Co-Director
Kathie Isaac-Luke |
Kathie Isaac-Luke's poetry collection,
Chrysalides, was recently published by Dragonfly Press.
Editor of caesura, the journal of Poetry Center San Jose for
five years, she is a freelance writer for the Union Democrat.
Kathie's short story, The Collection, was nominated for a 2015
Pushcart prize.
She is a freelance writer for the Union Democrat newspaper in Sonora.
She has two poems in the new anthology, Wine, Cheese and Chocolate published by Manzanita Writers Press.
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Executive Director
Sally Kaplan |
Sally Kaplan is a long-time member of Antoinette May’s writing critique group.
With a background in non-fiction film/television producing, she came to Gold
Rush Writers in 2016, became co-director in 2017, and Executive Director in
2018.
In addition to writing/directing prize-winning short screenplays, her
prose appears in Changing Course: Women's Inspiring Stories of Menopause,
Midlife, and Moving Forward, and Wine, Cheese & Chocolate.
Kaplan is a gifted
teacher and has offered courses at NYU, UCLA, University of Colorado, and Naropa
Institute. In association with Manzanita Writers Press, she serves as an editor
as well as a team-member teaching writing to elders. Kaplan and her husband
David Vassar own a documentary production company, Backcountry Pictures:
www.backcountrypictures.com
Co-Director
Erika Mailman |
Erika Mailman is the author of The Witch's Trinity, a San Francisco Chronicle Notable Book; Woman of Ill Fame, nominated for a Pushcart Press Editor's Book Award; House of Bellaver; and The Murderer's Maid: a Lizzie Borden Novel, which won an IPPY gold medal in historical fiction and was a National Indie Excellence winner. She holds an MFA in poetry from the University of Arizona, and has been a Yaddo fellow and Bram Stoker Award finalist. Under the pen name Lynn Carthage, her young adult trilogy includes Haunted, Betrayed and Avenged.
www.erikamailman.com
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Founder
Antoinette May |
Antoinette May
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Antoinette May's third novel, The Determined Heart: the Tale of Mary Shelley and Her Frankenstein was published in October by the Lake Union Publishing Division of Amazon Press. Her first novel, Pilate's Wife, published in 2007 by William Morrow, has been translated into 18 languages. The Sacred Well, her second William Morrow novel, was chosen best of 2009 by the San Francisco Book Festival.
Antoinette's non-fiction includes Adventures of a Psychic which spent 44 weeks on the New York Times best seller list. She was the recipient of La Pluma de Plata, an award conferred by the Mexican Government for the best travel article on their country. She writes weekly columns for the San Francisco Chronicle and SF Gate and is a frequent contributor to the Sierra Lodestar. Antoinette's articles have appeared in Cosmopolitan, Self, Country Living, San Francisco and Sacramento magazines.
Visit antoinette's website http://www.antoinettemay.com/
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Faculty
Kathleen Kent
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Kathleen Kent
Kathleen Kent's fourth book, The Dime, is a contemporary crime novel set in Dallas, and is based on a short story published in the crime anthology Dallas Noir. It was shortlisted for the Edgar Award. The New York Times picked The Dime as one of their "Latest and Greatest" in crime fiction, March 2017.
A Kirkus starred review says, "Kent's detective is Sam Spade reincarnated as a brilliant modern woman."
Ms. Kent is also the author of three bestselling historical novels, The Heretic's Daughter--recipient of the David J. Langum Sr. award for American historical fiction-The Traitor's Wife, and The Outcasts, which was the recipient of the American Library Association's 2014 top choice for Historical Fiction, as well as the recipient of a Will Rogers Medallion Award for Western fiction.
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Joe Quirk
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Joe Quirk
Joe Quirk is a science writer, novelist, and memoir ghostwriter, with a national bestseller in each category. He is co-author with Patri Friedman of Seasteading: How Floating Nations Will Restore The Environment, Enrich The Poor, Cure The Sick, and Liberate Humanity from Politicians, which was an Amazon bestseller in the category of marine engineering. He has consulted for Pixar, who volunteered to illustrate his public speaking for college students.
His novel The Ultimate Rush, about a bike messenger on roller blades conquering San Francisco's scariest downhills, led to his filing a Hollywood lawsuit.
