A Kansas Journal of Creative Nonfiction
Thank you for taking this journey with us! Since we published our “Beginnings” issue in the spring of 2021, we have shared stories by so many talented writers from across the state. We hope that you are thinking about writing for us, too! | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
As of Issue #5, the animal issue—
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And we have plans for more! | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
How can you help?
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Theme for Issue #6 (May 1 - June 30, 2023 Submission Period):
Landmarks
Remember that our themes are simply prompts to spur your essays. There are so many directions you can go. Surprise us. Engage us. Tell us about places that are ultimately Kansas for you. Tell us stories about those iconic places that stand out in your community, perhaps the legends surrounding them, or the school field trips that first introduced you to them.
Personal essays are welcome, but we are also looking for interviews, journalistic pieces, and more. Do you know the man who keeps the grass trimmed for tourists? Could you interview the people who restored, refurbished, or protected? There are so many true stories that need to be told.
Remember, It must be a true story that happened, all or partially, in Kansas. Can your story leave the boundaries of Kansas? Sure! But you must show us that Kansas connection!
Word count: Let’s say 100 - 3,000 words, give or take. How many words does it take for you to tell your story?
Our preference is original, never-before-published pieces.
We will consider pieces that have been published electronically or in limited-audience, small publication format (such as newsletters) if the author retains the right to publish. No simultaneous submissions, please.
105 Meadowlark Reader does not accept AI-generated stories.
Have fun: When a writer enjoys the process, that positive energy comes through to the reader.
Publishing rights: We are asking for First North American Serial Rights.
Payment: Payment is currently $10 per story and one contributor copy of the journal.
How to submit: File types accepted: .doc, .docx, .rtf
Please submit entries in 12-point Times New Roman with double-spaced lines.
IMPORTANT: Include your author bio at the end of your entry. Your name as printed in this bio is how we will refer to you in the rest of the journal. (Exception: Feel free to use titles and degree designations in the bio, but those titles will not be included in the byline, per Meadowlark style.)
Your bio should include:
Attach a high-resolution author photo in JPG format with your entry.
Submit via Submittable - Meadowlark Press Submission Manager
Limit: you may enter up to two (2) stories per submission period.
Questions? Contact us at info@meadowlark-books.com.
Now we are polishing up this collection of animal stories for delivery to POD Print in Wichita. We are proud of this Kansas product, from our writers whose love of this state is as deep as ours to our "first run" which is always locally printed, to the bookstore partners who have supported us in this endeavor and helped make this journal a reality.
The spring 2023 issue will be shipping to a mailbox near you sometime in early May.
Ah, but what you've arrived here for... the announcement of our winners! Without further ado, the Spring 2023 Ad Astra Awards!
As we prepare to take submissions for issue #5, we are adding something exciting to 105!
Cash prizes!
Cash prizes! Two $50 prizes!
Two $50 Ad Astra Awards for Excellence in Writing will be given to the two pieces in each issue that stand out for us as editor and publisher.
For these awards, we will be looking for masterful use of language, depth to the story/essay/article, a good story well told, and creative use of theme. We’re looking for overall excellence in writing.
$50 for the Editor’s Choice Award
$50 for the Publisher’s Choice Award
When you submit to 105, send us the best piece of writing you can put together.
Consider possible stories for the theme. Write. Revise. Polish it, make it shine. Read it aloud. Proofread. Submit.
Every submission will automatically be considered for these awards.
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Now, specifically, about issue #5. If you’re submitting to our “animal” issue, here are some leads on what we’d like to see land on our desks . . .
Our next theme is “animals.” While we expect to get a few dog and cat stories, we’d love to get a variety of other animal stories as well.
Create your own list of potential animal stories. Some ideas to get that list started . . .
Reptile encounters
Have you met up with bears or bison, owls, deer, perhaps a coyote?
Any critter events while camping? Chiggers, ticks, mosquitoes?
Maybe you’ve worked in a zoo, or have zoo-related stories
Write a profile about your favorite veterinarian.
Have you ever had to have rabies shots?
