2018 Panelists - Myths and Legends Con

We love to bring talented members of our community in to do interesting panels and events! Our announced guests appear below.

A.M. Burns

A.M. Burns lives in the Colorado Rockies with his partner, several dogs, cats, horses, and birds. When he’s not writing, he’s often fixing fences, splitting wood, hiking in the mountains, or flying his hawks. He is a former president of the Colorado Springs Fiction Writers Group. You can find out more about A.M. and his writing at www.amburns.com, or follow him on twitter @am_burns

Aaron Michael Ritchey

Writing as Aaron Michael Ritchey, he is the author of numerous short stories, and he’s appeared in several anthologies alongside such authors as David Farland and Brandon Sanderson. He’s also the author of seven well-received young adult novels including the award-winning Long Live the Suicide King. His epic sci-fi western series, The Juniper Wars, is available now through Kevin J. Anderson’s WordFire Press. The first three books have all been nominated for InD’Tale Magazine’s YA Speculative Fiction novel of the year.
Writing as Aaron Crash, he is the co-author of War God’s Mantle: Ascension (Shadow Alley Press) and other over-the-top sci-fi/fantasy novels. He’s been an Amazon All-Star and his books have broken into Amazon’s Top 100.
He lives in Colorado with his wife and two daughters but frequently travels to writers conferences and comic cons across the U.S. selling books at Bard’s Tower, meeting fans, and collecting pen names.

Visit his website at www.aaronmrit

Aaron Spriggs

Scientist by day, rock star by night. I’m the poor man’s Buckaroo Banzai. I go to Burning Man every summer as as a band tour (not always in the USA). I’ve worked at Superfund Sites as well as natural history museums.

Alastair Mayer

Amalie Howard

Amalie Howard is the best selling, award winning author of several young adult novels critically acclaimed by Kirkus, Publishers Weekly, VOYA, and Booklist, including Waterfell, The Almost Girl, and Alpha Goddess, a Spring 2014 Kid’s INDIE NEXT title. Her debut novel, Bloodspell, was a #1 Amazon bestseller, and the sequel, Bloodcraft, was a national IPPY silver medalist. She currently resides in Colorado with her husband and three children. Visit her at www.amaliehoward.com.

Amy Armstrong

Amy is a Licensed Professional Counselor with a group practice in Denver’s picturesque Capital Hill neighborhood. She works primarily with young adult clients facing life transitions.

Outside of the office, Amy writes science fiction and memoir, reviews books, runs through the woods for the Dystopia Rising LARP, and haunts Denver’s open mics.

Amy loves live storytelling and has already been a guest at Stories Stories at the Mercury Cafe and Mortified at the Oriental Theater.

Amy Griswold

Amy Griswold is a professional seamstress with over thirty years of experience in clothing construction and industrial sewing. She is self-taught and also worked as an apprentice in her sister’s shop where she learned techniques in alterations, custom clothing design, reupholstery, canvas work, as well as large scale production industrial sewing. Her body of work includes everything from wedding gowns and costuming to boat covers and custom reupholstery. Her motto is “show me a picture and I can make it for you.”
She has taught basic sewing and machine sewing to numerous homeschool and scouting groups and has taught reuphostery techniques at JoAnn Fabrics. Her drive for teaching is to take the fear and mystery out of sewing and show people it’s easier than they think.
Currently she is designing costumes and cosplay items for her family members and working on a new line of Neo-Victorian and Steampunk clothing and accessories for her on-line shop.

Ana MacDonell

Ana was born and raised in Spain, and came here 25 years ago. She is been a congoer for +30 years. She is a pirate, alien, trekkie, walking dead, shieldmaiden, companion, Sith, Stark, Gryffindor, Pikachu, Asha’man, mystery lover, and all around pun

Andrew Mayne

Award nominated author, WSJ best seller, host of A&E television’s Don’t Trust Andrew Mayne and is star of an upcoming special for Discovery Channel’s Shark Week.

His Edgar and ITW Thriller Award nominated Jessica Blackwood series is about a female FBI agent who pursues crimes that appear supernatural, was nominated for the ITW Award.

As a magician, he started his first world tour when he was a teenager and went on to work behind the scenes for Penn & Teller, David Blaine and David Copperfield. He’s also the host of the Weird Things podcast, winner of the Podcast Award for best science series.

Anne Holland

Holland is the Community Engagement and Exhibits Manager at the Space Science Institute, located in Boulder Colorado. Holland manages exhibit programs at the institute, including a new exhibit on exoplanets. Holland’s research interest was in planetary geology, but now that she’s moved into the education realm, she prefers exoplanets. Holland specializes in creating unique exhibit interactions around real science topics, including her favorite interactive “Science Fact or Fiction”.

Ben Yalow

Ben has been to about 800 conventions, and worked on about a third of them, from gofer to Worldcon Chair Staff and Division Head.
He also edited four books for NESFA Press, two of which were nominated for the Hugo Award.

