Ukaisha Al-Amin

Ukaisha Al-Amin Graduated from Columbia College Chicago in '08 with Honors with a B.A in Fiction Writing and  minor in Playwriting. She is currently studying creative writing with a Fiction concentration in the MFA program at Roosevelt University. Her Flash Fiction piece 'The Stairwell' won first place in the Writing Center's First annual Flash Fiction Contest. Her play 'Rooms For Breathing' was workshopped and a staged reading directed by Lisa Di' Franza was performed in the theater department at Columbia College. Her other plays 'Jerry Trauma' and 'Without Mother' were performed during Columbia's annual Story Week Festival.

Ukaisha has lived in Chicago most of her life but she loves to travel and visiting family in China is a plus. She loves to read and write Young Adult Sci-Fi/Fantasy novels and is amazed by writers who have mastered the short story. Realistic Fiction is not her forte but she happens to have more stories in that category than the later. What?! Her library at home is so random. She has books from Roald Dahl to Susan Lori-Parks, Anne Rice to John Green, and Aimee Bender to Shakespeare back to Suzanne Collins. Yes, she reads them all.
She is currently trying to build her platform, work on her thesis, and master the Force all with the help of Master Yoda.

Dee Hogan

Dee Hogan was born and raised in a Suburban Kansas Town where she spent her days doing Suburban Kansas Things, such as going to school, playing basketball, and wondering what hills look like. She graduated from the University of Kansas with degrees in English and East Asian Studies, both subjects branding her as the sort of nerd that other nerds shove into lockers. She now lives in Bucktown, Chicago, where she has fabulous misadventures with her roommate and their exceptionally fat cat.

Since Dee has genre ADD, she likes to fiddle with fiction styles, bouncing between prose pieces, screenplays, graphic novel scripts, and the occasional stage play. Basically, she wants to be Neil Gaiman when she grows up. Other modern writers she enjoys include Tamora Pierce, China Mieville, Haruki Murakami, and Mark Danielewski. Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy has been her favorite series since she was thirteen, though she is unashamed to admit that it is closely followed by the Redwall books.

Between class and work, Dee collects hobbies, such as drawing Noses Off! comics, translating Japanese songs and stories, and scouring the streets of Chicago for cheap places to eat, drink, and watch KU basketball games. She intends to launch a blog just as soon as she has the time to write in it.

James Orbesen

James Orbesen has lived in the Chicago area all his life and thinks that pretty grand. In 2010, he received his B.A. from Roosevelt in English and was so pleased with the school that he returned for his MFA, specializing in fiction. James has worked in warehouses and pizza kitchens but finally found fulfillment first as a writing tutor and now as a freelance writer.

 

James has written for publications such as CollegeNews, PopMatters and Gapers Block. A smattering of his fiction can be found online, conveniently linked to his semi-regular blog (www.jamesorbesen.blogspot.com).

 

James likes blizzards, craft beer and Grant Morrison. He also fancies himself a comic book writer and is currently working on two graphic novels with two very talented artists, a submission to 215 Ink's 2011 Anthology and is writer and co-creator of the webcomic, The Breakouts (www.thebreakoutscomic.com).

Bernard Cox

Bernard M. Cox has been transplanted many times and is now considered an invasive, though naturalized, species. His recent transplantation was from Philadelphia to Berwyn, IL. It was originally planned as a cutting but no one was willing to propagate him.

He likes to write, a lot, sometimes. Other times he may play music or sing songs. He likes kitty cats and the color yellow. His food pyramid consists of black licorice, sriracha, and ginger. He likes to read, a lot, most of the time. He likes books that are written by people and non-people. His writings are popular with scutigera coleoptrata, octopi, stomatopods, cardinalidae and human people whose first names begin with the letters A, B, C, D, I, K, M, R, S, X, Y and Z.

When he is not writing, making music, or reading, he is often wandering the remnant prairies of Illinois, looking for insects, and dreaming about the soils of Philadelphia. 

Timothy Moore

Timothy Moore is an army brat and has traveled all across the United States. He remembers standing high on a glacier in Alaska, swarms of grasshoppers slamming against windows in Arizona, seemingly endless car rides from one part of the country to the next.

He went to undergrad in Philadelphia at the University of the Arts for screenwriting. He's wanted to write fiction of all kinds since his father picked him up a Batman comic at age six. His favorite writers right now are Tao Lin, Amelia Gray, Lindsay Hunter, Albert Camus, Jonathan Swift, Christian Tebordo, Blake Butler, and Patrick Sommerville. He is currently an editor at the online Ghost Ocean Magazine. He also blogs feverishly at readmyblogplease.com. He is cool and has nice facial features, like his birthmark by his left eye.

Jenna Tackett

Growing up in an artsy town in Arkansas (paradox?), there wasn’t much to do other than write and be in marching band. Jenna did both, though never at the same time. Before starting her MFA in fiction, she proofread grammar textbooks, tutored in writing, worked briefly at the only bookstore in her hometown, and tried her hand at layout-editing.

When she’s not writing, she is busy imitating Gilmore Girls, watching 80s movies,reading young adult fiction (particularly John Green), singing loudly, hanging out with friends, talking to family, making vlog (and blog) posts, and drinking coffee.

In the future she plans to edit, teach, write, and conquer the world, all while drinking a never-ending glass of iced tea.