Peter Turchi is author of the novel "The Girls Next Door", a collection of stories, "Magician", & a book of non-fiction, "The Pirate Prince". He is Director of the MFA Program for Writers, Warren Wilson College.
Andrea Barrett was born on July 17, 1965. She has taught in the M.F.A. program for writers at Warren Wilson College, and has been a visiting writer at several other colleges and universities, as well as teaching frequently at conferences such as the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference. Barrett was also a juror for the 1998 O. Henry awards for short stories. Barrett received the Distinguished Story Citation from Best American Short Stories in 1995 for The Littoral Zone and the National Book Award in 1996 for the short story collection Ship Fever and Other Stories. She is a recipient of a fellowship from the Guggenheim Foundation. Scientific discovery is a theme in several of Barrett's short… stories, as well as in her 1998 novel The Voyage of the Narwhal. However, another type of discovery often takes place as her characters struggle to overcome unhappiness by coming to a better understanding of themselves and of life in general. Her other novels include Lucid Stars, Secret Harmonies, The Middle Kingdom, and The Forms of Water. Barrett also contributes short fiction to periodicals such as Mademoiselle and Prairie Schooner. Andrea Barrett resides in Rochester, New York.
Novelist and screenwriter Richard Russo was born in Johnstown, New York on July 15, 1949. He received a Bachelor's degree, a Master of Fine Arts degree, and a Doctor of Philosophy degree from the University of Arizona. He taught at numerous colleges including Southern Illinois University Carbondale and Colby College. He has written numerous books including Mokawk, The Risk Pool, Straight Man, Bridge of Sighs, and That Old Cape Magic, as well as a short story collection, The Whore's Child. His novel Empire Falls won the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and Nobody's Fool was made into a movie starring Paul Newman, Bruce Willis and Melanie Griffith. He also co-wrote the 1998 film Twilight with… director Robert Benton and the teleplay for the HBO adaptation of Empire Falls.