Experiences with farm animals - horses, cattle, chickens, goats.
Your story could be a personal story, an essay, an interview, a factual article about peacocks or possums, or people involved with animals. Any true story.
But what if you’re writing a story about a bear? Or a shark? While we would like at least part of your story set in Kansas, you could start the story in Kansas and go from there.
We do value having a theme for each issue, it ties all of the stories together with a soft link, but you can also take some freedom with 105 themes. The entire story doesn’t have to be about “an animal.” Take a theme, give it a solid connection to your story, and then run with it.
Our reading period for animal stories runs from November 1 - December 31, 2022.
Other guidelines apply. Find them here: https://www.105meadowlarkreader.com/p/submission-guidelines.html
With music, painting, writing and performance, Teresa Bachman has wrapped herself in the arts her entire life. She has been published in periodicals, newspapers, and poetry books; won historical essay contests, and garnered an honorable mention for a Kansas Authors Club Contest entry. Performing her original scripts, Bachman traveled Kansas and other States as several First-Person Historical Characters on the Kansas Touring Arts Roster and as a member of Ride Into History Performers Group. She considers herself a prairie person and has proudly taken the delights of heartland living to audiences throughout the region and as far away as Japan and Ireland via her first-person character and musical performances. Teresa is a sixth-generation Kansan now living in El Dorado.
Lindsey Bartlett teaches composition and literature at Emporia State University. An Emporian by choice, she lives in the Flint Hills region of Kansas where she spends her days writing in various coffee shops, holed up at home with a good book, or driving the countryside for good photo opportunities. You can find her wherever there is a sunset. Bartlett has published one poetry collection, Vacant Childhood. Her writing and photography have appeared in The Write Bridge, Flint Hills Review, 105 Meadowlark Reader, and The Wyandotte Window.
Boyd Bauman grew up on a small ranch south of Bern, Kansas, with his dad the storyteller and his mom the family scribe. He has published two books of poetry: Cleave and Scheherazade Plays the Chestnut Tree Café. After stints in New York, Colorado, Alaska, Japan, and Vietnam, Boyd now is a librarian and writer in Kansas City, inspired by his three lovely muses. Visit him at boydbauman.weebly.com.
Jenna Brack is a writer, teacher, and celebrator of the arts. She grew up in Hutchinson, Kansas, and attended Kansas State University, where she earned a B.S. in Education and an M.A. in English. Her creative work has appeared or is forthcoming in Every Day Poems, Fathom, The Sunlight Press, Mothers Always Write, Coffee + Crumbs, and others. She currently lives with her family near downtown Kansas City.
Rex Buchanan is the director emeritus of the Kansas Geological Survey. He grew up in Rice County on the edge of the Smoky Hills. He is the co-author of Roadside Kansas: A Traveler’s Guide to Its Geology and Landmarks, Kansas Geology, and Petroglyphs of the Kansas Smoky Hills, all published by the University Press of Kansas, and The Canyon Revisited, published by the University of Utah Press. He records occasional commentaries for Kansas Public Radio.
Cathy Callen was born in Kansas City, Missouri. Since then, though, she has lived mostly in Kansas. Her father worked for Southwestern Bell, and every time he was promoted, the family got to see more of Kansas. They lived in Sunflower, Manhattan, Hays, Salina, Topeka, and Wichita. Her career as a teacher and special education coordinator with Topeka Public Schools kept her in the state for more than thirty years. After retiring, she moved to Lawrence with her soon-to-be husband, Barry, and it is her current favorite Kansas location. She likes the Lawrence Busker Festival, the Art Tougeau parade, the library, The Raven Bookstore, the political environment, the summer pooch swim, Liberty Hall, Wheatfield’s Bakery, and walking on the KU campus and in her friendly neighborhood.
