Contributors
July 2018
Writers
Poe Ballantine imagined as a child that everyone in the future would be bisexual and play the electric guitar. His novel Whirlaway, published by Hawthorne Books, is out now. He lives in Chadron, Nebraska, with his wife and son.
moreKrista Bremer lives in Carrboro, North Carolina.
morePema Chödrön directs the Gampo Abbey in Nova Scotia, Canada, and is the author of The Wisdom of No Escape, Practicing Peace in Times of War, and The Places That Scare You.
moreVanessa Hua is the author of Deceit and Other Possibilities and the forthcoming A River of Stars. A columnist at the San Francisco Chronicle, she has written for The New York Times, The Washington Post, and ZYZZYVA.
moreJohn Jodzio is the author of the story collections Knockout and If You Lived Here You’d Already Be Home. He lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and is horribly addicted to burritos.
moreHugh Martin is a veteran of the Iraq War and the author of The Stick Soldiers and the forthcoming In Country. He is currently a PhD student at Ohio University. Before joining the military, he played basketball in leagues around Akron, Ohio, against a younger player named LeBron James.
moreMichael Shapiro has been entranced by ocean life ever since watching Jacques Cousteau specials in the 1970s. He is the author of A Sense of Place, a collection of interviews with the world’s leading travel writers.
moreLauren Slater is the author of Prozac Diary; Opening Skinner’s Box: Great Psychology Experiments of the Twentieth Century; and, most recently, Blue Dreams: The Science and the Story of the Drugs That Changed Our Minds. She lives in Somerville, Massachusetts.
moreRobert Tremmel lives in Ankeny, Iowa, where he is an emeritus professor of English at Iowa State University. He has four books of poetry, most recently The Records of Kosho the Toad. In 1992 he and three others founded the Des Moines Zen Center, where he continues to practice.
morePhotographers
Edwin Barkdoll is a veterinarian who lives with his wife, three dogs, and a cat in Surry, Maine.
moreRachel J. Elliott is the editorial associate and photo editor at The Sun. She lives in Carrboro, North Carolina.
moreKip Evans is a photographer and cinematographer who lives near Monterey Bay, California, with his wife and two children.
moreAriana Harley is a photographer, painter, and native Oregonian. She often spends her winter days working at home in furry pink one-piece pajamas; it’s embarrassing when a deliveryman arrives. You can follow her on Instagram: @arianaharleyphoto.
moreJon Kral lives in Boone, North Carolina. He traveled extensively in the Middle East in the 1980s and 1990s, when he was reporting on the conflicts there for The Miami Herald.
moreLaurie Minor has been a photographer for thirty years. She lives in Ontario, Canada.
morePatricia O’Brien is a freelance photographer who lives in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and travels frequently between Philadelphia and the Susquehanna River Valley.
moreJohn Rosenthal has published a book of photographs, Regarding Manhattan, and is the recipient of a North Carolina Arts Fellowship. He lives in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.
moreZoe Shipley lives in Tualatin, Oregon, where she plays guitar, sings, rock climbs, and takes photographs.
moreRon Terner has run the Focal Point Gallery in the Bronx for more than forty years. According to his wife, he doesn’t have any bad habits.
moreOn The Cover

Anna Ryabtsov was born in Moscow, Russia, and immigrated to the U.S. when she was a child. She’s currently exploring the American Southwest, documenting sand dunes and red rocks. Her photo on this month’s cover, of a man walking through tide pools, was taken at Mile Rock Beach in San Francisco, California.
more
Editor and Publisher
Sy Safransky
Managing Editor
Carol Ann Fitzgerald
Senior Editor
Andrew Snee
Art Director
Robert Graham
Digital-Media Director
David Mahaffey
Manuscript Editor
Colleen Donfield
Assistant Editor
Luc Saunders
Editorial Associate
& Photo Editor
Rachel J. Elliott
Editorial Assistant
Derek Askey
Proofreader
Seth Mirsky
Associate Publisher
Krista Bremer
Business Manager
Rob Bowers
Circulation & Events
Manager
Molly House
Office Manager
Holly McKinney
With Help From
Manuscript Reading
Dave Hart
Nancy Holochwost
Paula Jolin
Gillian Kendall
Rebecca Lanning
Lauren Rose
Hank Stephenson
Proofreading
Erica Berkeley
Has something we published moved you? Fired you up? Did we miss the mark? Send A Letter