Wendy Call

Wendy Call is the 2009 Distinguished Northwest Writer in Residence at Seattle University. She also teaches creative writing at Pacific Lutheran University and Seattle's Richard Hugo House  where she was the 2006-2008 Writer in Residence. Wendy is co-editor of Telling True Stories: A Nonfiction Writers' Guide (Plume/Penguin 2007). Her narrative nonfiction, essays, and poem translations have appeared in more than 30 magazines and journals in seven countries.

Lawrence Cheek

Architecture, cities, nature, environment, prehistoric civilizations, the American Northwest and Southwest, and, of course, boats—these are the things I look into and write about. I’ve been a professional journalist and author since the age of 15. I have a journalism degree from Texas Tech University, a graduate-level browse through architecture history at the University of Arizona, and 17 years of reporting and editing experience in daily newspapers. Since 1998, I’ve taught nonfiction writing in the University of Washington Educational Outreach Department. Beginning in 2008, I’m also teaching nonfiction in the Whidbey Island Writers Association’s MFA program. My wife, Patty, and I live on Whidbey Island, Washington, where the salty moat of Possession Sound provides us with just the right degree of separation from Seattle’s urban commotion.

 

Warren Read

Warren Read is a writer who teaches elementary school on Bainbridge Island, Washington. He earned a Master of Education from Western Washington University in Bellingham, Washington. His book, The Lyncher in Me, was released in March of 2008 by Borealis Books. It was selected as the headlining title for their spring collection. Currently, he is knee-deep in a meticulously researched historical fiction project set during WWII America. Shortly after Warren attended the Whidbey Island Writers Conference in 2006, he signed a publishing contract for The Lyncher in Me. He lives on five garden-filled beautiful acres with his partner of 12 years and three active, strong-willed and adorable sons, ages 8, 11 and 14.  www.thelyncherinme.com

Wayne Ude

Wayne Ude, M.F.A. is the author of Becoming Coyote, Buffalo and other stories, Maybe I Will Do Something:  Seven Tales of Coyote (for ages ten and up), and the fine press limited edition Three Coyote Tales. His stories have appeared in Ploughshares, North American Review, and The Last Good Place, among others. After receiving an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Massachusetts, he taught creative writing and directed writing programs at universities for 17 years. Since 1993 he's lived, written, and taught on Whidbey Island, in addition to teaching writing through correspondence and online courses. He is partner of Blue & Ude Writers’ Services and the Director of the Whidbey Writers Workshop MFA Program 

Carolyne Wright

Carolyne Wright has published eight books of poetry, four volumes of translations from Spanish and Bengali, and a collection of essays. Her latest collection, A Change of Maps (Lost Horse Press, 2006), nominated for the LA Times Book Awards, finalist for the Idaho Prize and Alice Fay di Castagnola Award from the PSA, won the 2007 Independent Book Publishers Bronze Award for Poetry.  After a return trip to Chile this past fall, she is completing her investigative and literary memoir, The Road to Isla Negra, portions of which have received the PEN/Jerard Fund and the Crossing Boundaries Awards.  Wright, who served on the Board of the AWP from 2004-2008, moved back to her native Seattle in 2005, and teaches for the Whidbey Writers Workshop MFA Program, the U of Washington - Bothell, and Seattle's Richard Hugo House.  In 2008, she was Thornton Writer in Residence at Lynchburg College and Distinguished Northwest Poet at her alma mater, Seattle University.