Participants

Her published works include eight novels, Yesterday’s Dreams, Tomorrow’s Memories, Today’s Promise, The Halfling’s Court, The Redcaps’ Queen, Daire’s Devils, The Play of Light, and Baba Ali and the Clockwork Djinn, written with Day Al-Mohamed. She is also the author of the solo collections Eternal Wanderings, A Legacy of Stars, Consigned to the Sea, Flash in the Can, Transcendence, The Kindly Ones, Dawns a New Day, The Fox’s Fire, Between Darkness and Light, Echoes of the Divine, and the non-fiction writers’ guides The Literary Handyman, More Tips from the Handyman, LH: Build-A-Book Workshop, and The Literary Handyman Library omnibus edition. She is the senior editor of the Bad-Ass Faeries anthology series, No Longer Dreams, Heroes of the Realm, Clockwork Chaos, Gaslight & Grimm, Grimm Machinations, A Cast of Crows, A Cry of Hounds, Other Aether, The Chaos Clock, Grease Monkeys, Side of Good/Side of Evil, After Punk, and Footprints in the Stars. Her short stories are included in numerous other anthologies and collections. She is a full member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Association.

In addition to her literary acclaim, she makes homemade flavor-infused candied ginger and other sweet confections under the brand of Auntie D’s Sweet Treats at literary conventions, on commission, and wholesale.

Danielle lives in New Jersey with husband and fellow writer, Mike McPhail and four extremely spoiled cats.

Her documentary, THE INVALID CORPS, about disabled Civil War soldiers, was licensed to Alaska Airlines and had its broadcast premiere on public television in 2020. She just completed a docu-series, RENEGADES, of role-breaking disabled leaders in history for American Masters/PBS digital (Season 1, October 2024) and is a proud producer of feature documentary UNSEEN (POV, 2024). Day was named a DOC NYC 2021 Documentary New Leader, was part of the NBC 2022 Original Voices Fellowship class, and awarded a Disability Futures Fellow grant in 2024. In 2025, she has been working to get back to more writing of books. 

Outside of her creative work, Day is a policy expert with over 15 years of experience and the former White House Director of Disability Policy. She is a proud member of the US Coast Guard Auxiliary.  Day lives in Washington DC with her wife, N.R. Brown, daughter Octavia, and (hopefully soon) a new guide dog.

            Catherine has a doctorate in chemical physics from Harvard and a BS in chemistry from UCLA. Her paper “Complex Speeds and Special Relativity” (The American Journal of Physics, April 1996) forms the basis for some of the science in her fiction. She directed the Chesapeake Math Program for many years. Her students distinguished themselves in many national programs, including the USA Mathematical Olympiad, the USA Physics Olympiad, and the Harvard-MIT Math Contest.

            Catherine has appeared as a speaker at many institutions and as a Guest of Honor at cons across the US and abroad. She served two terms as president for SFWA and is a member of SIGMA, a think tank that advises the government as to future trends affecting national security. She also appears as a vocalist at clubs and conventions. Her most recent single is the Celtic-themed song Ancient Ages (written by Arlan Andrews) placed on the Blast-FM top 100 in 2020.

Catherine can be reached a www.catherineasaro.net, and she has a Patreon page at www.patreon.com/CatherineAsaro

For several years he was an assistant editor for Asimov’s SF Magazine (but has lived an otherwise blameless existence).

Since then he has worked as a software and database developer, working in the medical, legal, advertising, financial, scientific, and other areas, with clients ranging from a perinatal laboratory to a cemetery (his company slogan is cradle to grave programming).  He currently supports a leading optical switch manufacturer (your web pages & email travel over switches he helped build).

John has stayed part of the science fiction community.  Recently he co-edited (with Darrell Schweitzer) Tales from the Miskatonic University:  what evils lurk in the dark reaches of the Dewey Decimal System?  And he has given talks at NASA, Philcon, Capclave, Balticon, and several Worldcons on subjects such Time Travel, Invisibility, Practical Telepathy, Artificial Intelligence, and the Quantum Internet.

He has published several peer-reviewed physics papers on the relationship between time and quantum mechanics: does quantum mechanics apply along the time dimension?  and if so, how could we look for this experimentally? and with current technology?  Details (& papers) at his web site Time and Quantum Mechanics.

His lifetime goal is to build a really practical time machine.

She proudly writes in cursive with fountain pens, knows many useless facts, and loves putting stickers on things. Her retired racing greyhound and Cardigan Welsh Corgi let her pretend to be leader of the pack as long as she provides the right snacks.