Annabelle Corrick was born and raised in Topeka, lived in five other Kansas towns and three other states, returned to Topeka the last decade, and currently resides in Columbia, Missouri. She earned advanced degrees from Emporia State University and Kansas State University and was the Kansas Authors Club 2015 Prose Writer of the Year. Her writings have appeared in The Poet’s Art, 2016 Kansas Voices Writing Contest, Well Versed, and other publications. Her most awesome Kansas experience has been standing against the wind and viewing the vast vista of western Kansas where her paternal grandparents pioneered.
Jim Dalzell was born and raised in Grandview, Missouri. He now lives in Overland Park, Kansas, and he has been there for the past ten years. He has been with his wife, Amber, for eleven years and married for six of those years. They have a child, Alastair, and two dogs: Feig and Pocket. His favorite spot in Kansas is walking around Massachusetts Street in downtown Lawrence because he is a huge fan of the Jayhawks. One of the most interesting facts he found about Kansas is that it is home to the first Pizza Hut and the first ever White Castle. He also has a publishing credit in a journal called Mind’s Eye from Johnson County Community College.
Michael Durall grew up in the thriving metropolis of Pawnee Rock, Kansas, population 250. He was the champion sentence diagrammer in his sixth grade English class, which eventually led to his writing nine books about his work as a consultant to nonprofit organizations. He lives in Salina and writes a weekly column for the Salina 311 newspaper and has recently published a book of essays from local residents for the Salina Arts and Humanities Commission on the theme of The Day That Changed My Life Forever.
Angel Edenburn is a lifelong Kansan, freelance screenwriter, author, poet, and semi-professional belly dancer. All of her books are “Kansas-centric” and utilize elements unique to Kansas. After growing up in Kanopolis, Kansas, in the shadow of the Fort Harker Museum, she now lives outside Council Grove with her husband and animal “children,” most of them orphans or rescues. She has two blogs—one written in character. Isysthevampire.com is her character blog and Angel’s Musings can be found at angeledenburn.wordpress.com. She has published several novels, a novelette, a poetry book, and two short story books, and published in several niche anthologies. Her newest book, Jaded Moon, is due to be published later this year.
Mark O. J. Esping first lived in a Swede-Town in Pottawatomie County. He graduated from Bethany, a Swedish-Lutheran College. He reprinted NEQUA, a feminist sci-fi novel first published in Topeka, Kansas, in 1900. Mark directed www.folklifeinstitute.com, a nonprofit, and two N.E.A. Folk Art grants. His work has appeared in The Clarion Folk Art, Country Living, Scandinavian Review, Victorian Homes, and Hemslöjden. He is an Eagle Scout and a veteran. He and his wife share a home in Merriam, Kansas, with three near-feral cats. Twin deer occasionally graze in their backyard. Mark tells stories, true stories, with a humorous nature and a hint of morality. In collection they are packets of maps that are Near Invisible, Like Footprints in Ever Shifting Sand.
Caryn Mirriam-Goldberg, PhD, the 2009-13 Kansas Poet Laureate is the author of twenty-four books, including How Time Moves: New & Selected Poems; Miriam’s Well, a novel; and The Sky Begins At Your Feet: A Memoir on Cancer, Community, and Coming Home to the Body. Founder of Transformative Language Arts, she is a beloved writing workshop facilitator and writing and Right Livelihood coach. After growing up in Brooklyn and New Jersey, she fell in love with the big skies of Kansas over forty years ago, and lives with her husband, Ken Lassman, on family land they’re saving through a conservation easement. She loves life-giving collaborations: she offers YourRightLivelihood.com with Kathryn Lorenzen, Bravevoice.com with Kelley Hunt, and TheArtofFacilitation.net with Joy Roulier Sawyer. She offers weekly “Care Packages for a Creative Life” through her Patron.com/carynmg. Find more about her, including her blog, “Everyday Magic” at CarynMirriamGoldberg.com.
Beth Gulley first moved to Newton, Kansas, when she was two. Her family moved to Latin America, but Beth returned to the Olathe area for college where she met her husband. They moved to Paola, Kansas, to raise their family. Beth has advanced degrees from UMKC and the University of Kansas. She teaches writing at Johnson County Community College. Her recent writing is included in Kansas City Voices, Dragonfly Magazine, Kansas Speaks Out, and The Write Bridge. She has published three full-length poetry collections: The Sticky Note Alphabet, Dragon Eggs, and The Love of Ornamental Fish. She currently resides in Spring Hill, Kansas, which gives her easy access to Hillsdale Lake where she enjoys trail running and fishing.
