Edith Krone (she/her) is a transgender, redneck writer from the beautiful, haunted, and Queer South. A poet at her core, Edith spends her time hiking, working on one of her seven different writing projects, or hanging at home with her cats. She is a founding member of the Northwest Arkansas Writers Nonprofit and a reader for Palette Poetry. Edith loves poetry that pushes form and non-fiction that teaches a broader truth.

Mar Prax (she/her) is a writer from storied Valdez, Alaska. She loves writing stories somewhere between absurdism and magical realism that feature clowns, ghosts, and, of course, dogs. Currently living in Northwest Arkansas, she spends her time biking, hiking, fishing, and collecting comic books. She enjoys readings stories with off-kilter narratives, memorable characters, and an adventurous spirit. Her work is featured in LitSite Alaska and New Plains Review.

Mariya Kurbatova (she/her) is 24, on the fiction track of UArk's MFA program, and vodka cran's #1 fan. She loves literary monsters and sharp portrayals of our modern moment. 

Nicolle Lioncourt is southern fiction writer and a 2nd year in the MFA program of creative writing at the university of Arkansas. She loves three things: her cat Rocket, A Song of Ice and Fire, and Taylor Swift. 

Esra Jackson (they/them) is a trans and genderqueer poet from all around the very wide metro of Kansas City, Missouri. Their work has been published in Divinations Magazine, and navigates grief, faith, and gender as a physical experience in the body. They are excited by poems that are feverish and unwieldy in their language, surprising the reader with each line and speaking with conviction. Generally, you can find them either snacking on sweet potatoes, at the theater on discount days, or listening to horror fiction podcasts while taking walks.

Laurie Marshall (she/her) is a third year fiction candidate in the MFA in creative writing at University of Arkansas so most of the time she is reading and writing and stressing that she’s not reading and writing enough. When she is procrastinating, Laurie shops at thrift stores, performs with a comedy improv group, and feels guilty about the state of her flower beds. She is a firm believer in the transformative power of Militant Optimism and Nacho Cheese Doritos.

Lillian Durr (she/they) is a flash fiction writer and poet from southwest Missouri. Her writing explores performance, rural queer experiences, and childhood through absurd and haunting lenses. Lillian loves reading stories with bold voices and absurd conceits and poems with melancholy in their bones. You can find her work featured in Door Is A Jar Literary Magazine and The Crossroads Review.

“Call me Maggie.” —Maggie

Maggie (she/her/good girl), escaped the stone labyrinth built underneath her former owner’s property and into the craggy, Turkish countryside. Confusing Turkiye with turkey, she sought after the Mystical Wishbone which would grant her deepest wishes–a family. On her long journey to find the Wishbone, she slowly assembled a ragtag pirate crew, and discovered that family isn’t always something you’re born into, but something you find. On her adventures, Maggie contracted scurvy, and after a duel with Dread Pirate Ruffbert, was weak and almost succumbed to her illness. Her crew abandoned her, weak and famished, in a small inland hospital in the Western US. When it seemed all hope was lost, a mysterious country doctor rode in on a pale horse, dropping off the medicine that saved Maggie’s life! When she awoke from her stupor she saw he’d dropped a copy of a literary magazine on the floor of her hospital room, and our dear girl knew then what her life mission was: to become the mascot of the world’s best new literary magazine. (P.S. the horse’s name was Friday.)