Monique Manatch is a member of the Algonquins of Barriere Lake. Monique is a Knowledge Keeper working closely with Algonquin Elder Albert Dumont. Currently, Monique is a student at Carleton University taking a doctorate program in Anthropology focusing on the impact, use and creation of digital arts in the Indigenous community. Her Master’s Degree is in Indigenous and Canadian Studies with a specialty in Digital Humanities. Monique also holds a post graduate diploma in Indigenous Policy and Administration.
Silvia Moreno-Garcia is the author of the novels Velvet Was the Night, Mexican Gothic, Gods of Jade and Shadow, and a bunch of other books. She has also edited several anthologies, including the World Fantasy Award-winning She Walks in Shadows (a.k.a. Cthulhu’s Daughters).
Kevin Hearne is into nature photography, heavy metal, and beard maintenance. He likes to plan road trips and sometimes even takes them. He is the New York Times bestselling author of The Iron Druid Chronicles, the Ink & Sigil series, and the Seven Kennings series, and is co-author of The Tales of Pell with Delilah S. Dawson.
Brandon Crilly has been previously published by Daily Science Fiction, Fusion Fragment, PULP Literature, Flame Tree Publishing and other markets. He’s also an Aurora Award-nominated podcaster, reviewer, conference programmer, history teacher and Dungeon Master for a bunch of other writers. Clearly he needs more projects.
Annette Mocek first encountered SF and F when she was given a set of Narnia books for her seventh birthday. One thing led to another; Tolkien, Bradbury, Clarke, etc. At university, she dabbled in computer science and astronomy, majored in English Lit and graduated as a librarian. In retrospect, working at the Spaced Out Library (now renamed the Merril Collection) was inevitable. In addition to raising two children, Annette has volunteered at several non-profit organizations. She has created skating costumes, props and promotional material, and has also performed as a soprano soloist.
Annette is a former treasurer of SF Canada, a former board member of the Ad Astra Science Fiction Convention, and has served as a juror for CSFFA’s Best of the Decade Aurora Awards.
Waubgeshig Rice is an author and journalist from Wasauksing First Nation. He has written three fiction titles, and his short stories and essays have been published in numerous anthologies. His most recent novel, Moon of the Crusted Snow, was published in 2018 and became a national bestseller. He graduated from the journalism program at the university formerly known as Ryerson in 2002, and spent most of his journalism career with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation as a video journalist and radio host. He left CBC in 2020 to focus on his literary career. He lives in Sudbury, Ontario with his wife and two sons.
Burlington-based artist, Lana Kamarić is a self-taught painter from Sarajevo, Bosnia. Working with oil, acrylic, watercolour and mixed media her cosmic, surrealist style creates a visual language for abstract concepts such as identity and the subconscious. She approaches each painting as an opportunity to introspect and explore her fascination with science, nature and metaphysics.
Sienna Tristen (they/she) is an author, poet, and literary organizer. Her award-winning fantasy novel The Heretic’s Guide to Homecoming came out from indie arts collective The Shale Project in 2018, and you can find her poetry in Augur Magazine. While the sun is up, Sienna works with The Word On The Street Toronto, one of Canada’s biggest book festivals; once it goes down, their time is spent finishing their second novel and playing with their baby bearded dragon.
Liz Westbrook-Trenholm has published or aired mainstream and speculative short fiction on radio, in magazines and in anthologies, most recently in Seasons Among Us (Laksa Media), Over the Rainbow (Exile Press), Tesseracts 22 (Edge) and Amazing Stories. She won the Prix Aurora Award for short fiction in 2018 and had stories nominated in in 2019 and 2020. She lives in Ottawa with her husband, Hayden Trenholm and electronic pets, Bright Eyes, the Shrodinger’s Cat decision maker, and Oreo, the robo-vac. Bright Eyes likes to ride on Oreo and take swipes at our angst.
Suyi Davies Okungbowa is a Nigerian author of fantasy, science fiction and general speculative work. His latest novel is Son of the Storm, first in the epic fantasy trilogy, The Nameless Republic. His debut godpunk fantasy novel David Mogo, Godhunter (Abaddon, 2019), won the 2020 Nommo Ilube Award for Best Speculative Novel by an African. His shorter works have appeared in various periodicals and anthologies and have been nominated for various awards. He earned his MFA in Creative Writing at the University of Arizona, and currently teaches at the University of Ottawa.
Kate Heartfield‘s debut novel, Armed in Her Fashion, won Canada’s Aurora Award for 2018, and her novella Alice Payne Arrives was a finalist the same year. Her short stories and interactive fiction have also been shortlisted for the Nebula, Locus, Sunburst and Crawford awards. A former newspaper journalist, Kate lives near Ottawa, Canada. Her next novel, The Embroidered Book, is coming out in 2022.
Premee Mohamed is an Indo-Caribbean scientist and speculative fiction author based in Edmonton, Alberta. She is the author of novels ‘Beneath the Rising’ (Crawford Award, Aurora Award, British Fantasy Award, and Locus Award finalist) and ‘A Broken Darkness,’ and novellas ‘These Lifeless Things,’ ‘And What Can We Offer You Tonight,’ and ‘The Annual Migration of Clouds.’ Her next novel, ‘The Void Ascendant,’ is the final book in the Beneath the Rising trilogy and is due out in March 2022. Her short fiction has appeared in many venues and she can be found on Twitter at @premeesaurus and on her website at www.premeemohamed.com.
‘Nathan Burgoine is a tall queer writer of mostly shorter queer fiction. His first novel, Light, was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award, and his first YA novel, Exit Plans for Teenage Freaks, was a finalist for a Prix Aurora Award. He mostly writes shorter fictions and novellas somewhere in the Venn diagram of spec-fic and/or romance, but always queer. His next YA novella is included in Three Left Turns to Nowhere, and comes out in February 2022 from Bold Strokes Books. He lives in Ottawa, Canada, with his husband Dan and their rescued husky. You can find him online at nathanburgoine.com.
Amal El-Mohtar is an award-winning writer of fiction, poetry, and criticism. Her stories and poems have appeared in magazines including Tor.com, Fireside Fiction, Lightspeed, Uncanny, Strange Horizons, Apex, Stone Telling, and Mythic Delirium; anthologies including The Djinn Falls in Love and Other Stories (2017), The Starlit Wood: New Fairy Tales (2016), Kaleidoscope: Diverse YA Science Fiction and Fantasy Stories (2014), and The Thackery T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities (2011); and in her own collection, The Honey Month (2010). Her articles and reviews have appeared in the New York Times, NPR Books and on Tor.com. She became the Otherworldly columnist at the New York Times in February 2018, and is represented by DongWon Song of HMLA.