Carolyn Hall is an award-winning author who grew up on a farm outside Olmitz, Kansas. Her childhood on the farm provided wonderful memories which she shared in her book, Prairie Meals and Memories: Living the Golden Rural. It was named to the Kansas Sesquicentennial’s Best 150 Books list. Her stories and poems have appeared in Chicken Soup for the Soul, The Christian Science Monitor, The Kansas City Star, and various anthologies. She lives in Lenexa, Kansas.
Roger Heineken grew up in rural Atchison County. Emporia has been his home since 1969 when he transferred to Kansas State Teachers College (now Emporia State University). Heineken retired from an ESU career working in the first student union building west of the Mississippi River. Writing is a relatively new endeavor for Heineken who values non-fiction and storytelling. One of his pieces was included in the inaugural issue of 105 Meadowlark Reader. Heineken loves sharing local history as a step-on guide for day trippers and reunion groups for the Visit Emporia Bureau through his Magical History Tours. Should you meet Roger, ask him about “Bonton,” the 3,500-lb circus hippopotamus, that died in 1930 Emporia. He wasn’t there then but knows the story.
Jerilynn Jones Henrikson, a retired English teacher, has always loved teaching, telling, reading, watching, and writing stories. To date, Jerilynn has published nine children’s picture books, an adult memoir, and a young adult historical fiction novel. Her work reflects her sense of humor, love of words, and talent for detail. Jerilynn finds her inspiration in the rolling hills of east central Kansas. No matter the subject of a current work, she is motivated by the people, history, and changing seasons of this place. As a student of history and language, she enjoys traveling to beautiful places. But ultimately, she finds the greatest joy in travel is coming home. www.prairiepatchwork.com
Jennifer Broadstreet Hess has been working as a freelance writer and photographer for the past nine years. She has had a passion for writing since she was young. Jennifer was born in Wichita, Kansas, and raised in Elk County. She then married and raised her children in Marion. She was hired as a Field Editor for Country and Birds and Blooms Magazine four years ago. She felt compelled to write about her travel adventures with her family, sharing the beauty of the Flint Hills Region, and other Kansas landscapes, her favorite spot being the Tallgrass Prairie Preserve region for hiking and the native wildflowers that grow there, primarily the Kansas sunflower. It reminds her of childhood backroad trips with her parents.
A lifelong Kansan, Connie Hocking grew up in Cawker City. Yes, home of the World’s Largest Ball of Twine! After marrying a Saline County farmer, she and her husband Jim raised three children on the family farm west of Salina. In 2020 she retired after twenty-three years at the Salina Public Library, fifteen of those years as the Interlibrary Loan Coordinator, where she connected with people all across Kansas. Now she enjoys having no alarm clock, cooking and canning, and keeping up with her four grandchildren, a granddaughter in Texas, and three little seventh-generation farm boys just a quarter mile down the road.
Thomas N. Holmquist is a fifth-generation farmer and rancher near Smolan, Kansas. He also is a retired teacher in the Smoky Valley School District having taught music, American History, and agriculture for forty-four years. He has also published three books, including Pioneer Cross, Swedish Settlements Along the Smoky Hill Bluffs, Bluestem, a novel, and Salemsborg, A History of the Salemsborg Church and Community, Volume 1, 1869-1939, for which he won the Award of Commendation for Lutheran Church History from the Augustana Historical Association. Tom has several writing projects in the works in between feeding cows, putting up hay, and planting and harvesting crops.