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Kathie Isaac-Luke
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Kathie Isaac-LukeKathie Isaac-Luke was editor of
caesura, the journal of Poetry Center San Jose, for five
years. Her poetry collection, Chrysalides, published by Dragonfly Press, was selected as runner-up at the 2014 Los Angeles Book Festival. Kathie's short story, "The
Collection," was recently published by the Dragonfly Press Ezine, DNA, and was nominated for a 2015 Pushcart prize. She is a
freelance writer for the Union Democrat newspaper in Sonora.
She has two poems in the new anthology, Wine, Cheese and Chocolate published by Manzanita Writers Press.
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Sally Kaplan
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Sally Kaplan
Sally Kaplan moved from Los Angeles to Calaveras country in 2010. She and her husband David Vasser run Backcountry Pictures, a production company in Murphys, California (see bcpfilms.com).
In addition to working in non-fiction film and television, Kaplan has written and/or directed prize-winning original screenplays. Her script Crossroads developed into a short film at the American Film Institute's Directing Workshop for Women; Dybbuks and Chicken Soup screened in numerous film festivals and Man on the Plane received accolades from screen-writing contests.
Her prose appears in the anthologies: Changing Course: Women's Inspiring Stories of Menopause, Midlife, and Moving Forward, and Wine, Cheese & Chocolate, published by Manzanita Press. With a degree in dance and creative writing from Hampshire College, Kaplan has taught courses at NYU, UCLA, University of Colorado.
www.backcountrypictures.com
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Kevin Arnold
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Kevin Arnold Kevin Arnold, from the San Francisco Bay Area, was one of the founders of Gold Rush Writers.
He's has published sixty stories and poems in such quarterlies
as Seattle Review, Slippery Elm, and Mudfish.
The President of Poetry Center San Jose for twelve years, he was selected by the San Francisco / Peninsula
California Writer’s Club as Writer of the Year, and chosen for the national
website Your Daily Poem six times.
His novel, The Sureness of Horses, published by Manzanita Writer’s Press, is
available in hardcover, paperback, and electronic formats, and forthcoming as
an Audible Audiobook later this spring. Kevin will be one of five speakers for
the Bay Area's 28th Annual Writer’s Salon on March 30.
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Kathy Boyd-Fellure
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Kathy Boyd Fellure
Kathy Boyd Fellure is author of four children's books, and her debut contemporary women's fiction novel that released January, 2018. The Language of the Lake is the first book in the completed ~ On the Water's Edge Tahoe Trilogy.
Her 4th novel, Across the Pond and her WIP, Harper House, are both set in England. Kathy is a member of CWC, ACFW, and is the founder of Amador Fiction Writers. She hosted, wrote & produced the TSPN TV Show ~ Authors, Writers, Books & Beyond from 2012- 2015.
Kathy has served as a judge for the NCPA book awards in 2017-18. She guest speaks, teaches at writer conferences, hosts an annual literary read, exhibits her photography, and is agented with Books & Such Literary Agency. Kathy Boyd Fellure currently lives in the foothill gold country of California with her family and three stand-up comedian rescue dogs.
http://www.kathyboydfellure.com/
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Erika Mailman
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Erika Mailman
Erika Mailman is the author of four historical novels: The Witch's Trinity, which was a San
Francisco Chronicle Notable Book which Khaled Hosseini called "gripping"; Woman of Ill Fame, which is about a Gold
Rush prostitute; House of Bellaver, which is a literary ghost story set in Oakland; and The Murderer's Maid: a
Lizzie Borden Novel.
Mailman holds an MFA in poetry from the University of Arizona, has been a Yaddo fellow and served as
a juror for the Shirley Jackson Awards.
Her website is www.erikamailman.com . She also writes Y.A. fiction under the
name Lynn Carthage, with a neo-Gothic trilogy published by Kensington. www.lynncarthage.com.
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Antoinette May |
Antoinette May
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Antoinette May's third novel, The Determined Heart: the Tale of Mary Shelley and Her Frankenstein was published in October by the Lake Union Publishing Division of Amazon Press. Her first novel, Pilate's Wife, published in 2007 by William Morrow, has been translated into 18 languages. The Sacred Well, her second William Morrow novel, was chosen best of 2009 by the San Francisco Book Festival.