Learn more at https://www.jennifer-brinn.com/

Jack Campbell (John G. Hemry) is a retired US Navy officer who writes the New York Times best-selling Lost Fleet series and whose books have been translated into fifteen languages and sold four million copies worldwide.  His most recent novels are In Our Stars and Destiny’s Way in the Doomed Earth series, and Implacable, the third book in the Lost Fleet Outlands series.  The Lost Fleet Universe story collection Rendezvous at Corsair also came out recently.  He’s the author as well of the Genesis Fleet and Lost Stars series, as well as the “steampunk meets high fantasy” Pillars of Reality and Empress of the Endless Sea series.  He’s had numerous short stories published dealing with alternate history, time travel, SF, fantasy, and humor.  His YA novel The Sister Paradox won the 2018 Epic ebook award.  While in the Navy he served in surface warfare, intelligence, amphibious warfare, anti-terrorism, and other assignments. He lives in Maryland with his indomitable wife “S” and three great kids.  www.jack-campbell.com

Doc’s short stories can be found in The Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences’ Tales from the Archives, the Way of the Gun Bushido Western Anthology, the Steampunk Special Edition of Flagship magazine, the Paradise Found, Tales from the Library anthology, and the Forgotten Lore anthology series by eSpec Books. Doc has also published a collection of short stories: The Shining Cog and Other Steampunk Tales.

The Perils of Prague is the first novel in the series The Adventures of Crackle and Bang. The Kindred of Kali is the second, and several more books are planned to chronicle the journeys of Professor Harmonious Crackle, Miss Titania Bang, and Sir Richard Blasphemy.

Doc has been known to stream the latest video games he’s enjoying on Twitch (https://www.twitch.tv/doccoleman) and on Sundays he streams writing chat and productivity sprints on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/@DocColeman).

When he isn’t juggling projects, making a living, or mainlining podcasts, Doc is a gamer, an avid reader, a motorcyclist, a home brewer and beer lover, a fan of renaissance festivals, and frequently a smart-ass. He lives with his lovely wife and a cat in Germantown, MD.

Maryland-born Randee Dawn is now a Brooklyn-based entertainment journalist who scribbles about the glam world of entertainment by day, then spends her nights crafting wild worlds of fiction. She’s the author of three novels: dark Celtic rock ‘n roll-infused fantasies The Only Song Worth Singing and Leave No Trace, both of which were published by ArcManor in 2025. Her next novel, the funny pop culture fantasy We Interrupt This Program, returns to the wacky world of TV created by fae that she originated in 2022’s Tune in Tomorrow. She’s a former editor at The Hollywood Reporter and Soap Opera Digest, and these days covers the wacky world of show business for Variety, The Los Angeles Times, Emmy Magazine and Today.com. Dawn’s obsessive love of all things Law & Order led her to appear in one episode and later co-author The Law & Order SVU: Unofficial Companion. Her short fiction has also appeared in numerous anthologies and online publications. Once a month she can be found hosting Brooklyn Books & Booze reading series in Brooklyn, and she runs an online course with Creative Coaching Partners called How to Be Interviwed. When not writing she’s focused on her next travel destination, and hangs out with her wonderful, funny husband. She admits she reads way too many books and consumes far too many mangoes.

Tom Doyle is the award-winning author of the American Craftsmen trilogy from Tor Books, a saga of modern-day magician soldiers and psychic spies fighting their way through nightmares from the worlds of Hawthorne and Poe. 

Tom’s latest work for Graphic Audio is the Agent of Exiles series of supernatural spy adventures in the 6th century BCE. His recent SF novel, Border Crosser, follows the far-future journeys of Eris, a psychologically extreme secret agent whose shifting loyalties cause chaos wherever she goes in the galaxy. His story “The Wizard of Macatawa” won the 2008 WSFA Small Press Award.

Tom has survived Harvard, Stanford, and cancer, and he writes in a spooky turret here in Washington, DC. Links to Tom’s short fiction and audio versions of his stories are available at www.tomdoyleauthor.com.  

Edelman also worked for the Syfy Channel for 13+ years as editor of Science Fiction Weekly, SCI FI Wire, and Blastr. He was the founding editor of Science Fiction Age, which he edited during its entire eight-year run. He also edited SCI FI magazine, previously known as Sci-Fi Entertainment, for more a decade, as well as two other SF magazines, Sci-Fi Universe and Sci-Fi Flix. He has been a four-time Hugo Award finalist for Best Editor. Additionally, he is the host of the Eating the Fantastic interview podcast, which since February 2016 has allowed listeners to eavesdrop on his meals with creators of science fiction, fantasy, horror, comics, and more.

Gilman lives in Washington, D.C., and works as a freelance writer and museum consultant.  She is also author of seven nonfiction books about North American frontier and Native history.