Delphine Holston was born in Abilene, Kansas, and has lived in the area all her life. After graduating from Abilene High and Marymount College, she began her teaching career in Abilene. She married a farmer and lived south of Abilene until he retired and they moved to town. She taught in elementary schools in Abilene and Chapman districts for thirty-one years. She enjoyed doing creative writing and poetry with her students, and she writes in her journal every day. Before she was widowed in 2004, she and Gene enjoyed traveling and volunteering. She loves seeing their three children and five grandchildren who live in Topeka, Denver, and Helena, Montana. She has been volunteering at Memorial Hospital and Great Plains Theater for twenty-five years.
Beth Inwood grew up in Hamilton, Kansas. Living there all her life, except while she attended college to receive her teaching degree, Beth started out on a farm and the family moved to town when she was in high school. She attended the Methodist Church. Beth was a 4-H Club member for ten years. After graduating from college, she had a variety of occupations ranging from teacher to bank employee to vice president of an oilfield corporation. After retiring from teaching, Beth took a job at the local post office and city library. Currently she substitutes at the school and the library, loves to garden, feed the birds, and quilt, as well as other arts and crafts. Her favorite thing about Kansas is the sunflowers.
Deb Irsik was the owner of Makin’ Waves Salon in Emporia, Kansas, and retired from the beauty industry after twenty-five years. She is a Kansas girl and shares her life with her husband Mike, and children John and Emily. Deb is a member of the Kansas Authors Club and Emporia Writers Group. Deb’s favorite thing about Kansas is the people. “Most people in Kansas have a strong work ethic and family values. The beautiful Flint Hills and Kansas sunsets are second to none. What’s not to like?” Poetry and lyrics have always been part of her life, but she felt a call to write middle-grade Christian fiction after her daughter found it difficult to be “that God girl” in eighth grade. “It is my hope that my books will encourage young people to hold onto values and faith as they navigate their teen years.” Deb’s “Heroes by Design” series was completed in 2020, and she hopes to dedicate her time to creating a book of poetry and continuing to write essays, prose, and fiction. Deb can be found online: facebook.com/D.A.Irsikauthor, Twitter:@Writerwannabe1, www.dairsik.com, amazon.com/author/dairsik, https://instagram.com/debirsik/
Miriam Iwashige lives on a three-acre property outside of Partridge, Kansas, near where her preacher-farmer dad and mom raised twelve children. She aims to live large from this small place, just as the land and sky around the property suggest. Reading, earning a bachelor’s degree, teaching, conversing, and traveling have often fostered large living, as did homeschooling her children and investing deeply in many aspects of homemaking, gardening, animal husbandry, nature study, and church and community life. She and her Japanese-immigrant husband parented three sons who all live nearby right now. Those who have joined their sons’ families through marriage or birth (nine grandchildren!) spent childhood years in such diverse places as Bangladesh, Kenya, El Salvador, and Washington state.
Sally Jadlow grew up in Ft. Scott, Kansas. After marriage, she and her husband moved to Overland Park. Teaching creative writing for the Kansas City Writers Group is one of her joys. She writes historical fiction, inspirational stories, devotionals, and poetry. Sally has published thirteen books. Her work has appeared in many compilations including Chicken Soup for the Soul and many other publications. Her books are available on Amazon.com. Sally also loves to bake, cinnamon rolls, her specialty. Family Favorites from the Heartland contain her favorite recipes. The eastern Kansas countryside with its gently rolling hills claims Sally’s most favorite area of the state. She believes what Dorothy says, “There’s no place like home,” is true—if you live in Kansas.
As assistant director of the Center for Great Plains Studies at Emporia State University, Julie Johnson honed her writing skills developing “Plains Talk,” a series of public service announcements for radio. Focusing on interesting facts about the Great Plains, the series found an audience throughout the region. Julie also developed a sharp eye for editing and proofreading with her work on the journal Heritage of the Great Plains. Now retired, she continues to chronicle her travels with her blog that has evolved to include her musings and observations about gardening, aging, and life in the middle of the country. Her blog “Julie’s Garden of Life” is available at johnsonjulie45.wordpress.com.
