Diane Ackerman has been the finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Non-fiction in addition to many other awards and recognitions for her work, which include the international bestsellers The Zookeeper's Wife and A Natural History of the Senses.

She lives with her husband Paul West in Ithaca, New York.

Brian Evenson is the author of a dozen works of fiction.

He has been a finalist for the Edgar Award and the Shirley Jackson Award, and has won an International Horror Guild Award and American Library Association's award for Best Horror Novel.

He lives in Los Angeles and teaches at CalArts.

Karen Russell, a native of Miami, has been featured in the New Yorker's debut fiction issue, was chosen as one of Granta’s Best Young American Novelists in 2007, and was named one of New Yorker magazine's 20 Under 40.

Her first collection of short stories, St Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves, was longlisted for the Guardian first book award. Her novel, Swamplandia!, was longlisted for the 2011 Orange Prize and shortlisted for the 2012 Pulitzer Prize.

Altogether Karen has now won 2 National Magazine awards and had 4 of her stories published in Best American Short Stories. Both Swamplandia! and Vampires in the Lemon Grove have been US bestsellers. And in 2013 Karen won a MacArthur 'Genius' Grant. She lives in Portland, Oregon.

John Edgar Wideman's books include, among others, American Histories, Writing to Save a Life, Philadelphia Fire and Brothers and Keepers. He won the PEN/Faulkner Award twice, won the Prix Femina Etranger, and has twice been a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the National Book Award. He is a MacArthur Fellow and a recipient of the Lannan Literary Award for Lifetime Achievement and the PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in the Short Story. He divides his time between New York and France.