Elektra is a graduate of the Odyssey Writing Workshop and a member of SFWA. She lives in Delaware with her husband, Mike, and more than the usual allotment of felines.

You can find her on Mastodon (elektra@wandering.shop), Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/elektra.hammond/), Twitter (https://twitter.com/elektraUM), Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/elektraum/), and building her website at http://www.untilmidnight.com.

She’s part of the team that has brought you My Agent Database for querying authors. With over 2,000 vetted agents in lists sorted by genre and age range. Included are their submission requirements, MSWL, social links, and more.

When not writing, you can find her devouring book series on her kindle, learning to scroll saw, or feeding her webcomic addiction. She volunteers for her local science fiction and fantasy convention: Balticon. You can find her at: morganhazelwood.com or across social media.

Born and raised in Berlin, Germany, she completed her secondary education there before accepting a scholarship to attend Tenri University (Japan), where she studied Japanese. After later earning an undergraduate degree in Astronomy and Physics from Smith College, she earned a Master’s degree in Astronomy from the University of Hawai`i at Manoa, and a Ph.D. in Science Education from the University of Wyoming.

In addition to her professional work as senior data analyst at the Space Telescope Science Institute, Dr. Heyer also served as Deputy Press Officer for the American Astronomical Society and as the public information officer at the Joint Astronomy Centre, where she led the education and public outreach efforts. She has earned Shodan in both Judo and Karate.

Dr. Heyer currently teaches astronomy and physics at Loyola University Maryland. She is co-author of seven books, including Investigating Astronomy (5th Edition) and Being a Successfully Busy Professor. And if you have ever wondered how those beautiful Hubble images got into science fiction series like Babylon-5 and Star Trek, Inge is the trouble-maker who instigated this…

Nate is on the board of the Florida Writers Foundation and other writer groups​. His current obsessions include collecting autographed books, researching how to open a used bookstore, and creating a timeline of Baen Books’ spine logos.

In 2020, he published Robert A. Heinlein’s last published work, The Pursuit of the Pankera, under an exclusive contract with the Heinlein Estate.

His company also published Galaxy’s Edge for 10 years and currently co-sponsors the Mike Resnick Memorial Short Fiction Award in partnership with Dragon Con, one of the largest speculative fiction conventions in the United States. 

Arc Manor uses a mix of old and new technologies and continues to stay at the forefront of the publishing business. They are involved with eBooks and Print on Demand, as well as more traditional means of distribution, and their Caezik imprint is represented by Consortium (a division of Ingram), one of the preeminent full-service distributors in the world catering to independent presses.

Currently Shahid is creating Book Bale, which offers publishers and authors a new way to reach customers, while providing readers access to thousands of eBooks for one low monthly subscription fee.

As a professional author, he has been involved in numerous projects, but he is best known as the creator and series editor of the award-winning Defending the Future military science fiction anthologies—now in their second decade of publication. His body of work has been formally recognized with his acceptance into SFWA, the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America.

As a graphic designer, he is the owner of McP Digital Graphics (founded in 2006), a company established to provide cover art, design, layout, and prepress services. This built upon not only his experience as a game designer, but primarily from his time as the Proofing Supervisor for Phoenix Color Corp doing cover work for the great publishing houses.

As a publisher, he is the co-owner of eSpec Books LLC (since 2014), where his graphics company has become the inhouse design arm of production.

As Airman McPhail, he is a member of the Military Writers Society of America and is dedicated to helping his fellow service members (and those deserving civilians) in their efforts to become authors, editors, or artist, as well as supporting related organization in their efforts to help those “who have given their all for us.”

Adeena is a physicist and astronomer (by degree) working in aerospace as a software engineer and manager. More importantly, she’s a long-time science fiction geek with a strong desire to inspire others through writing about robots, aliens, artificial intelligence, computers, longevity, exoplanets, virtual reality, and more.

Website <> LinkedIn <> Twitter <> Facebook

The Robot Galaxy Series on Amazon (and universal link for all the other places)
Lunar Logic on Amazon (and universal link for all the other places)
Co-Host of The BIG Sci-Fi Podcast

In poetry editing, Miguel is the editor of the 2025 Dwarf Stars, an anthology of the best 1-10 line speculative poems (or 100 words or fewer prose poems) published in 2024. With David Kopaska-Merkel, Miguel also co-edited Dwarf Stars 2023. Currectly, Miguel is Editor-in-Chief and Publisher of SpecPoVerse: An International Journal of Speculative Poetry.