Mary-Lane Kamberg is a professional writer, editor, and speaker from Olathe, Kansas. She is co-leader of the Kansas City Writers Group and founder and director of the I Love to Write Camp for kids. She coached competitive swimming for forty years for the Homestead Country Club, Olathe Cyclones, and Kansas City Blazers. She is the author of The “I Don’t Know How to Cook” Book and books for young writers: The I Love to Write Book, The I Love to Write Stories Book, and The I Love to Write Poetry Book. She has published more than thirty nonfiction books for middle school and high school libraries from Rosen Publishing and Britannica. She has swum with dolphins, ridden an elephant, and been kissed by a camel.
Doug Kjellin was born and raised on a Marion County farm in Kansas. Growing up, he had the idyllic childhood of farm life. From the drudgery of chores in the winter cold to the hot summer Sunday fishing at the creek, Doug grew up in a loving and hard-working farm family.
Doug resides in the same house, on the same farm, where he grew up. He shares the home with his wife of thirty-six years and their two German Shepherd dogs. If he is not working on the homeplace, Doug likes to tend to a special area near the creek called “Doug’s Park.” Doug also enjoys making wooden items and playing the bass guitar.
Amy Deckert Kliewer has lived her entire life in Kansas. She grew up in Pawnee Rock, Kansas, and went to high school in Larned. After attending Bethel College and graduating from the University of Kansas, Amy lived and worked in the Kansas City metro area as a civil engineer. Recently retired, Amy and her husband moved to North Newton to enjoy the smalltown feeling and be close to family. She is enjoying exploring her Next Chapter.
Nancy Julien Kopp grew up in the Chicago area and moved to Kansas, her adopted state and home, in 1975. She started writing in her mid-fifties, realizing a long-held dream. She has been published in many anthologies, including twenty-three times in Chicken Soup for the Soul books, in addition to publication on websites, in magazines, and in newspapers. She writes creative nonfiction, including personal essays and short memoir pieces, and also poetry, short fiction for children, and articles on the craft of writing. Nancy and her retired husband live in Manhattan, Kansas, and are strong supporters of all things K-State. She is mother to two and grandmother to four. She is a voracious reader and enjoys playing bridge. www.writergrannysworld.blogspot.com
Marilyn Hope Lake, PhD, writes short fiction, poetry, plays and children’s picture books. She has many awards for writing, including through the Kansas Authors Club contests. Dr. Lake’s first-place story, “Harry’s Stone,” was published in Words Out of the Flatlands; Kansas Writers Association. Lake has been published in Rock Springs Review, STIR, Well-Versed: Literary Works, the Gasconade Review, and the Mizzou Alumni Magazine. Marilyn lived in Hutchinson, Kansas, from 2002-2017, is a Kansas Authors Club ten-year member, and was a facilitator of the 2014 Annual Conference. Her Kansas favorites are the Wichita Art Museum, State Fair, Underground Salt Mine, Delos V. Smith Senior Center, Hutchinson, and others. Although she misses her Kansas friends, she is happy to live with her dog, Hugo, and near family in Columbia, Missouri.
A Kansan through and through, Sandee Lee celebrates being published in every edition of 105 Meadowlark Reader. Her favorite writing topic for nonfiction and fiction is Kansas. The turmoil of the mid-1800s in the Lawrence area is the topic of her current fiction project. Relaxing on her porch with her two border collies lying by her feet and watching cattle graze on the hillside is where you’ll find Sandee most evenings except in the winter months. From that porch she can observe the homestead where her family has lived since 1925.
Errin D. Moore, an emigrant from Montana, has called Kansas home for eight years. She lives in the Flint Hills near Leon with her husband, infant son, and eighteen-year-old stepson—along with their menagerie of chickens, turkeys, geese, pigs, and an overabundance of cats. She fell in love with the unique beauty Kansas offers, most especially the magnificent sunsets. Errin and her husband own Able and Ready Appliance Repair. She runs the office from home while raising Oliver. She was a teacher and administrator for nineteen years, and she owned and operated a bookstore in El Dorado. Her humorous, touching, and unique sense of voice is especially effective when she writes about the joys and challenges of being a first-time mother at the age of forty-four.