Antoinette's non-fiction includes Adventures of a Psychic which spent 44 weeks on the New York Times best seller list. She was the recipient of La Pluma de Plata, an award conferred by the Mexican Government for the best travel article on their country. She writes weekly columns for the San Francisco Chronicle and SF Gate and is a frequent contributor to the Sierra Lodestar. Antoinette's articles have appeared in Cosmopolitan, Self, Country Living, San Francisco and Sacramento magazines.
Visit antoinette's website http://www.antoinettemay.com/
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Indigo Moor
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Indigo Moor
Poet Laureate of Sacramento, Indigo Moor is also a scriptwriter and author. His first book Tap-Root was published as part of Main Street Rag's Editor's Select Poetry Series. His second book of poetry, Through the Stonecutter's Window, won Northwestern University Press's Cave Canem prize. As with Tap-Root, Indigo's 2017 release, In the Room of Thirsts & Hungers, is an Editor's Select choice from Main Street Rag.
Three of his short plays, Harvest, Shuffling, and The Red and Yellow Quartet debuted at the 60 Million Plus Theatre's Spring Playwright's festival. His full-length stageplay Live! at the Excelsior was a finalist for the Images Theatre Playwright Award and has been optioned for a full-length film.
Indigo teaches at the Stonecoast MFA Program, where he graduated in 2012 with an MFA in poetry, fiction, and scriptwriting. He is the former poetry editor for the Bookends Review Literary Journal. He is on the advisory boards for the Sacramento Poetry Center and Modesto Stanislaus Poetry center, a Cave Canem fellow, the resident artist at 916 ink, and a graduate member of the Artist's Residency Institute for Teaching Artists.
Indigo spends his days cleverly disguised as a mild-mannered Physical Design Engineer for computer companies.
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Monika Rose
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Monika RoseMonika Rose, at home in the foothills of Calaveras County, founded Manzanita Writers Press, a nonprofit literary publisher housed in the Manzanita Arts Emporium, a new art center in Angels Camp. She is published in several anthologies and literary magazines, and her book of poems, River by the Glass, by GlenHill Publications, is available from Amazon and Small Press Distribution as a print and eBook.
She has edited anthologies such as the recently released A Taste of Literary Elegance: Wine, Cheese & Chocolate, and the ongoing Manzanita series of literary prose and poetry, Wild Edges. With a Masters Degree in English, she teaches courses in writing and literature at Delta College as an Adjunct Associate Professor. Monika is currently writing a novel while editing other writers' books, readying them for publication. Contact her at www.manzapress.com or her website ~ you can also email her at
mrose209@gmail.com.
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Lucy Sanna
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Lucy Sanna
Lucy Sanna's historical novel, The Cherry Harvest (HarperCollins 2015), was named Book Club Book of the summer by the Wisconsin State Journal and the Midwest Independent Booksellers Association's Book Club Pick for July. For this and previous works, Lucy has been featured on national television and radio, including CBS, NBC, NPR, and FOX. Her books have been recognized by national press, including the Los Angeles Times, San Francisco Examiner, Wisconsin Journal, San Jose Mercury-News, Playboy Magazine and Men's World Magazine.
Lucy is a sought-after speaker and workshop leader at writers' conferences, including San Francisco's Litquake, the Wisconsin Book Fest, the Chicago Tribune's Book Fest, the Chicago Tribune's Printers Row, the University of Wisconsin's Writers Institute, the University of Wisconsin's Write-by-the-Lake Retreat, and the Sterling North Book & Film Festival. Since 1999, Lucy has served on the Executive Planning Board for the National Kidney Foundation's annual San Francisco's Authors Luncheon, the premier authors' event of the San Francisco Bay Area. She has also served on the Board of the California Writers Club, San Francisco Peninsula Branch. She is currently working on her next WWII historical novel.
Lucy's website: www.lucysanna.com
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Amy Smith
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Amy Smith
Amy SmithAmy Elizabeth Smith, originally from
Pennsylvania, teaches creative and professional writing at the
University of the Pacific in Stockton, CA. Her memoir,
All Roads Lead to Austen: A Yearlong Journey
with Jane, recounts a year traveling in six Latin American
countries learning Spanish and holding reading groups on Jane
Austen; it was praised by Booklist, Publishers Weekly, and Kirkus.
She is currently at work on the first novel of a mystery series
set in 1920s Buenos Aires.
You can visit her website at allroadsleadtoausten.com.
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