In SFF prose, Miguel has published a flash fiction story, “Trading with Monsters” in Fantasy, and a dark fantasy short story, “The Revenant Saga” in Scarlet Leaf Review (extended to a free novelette). He has also written a sci-fi novel called Vital Air about chlorine-breathing extraterrestrials on a space race to their oxygen-filled moon and who suffer from social inequalities that mirror our own (still seeking a publisher).

Since 2022, I have also served as the education committee co-chair for the American Association of Biological Anthropologists (AABA), of which I have been a member since 1999.

In my free time I am an active volunteer in a local invasive plant removal program, serve in the leadership of my son’s Scout troop, and enjoy gardening, role-playing games, board games, and reading widely in SF/F and in nonfiction.

His alter egotist, A.J. Harris, is best known for spicy SFF stories featured in anthologies like  STRANDED, SILVER SOLDIERS, THE BIG BOOK OF ORGASMS 2, SEXY STRANGERS, SECRET IDENTITIES and BEST WOMEN’S EROTICA OF THE YEAR, VOLUME 11. For more, check Biomechanoid Blues (biomechanoidblues.com) where you can publication credits and various ramblings.

He helped complete Jerry Pournelle’s Janissaries: Mamelukes and is working on the sequel.  He has written several military themed short stories including one in the RoboSoldiers: Thank You for Your Servos anthology.

His science fiction includes many light and humorous adventures of a space-faring stage hypnotist and his alien animal companion. Other works take a very different tone, exploring aspects of determinism and free will, generally redefining the continua between life and death. Sometimes he blurs the funny and the serious. Lawrence and his wife live near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Recently he has bested both Multiple Myeloma and Leukemia and is a chimeric cancer survivor.

His translations from Russian have appeared in Reactor, F&SF, Clarkesworld, Tor.com, Asimov’s, and Year’s Best volumes, and earned BSFA award nominations in 2024 and 2025.

Alex has edited over a dozen anthologies, including the long-running Unidentified Funny Objects series and, most recently, The Digital Aesthete. He’s also the narrative director at Card Advantage Games. Their first game was announced at the Seattle Worldcon and is expected to launch in late 2026.

Rosemary Claire Smith 

I am the AnLab-award-nominated author of “Diamond Jim and the Dinosaurs” (2016), “The Next Frontier” (2021) and “Apollo in Retrograde” (2023), as well as the 2023 winner of the Sidewise Award for alternate history, short form. I write a book review column that appears in every other issue of Analog Science Fiction and Fact. Somehow, my alternate histories, future romances, time-travel tales, fantasies, reworked mythologies, horror stories, essays, and editorials have snuck onto the pages of Analog, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Amazing Stories, The Reinvented Heart, The Reinvented Detective, and other periodicals and anthologies. Many of my stories showcase my fascination with dinosaurs. I’m also a former field archaeologist who excavated prehistoric sites around the United States. You are invited to play my RPG, T-Rex Time Machine, available from Choice of Games.

Website: https://rcwordsmith.com,

Social media @RCWordsmith

Facebook: my full name

Raised in Warren, New Jersey, Joab has had a long-standing career in technology: he’s worked as an application consultant, software trainer, network engineer, project manager, and technical writer over three decades. He currently resides in Alexandria, Virginia.

A voracious tabletop RPG enthusiast and game master, Joab draws inspiration from horror, espionage, fantasy, and sci-fi campaigns—ranging from Call of Cthulhu to Savage Worlds and Pathfinder—infusing his narratives with rich, imaginative depth. He also credits role-playing adventures and his deep interest in 19th- and 20th-century history as major creative influences.

Nathan holds a PhD in international relations from The Ohio State University and speaks Arabic, Spanish, and Hebrew. He has taught military operations, decision-making, and strategy for over a decade. He has lived in ten countries and visited some two dozen others, developing a firm belief that Mexican food is the best, at least for lunch and dinner.

He also is the non-fiction editor for Seize the Press Magazine, and a host on Podside Picnic.

As for my credentials, I have been an avid player of RPG and Tabletop games of a variety of stripes and systems for the past 23 years.  I have played and/or run games of D&D 3.5, 4e, 5e, Pathfinder 1e and 2e, Iron Kingdoms, Starfinder, Traveler, Star Wars, Fallout, Warhammer, Warmachine, Firestorm, and Infinity.  In more recent years, I have been streaming behind a virtual avatar (VTuber) with a variety content track including RPGs, Strategy, and Shooter games.

Professionally, I have spent the last 8 years with CommVault Systems working as a Support Engineer for the CommVault family of Enterprise Backup, Restore, and Indexing Solutions.  I specialize in the Support and Implementation of Cloud Storage Solution Integration with our software.