Julie Nischan is a country girl who was taught on the family farm that no matter your job, put your best effort into it. She loves writing, cooking and baking, her pets, and her husband. (Not necessarily in that order!) She also enjoys spending time with her friends and making people laugh. She is a native Kansan who currently resides in Topeka.
She is an active member of Kansas Writers Inc since 2019. Julie has self-published three books, Misspent: My Life in Retail, and a cookbook, The Substitute Cook. Her third book, I Belong to the Country is a collection of short stories from her childhood on the family farm in northeast Kansas. Her books are available on Amazon.com and Lulu.com.
Audrey Phillips is a Kansan through and through. She grew up in Overland Park, attended the University of Kansas, and is now living in Kansas City, Missouri. Audrey loves to represent her favorite parts of being a Kansan by cheering on her Jayhawks or Chiefs or Sporting Kansas City. Audrey loves Kansas because of the way everyone feels like family here. She is a proud midwesterner and strives to promote the kindness that midwesterners possess. She has always loved to write, even from a young age. She was and continues to be inspired by her famous Aunt Mary-Lane Kamberg who has published many books in her time as an author. Even though now she lives right across the state line, Kansas will always be her home.
Katie Pownell grew up in Newton, Kansas, and is a graduate of Emporia State University, with a BA in English. She also attended the ESU Creative Writing graduate program for a year before pursuing a life of world-travel and many address changes. She currently divides her time between Newton and San Francisco, where she works on various projects in the start-up industry.
Cynthia Schaker (Cindy), a retired Kansas educator of thirty-seven years, grew up on a farm outside of Hamilton, Kansas, in Greenwood County. Cindy taught grades six through eight at Towanda Grade School and served as school counselor at Circle Middle School in Butler County. One of her favorite places in Kansas is the Flint Hills because they remind her of going home. She currently resides in El Dorado, Kansas, with her rescue dog Moxie. Cindy does volunteer work in the Gift Shop at Susan B. Allen Memorial Hospital in El Dorado. She serves as President of the SBAMH Auxiliary. She loves humorous writing and penning stories from her childhood. She recently had her humorous murder mystery play performed at Cardinal Creek Farm in Butler County.
TinaRae Scott currently resides in Morris County with her favorite cowboy, their three children, three dogs, a herd of cattle, and a charm of hummingbirds. TinaRae has worked for nonprofits for the past two decades, currently serving as the resource librarian for the Council Grove Public Library. She also volunteers in her community, the region, and across the state speaking for public education. She is enamored each spring with the beauty of the Flint Hills and feels very fortunate to be able to reside within the tallgrass prairie. While Council Grove has been her home for the last twenty years, she has also resided across the state in Wichita, Goddard, Olathe, Emporia, Ellis, Sycamore, and Olpe.
Julie A. Sellers was raised in the Flint Hills near the small town of Florence, Kansas. She currently resides in Atchison, Kansas, where she is an Associate Professor (Spanish) and Chair of the Department of World Languages and Cultures at Benedictine College. Julie’s creative work has appeared in publications such as Cagibi, Wanderlust, Unlost, The Write Launch, and Kansas Time + Place. Julie was the 2020 Kansas Authors Club Prose Writer of the Year, and the Overall Poetry Winner (2022) and Overall Prose Winner (2017, 2019) of the Kansas Voices Contest. She is the author of Kindred Verse: Poems Inspired by Anne of Green Gables (Blue Cedar Press, 2021) and the novel, Ann of Sunflower Lane (Meadowlark, 2022).
Perry Shepard is a Vietnam veteran who has written two novels: The Hero versus Me and Monkey Jo, and Hard Love. He co-wrote two plays in the anthology titled Annabelle. He won a second-place award in Eber and Wein’s Best American Poetry of 2013, and an honorable mention in Writer’s Digest 84th annual Poetry Competition. Perry is a member and former District 2 president of Kansas Authors Club. He makes his home in Eudora, Kansas.
