Lee van der Voo is an award-winning investigative and environmental journalist whose reporting has appeared in Propublica, The New York Times, The Guardian, The Atlantic, High Country News and others. Her work has been supported by significant awards and fellowships, including an Oregon Book Award for her first book, The Fish Market. Lee’s second book, As the World Burns, chronicles a year in the life of the 21 youth plaintiffs who sued the federal government over climate change in the landmark lawsuit Juliana v. United States. It was released in September 2020.
Michelle Ruiz Keil is a Latinx writer and tarot reader with an eye for the enchanted and a way with animals. Her critically acclaimed debut novel, All of Us With Wings, was called “a transcendent journey” by The New York Times. A San Francisco Bay Area native, Michelle has lived in Portland, Oregon, for many years. She curates the fairytale reading series All Kinds of Fur and lives with her family in a cottage where the forest meets the city.
Thomas Mitchell was raised in New York and California, but has lived in Oregon since 1980. He received his Masters from California State University, Sacramento, where he studied with the poet, Dennis Schmitz. He received an MFA from the University of Montana, where he worked with Richard Hugo and Madeline De Frees. His first collection of poems, The Way Summer Ends, was published in 2016, followed by his second book, Caribou, in 2018. His new collection, Where We Arrive was released this year, in 2021.
David F. Walker is an award-winning comic book writer, filmmaker, journalist, and educator. Walker is best known for his work in graphic novels and comics, which includes The Life of Frederick Douglass and The Black Panther Party (Ten Speed Press), the Eisner Award and Ringo Award-winning series Bitter Root (Image Comics), and the Eisner Award-nominated series Naomi (DC Comics). He has written for Marvel Comics (Luke Cage, Occupy Avengers, Power Man and Iron Fist, Nighthawk, Fury, Deadpool) and DC Comics (Cyborg, Young Justice). He also teaches part time at Portland State University.