being a Tennessee native, Aslan is a lifelong lover of coffee, meditation, and corduroy.

A person with long, voluminous curls takes a black-and-white selfie on a train. They wear a light-colored puffer jacket and have nose jewelry. Reflections from the train window and blurred motion of the outside world are visible in the background.

Co-Coordinator, Poets in Pajamas

thandiwe adofo is a writer/director and recent graduate of Howard University. thandiwe is spending Fall 2024 to Spring 2025 attending six international artist residencies, including Momentum Berlin and Chateau d’Orquevaux. Their publications include The Amistad, The Bellingham Review, The Woven Tale Press, and more. thandiwe is also a 2025-2026 CUNY Writers’ Institute Fellow. They explore their passion for storytelling through visual narratives and creative writing while integrating the intersectionality of womanhood and blackness, tragedy, and trauma, overall examining the black interior

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Social Media Manager

Zoe Korte is a mad and queer poet whose work has appeared in new words {press}, Roi Fainéant, Maudlin House, Frontier Poetry, and elsewhere. They have earned degrees in English, Spanish, and Ancient Greek from the University of Missouri. They live in St. Louis with their partner and two tortoiseshell cats. You can find them on Instagram @zoekpoetry or Bluesky @mostlymosspoetry.

Blog Contributor for We Call Upon the Author to Explain

Marah Hoffman grew up in Reading, Pennsylvania. Since graduating with her bachelors in English and creative writing in 2022, she has lived in Tennessee, Michigan, and now North Carolina. She is an MFA candidate in creative nonfiction at University of North Carolina Wilmington and the Creative Director of Sundress Academy for the Arts. She enjoys genre fluidity, whimsicality, cats, lattes, distance running, travel, and adding to her personal lexicon. Her list of favorite words grows every week.

Lead Designer at Sundress Publications

Kristen Camille Ton is an artist and graphic designer with five years of experience as a professional designer in the world of small business. She holds a double BA in Literature and Creative Writing with minors in Graphic Design and Anthropology. In 2021, Kristen uprooted from Chattanooga, Tennessee and moved to Japan. She lives on the lush southern island of Kyushu, where she enjoys cycling through fields of rice paddies and painting her surroundings.

Graphic Designer at Sundress Publications

Lori Tennant is a poet pursuing an MFA in Creative Writing at Georgia College and State University. Her undergraduate degree is in graphic design and that merges with her poetry to become Crankies. She is prone to chasing butterflies, storytelling, and pretending to be a mermaid. Nature and myth play a large role in her work.

Managing Editor of Stirring: A Literary Collection

Luci Brown is an Appalachian highlander currently pursuing nonprofit work in the bourbon barrel hills of Louisville, Kentucky. Her chapbook, Home Brew, was published in 2015, and her work has appeared in Moon City Review, Rogue Agent, Menacing Hedge, and others. She is the managing and poetry editor for Stirring as well as a reader for Best of the Net. She lives with her tall partner, particular child, and strange dogs.

Jill Khoury has short pink hair and pale skin with pink lipstick. In front of a blue background, she gazes thoughtfully at the camera.

Editor of Rogue Agent

Jill Khoury (she/her) is a disabled poet. She is a Western Pennsylvania Writing Project fellow and has taught poetry in high school, university, and enrichment settings. She holds an MFA from The Ohio State University and edits Rogue Agent, a journal of embodied poetry and art. Her poems have appeared in numerous journals, including Copper Nickel, CALYX, diode, and The Shore. Winner of the Gatewood Prize from Switchback Books, her second full-length collection earthwork is forthcoming in 2024. Connect with her at jillkhoury.com.

Headshot of brown woman of Middle Eastern/North African descent against a bluish-lavender background. She wears a greyish navy hijab (headscarf), silver earrings, and a white jacket with silver buttons.

Editorial Intern at Sundress Publications

Tassneem Abdulwahab (she/her) is an aspiring writer and editor with a BA (Hons) Creative and Professional Writing from UWE Bristol. With a strong interest in culture, history, and psychology and a love for fiction, her writing often draws on one or more of these threads to tell character-centric stories. Trained in oil painting, she recently exhibited and sold two portrait paintings in February 2025. In her free time, you can find her buying more books (no, seriously—she owns three editions of Little Women), snapping pictures of the little details, or sitting at her easel.

A white woman wearing a blue denim dress smiles at the camera in a "selfie" format. She has brown hair and blue eyes, while a hazy sky and a body of water appear behind her.

Editorial Intern at Sundress Publications

Elizabeth “Lizzy” DiGrande is a graduate student in Emerson College’s Publishing and Writing program, where she also serves as a Transformational Leaders Fellow and Writing Assistant for the Emerson Grad Life Blog. She is on the board of the Women’s National Book Association, Boston chapter, and is passionate about amplifying women’s voices in publishing. Originally from New Jersey, Lizzy now resides in Boston and can often be found perusing the city’s public libraries or exploring new restaurants. She hopes to build a career as both a food writer and literary agent championing female-identifying authors.

Emma in Lake Arrowhead, California, where she enjoys hiking and paddle boarding in the summer!

Editorial Intern at Sundress Publications

Emma Goss is a senior English major with minors in Film and Linguistic Anthropology. A passionate reader, she prefers to always be juggling a poetry collection, a literary fiction novel, and an audiobook. Emma is especially drawn to poetry rooted in nature symbolism and metaphor. Some of her favorite collections include The Tradition by Jericho Brown, War of the Foxes by Richard Siken, What the Living Do by Marie Howe, and Jane: A Murder by Maggie Nelson. Her poetry has been published in Pangyrus Magazine and by the Princeton Leonard L. Milberg ’53 Poetry Contest. Originally from Los Angeles, she spends her time hiking local trails or browsing the poetry shelves at Barnes & Noble Studio City when not at Vassar.