A month after the sudden death of her second husband, Anne L. Spry had a mystical dream that detailed a new business based on capturing personal history for writing memoir. She had already begun publishing books through Createspace for herself and others following a twenty-seven-year career as a newspaper publisher and editor. Since the fortuitous dream, Spry and partner Cheri Battrick have developed a DIY Memoir Kit and Spry has expanded her book publishing to some two dozen titles under the Personal Chapters LLC banner. They include children’s books, memoir and fiction, and a few titles authored by Spry. Anne serves as President of District 1 of Kansas Authors Club and produces a newsletter for that group and another for a local Sweet Adelines group. She is married to a retired military pilot, and they live on a family acreage south of Topeka where Anne spent her first five years.
Carolyn Tillotson was born and raised in Little Rock, Arkansas. After graduating from the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville she moved to southern California where she worked for a group of weekly newspapers. Later, after a year at the Joplin News Herald in Joplin, Missouri, on the city hall and police beat, she worked for Associated Press, covering the Kansas legislature. In Topeka, Kansas, she met her future husband, a law student. Years later she had the opportunity to serve as a Kansas state senator from Leavenworth. It was harder than it had looked as a reporter. She is now retired, living in Leavenworth.
Chuck Warner is a lifelong Kansan. After growing up in Wichita, he has lived in Lawrence since first attending the University of Kansas in the 1960s. With business and law degrees, he embarked on a nearly forty-year career in business and banking. After he retired in 2008, he began writing about his maternal grandfather and in 2019 Birds, Bones, and Beetles: The Improbable Career and Remarkable Legacy of University of Kansas Naturalist Charles D. Bunker was published by the University Press of Kansas. In 2020 his book was recognized as a Kansas Notable book, and also won awards for the best Kansas history and best book layout from the Kansas Authors Club, and was a finalist in the High Plains Book Awards.
Barbara Waterman-Peters is an artist by training and a writer by chance. Both pursuits have come together over the years in her articles about art and artists for such publications as Topeka, Kansas, and New Art Examiner magazines, in her book cover paintings for authors such as Marcia Cebulska’s Watching Men Dance, and in her collaborations with poets, most recently, Two Ponders: A Collaboration with Dennis Etzel, Jr. Co-owner of Pen & Brush Press with author Glendyn Buckley, Waterman-Peters illustrated their first two children’s books, The Fish’s Wishes and Bird which won awards from Kansas Authors Club. She co-wrote and illustrated their third book, TING & the Caterbury Tales, which came out this spring. Recently her fiction piece, “The Critique,” appeared in The Pen Woman and her creative non-fiction and poetry have been included in several anthologies. She lives in Topeka and her studio is in the NOTO Arts & Entertainment District. She spent five years living in rural Jackson County and Holton.
Cat Webling is an actress and author based in Kansas. She loves everything mad and macabre, philosophical and silly, so that’s exactly what she writes! Scifi, fantasy, and poetry are her mainstays when she’s not writing about literature, theater, gaming, or fan culture. She currently has a novel, a couple of short story collections, and several poetry collections under her belt. She works as an editor for SUPERJUMP Magazine, is an active member of the Kansas Authors Club, and daylights as a copywriter for hire. Cat writes from her home in Russell, which she shares with her loving partner, adorable son, and several very cute cats. You can find her work at www.catwebling.com.
Anne Welsbacher grew up in Wichita and returned in 2006. Despite allergies to her beloved prairie grasses, she has kept them close throughout her life. Her plays are Last Chance Liquor, Radiating Like a Stone (Best Citywide Ensemble), Pardon My Dust (Best Citywide Comedy nomination), Road to Rouen, and The Miracle of Father Kapaun, among others. Her plays have been commissioned, produced, and stage read in Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Kansas City, Denver, and Wichita. Anne has published fiction, poetry, and critical essays in Pendulum, Mikrokosmos, The Wichita Eagle, The Minnesota Daily, and other publications. She writes creative nonfiction and has published nonfiction articles and books on the arts, science, biography, and the environment. Welsbacher.com.