A white woman with blonde hair and clear glasses sitting on a couch outside with several trees and plants in the background. She is wearing jeans and a blue-and-white striped button down shirt.

Editorial Intern at Sundress Academy for the Arts

Shelby Hansen is a creative writer and self-proclaimed fantasy maestro hailing from the northern plains of Texas. She recently graduated from the University of Tennessee’s English program with a focus in Literature and Creative Writing, where she won several awards for her fiction. Her writing often focuses on womanhood, identity, and the reclamation of the self. This is reflected in her debut novel, which she hopes to publish soon. When she is not writing or teaching today’s youth, she enjoys reading, crocheting, swimming, and spending time with her two cats, Stella and Gemma.

A close-up of an Asian woman with long brown hair and front bangs smiling at the camera. She is wearing a light tan cardigan and a cream-colored collar shirt with a navy blue and red ribbon tied in the front. An empty street with two parked cars is behind her and she is standing in front of a pink curtain and green hedge.

Editorial Intern at Sundress Publications

Marian Kohng (she/her/hers) is a proud Korean American and an Editorial Intern at Sundress Publications and a Traffic Copy Editor at a local news station in Tucson, AZ. She also has a Bachelor’s in Neuroscience and Cognitive Science and a Master’s in Marketing. She loves to get lost in a good book and will read just about anything, including the back of the shampoo bottle.

A white person in a black button-down shirt and black Oakland A's baseball cap, wearing rings on both hands, sits at a table and leans their chin on their right hand. They smile softly at the camera.

Editorial Intern at Sundress Academy for the Arts

Catie Macauley (they/he/she) is a transmasculine aspiring poet living and working in Boston. They study Sociology, Environmental Studies, and English at Wellesley College, where they also compete on the Wellesley Whiptails frisbee team and perform with the Wellesley Shakespeare Society. A Best of the Net 2024 Nominee, his writing has appeared in brawl lit, The Wellesley News, and the Young Writer’s Project, among other publications. In their free time, Catie enjoys boxing, re-reading A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and buying far too many books at independent bookstores—primarily the Grolier Poetry Bookshop, where they are somehow lucky enough to work.

A white woman looks over her right shoulder and into the camera while standing on an empty parking garage rooftop. Her hands are clasped together as she rests on a ledge in front of her. She has short red hair with bangs. She wears a maroon wide brim hat, large silver hoop earrings, deep red lipstick, a short sleeve black shirt, and black trousers with thin white stripes.

Editorial Intern at Sundress Academy for the Arts

Caylin Moore (she/her) is currently pursuing a graduate level certificate in book publishing from Pace University, and SAFTA is her first internship in the publishing industry. Her previous work includes copyediting, social media marketing, and project management. She hopes to use these skills and those gained during this internship for a job in either editorial or marketing one day. As someone who has often felt seen by the stories she reads, she is passionate about bringing stories into the world that help others feel that same comfort. She is planning her wedding to Nathan, the love of her life, for next August. In addition to her fiancé, she also loves romance novels, murder mysteries, musical theatre, and her pets Stitch and Oreo. Stitch is a hound dog named after objectively the best Disney character of all time, and she will hear no debate on that matter.

Photo of a young woman standing underneath the branch of a tree. The tree branch is decorated with colorful paper.

Editorial Intern at Doubleback Books

Katy Nguyen is a budding creative studying Sociology and English at the University of California, Irvine. Katy enjoys reading and writing about the little things, music, and peoplehood. In her spare time, she likes to peruse around stationery shops and add more pens to her growing collection.
A portrait photo of Ana Mourant, a young woman, smiling, with light skin and blond hair, wearing a purple dress, outside with trees in the background.

Editorial Intern at Sundress Publications

Ana Mourant is an editorial intern for Sundress Publications and a recent graduate of the University of Washington’s editing program. She holds a Certificate in Editing as well as a Certificate in Storytelling & Content Strategy. Ana conducts manuscript evaluations, developmental edits, structural edits, line edits, copyedits, proofreads, and beta reads, as well as authenticity and sensitivity readings for Indigenous Peoples content. She has previously worked for a variety of publishing houses, independent authors, and businesses, including Lex Academic in the UK, the Independent Publishers of New England, and the Seattle Scriptorium. Ana was born and raised in rural Alaska, living a subsistence lifestyle—foraging, fishing, and hunting with her family. She loves nature writing and Indigenous cultures, and, when she’s not working, is often out in the wilderness tracking animals, Nordic skiing, or just enjoying nature.

A young white woman with wavy brown hair sits on the grass, smiling at the camera. She is wearing a white sleeveless top with tie straps and layered gold necklaces, including one with a pink butterfly charm. The background is softly blurred with green trees and warm sunlight.

Editorial Intern at Sundress Academy for the Arts

Savannah Roach (she/her) is a senior at the University of Tennessee, where she majors in English with a concentration in technical communication and minors in advertising and public relations. She is a travel enthusiast, bookworm, amateur baker, and nature lover. While she enjoys books of all kinds, she’s especially drawn to the haunting beauty and rich atmosphere of Southern Gothic literature. With a great love for Knoxville, she looks forward to serving the writing community in this position.

Girl with dress sitting in a car.

Editorial Intern at Sundress Publications

Penny Wei is from Shanghai and Massachusetts. She has been recognized by the Longfellow House, Cafe Muse, and Just Poetry, amongst others. Her works are up or forthcoming in Eunoia Review, Inflectionist Review, Dialogist, Aloka, and elsewhere.