Bill

Bill has been gaming for over 30 years, and people keep coming back to play, so he must be doing something right. Bill wa the layout designer and art director for Hero Games, Silverback Games, and Blackwyrm Publishing. His first book, The Widening Gyre, is a world of steampunk and sorcery for Savage Worlds and the HERO System. Known as “The Bunny” (for reasons we are unable to explain), Bill claims to have been elected President in an rigged election, conquered the Midwest, been shot and killed at least once, sworn (and achieved!) vengeance on the gods themselves, crowned himself King of the World, become the arch-enemy of a llama, deposed the Pope, and had torrid love affairs with several well-known movie starlets. It is unlikely that any of these things are actually true, but it’s best to just humor him when he gets like this.

Bill Farrand

Dr. Bill Farrand is a Planetary Geologist with the Space Science Institute with a lifelong interest in space exploration (and science fiction!). He has a PhD in the Geosciences from the University of Arizona and has worked on numerous government and commercial remote sensing programs. He currently is a member of the Mars Exploration Rover science team and is involved in other Mars and Earth science research programs. Dr. Farrand is the Director of the Space Science Institute’s Center for Mars Science and is the first author of over 20 peer-reviewed publications as well as a number of popular science articles. He is an avid rock climber and a big fan of dogs.

Bill Laubenheimer

Bill was introduced to filk on his first serious date with his wife. At his first science fiction convention, the filk room was the first place he went. He’s still there, writing and sharing original lyrics and music with his filk friends.

Blair Bartlett

Blair has been doing photography of one type or another say back in the 4th grade. After trying his hand at various different forms, he decided about 4 years ago to stop selling his services as a photographer and instead concentrate on photography as an artform. He has been showing his work in various local convention art shows ever since. Blair also does all his own matting, and photographs his wife’s Mitzi’s sculptures. When not working on his art or working the mundane job, Blair spends what little free time he may have playing Pokemon Go (Team Mystic for the win!) or roaming around with dinosaurs in Ark: Surtvival Evolved. Blair lives with his lovely wife of 30+ years, Mitzi, and their feline overlords Koda and Sparo.

Billy Van Ark

Billy has been helping out behind the scenes at Denver conventions since early 2013. Contributing part tech support, part treasurer, part teacher of chainmaille, he does his best to make everything run smoothly.

Blair Bartlett

Blind Lemming Chiffon

Blind Lemming Chiffon is a blues comedian and singer/song-rewriter from Denver. He writes song parodies and is a performer and fan of pre-WW2 country blues, thus leading to his name, which is a parody of a blues name.

His days in fandom go back at least to his first con in 1977, and he’s he’s attended 18 Worldcons, starting in 1979.

He and Kathleen Sloan are co-directors of filk programming, after doing the same thing at Denvention 3, and swearing, “Never again!”

Brenna

Creators of handmade stuffed animals, Brenna and Jessica are proud to bring you fun and easy canvas painting & stuffed animal classes! See the Whimsical Whiskers booth in the Vendors Room and adopt your snuggly dragon friend today!

Bret Carter

Brett Glass

Brett Glass is an Electrical Engineer, science nonfiction author, inventor, multi-instrumentalist, and songwriter based in Laramie, Wyoming. Known to the computer community as the author of Borland’s “Turbo Pascal Tutor” (which taught tens of thousands of people to program) and as a columnist for some of the earliest computer magazines (Dr. Dobb’s Journal of Computer Calisthenics and Orthodontia, BYTE, PC World, PC Magazine, InfoWorld, and Boardwatch), he helped to bring up the modern Internet as a graduate student at Stanford. He later founded LARIAT, the world’s first wireless ISP, which has been operating for 25 years. He played bass in Avalon, the first band formed by Music guests of Honor Margaret Davis and Kristoph Klover, and will be reuniting with them for performances at the convention.

Brett J Baker

Brett Baker is an independent author and publisher, and a graduate of the University of Colorado. He is unmarried, and he lives in Denver, CO. For more information about Brett or his books, please visit http://www.brettbaker.ws.

Brian Douglass

Brian Ziman

Brian Ziman has studied Applied Physics, Computer Science, and Linguistics, and is currently a software engineer for Google. For fun, he has translated the Tales of Beedle the Bard back into Ancient Runes. Brian is a board member of Shiny Garden, the non-profit organization that hosts Myths and Legends Con.

Carol A Berg

Former software engineer Carol Berg is venturing into unknown territory. After fifteen epic fantasy novels that have won national and international awards, including three Colorado Book Awards and the Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Adult Literature, she’s attempting to write short(er). So far, so good. Her stories have appeared in the BlackGuards anthology (2016) and the Hath No Fury anthology (2018). She has a fantasy-detective story in Pulp Literature magazine (Issue 10), and a novelette follow-up to her award-winning novel Song of the Beast in the Lace and Blade 4 anthology (May 2018). Carol is most excited right now about a Secret Project in the works. News coming soon!

Carole I. Parker

Carole’s detail focus works well in her more than 30-year publications career including technical writing and technical editing, as well as her interests in costuming, dyeing, and wearable art. She has competed in masquerades and won numerous workmanship awards for her dyework. Carole has served on numerous concoms, including Helsinki Worldcon, and is a member of the San Jose Worldcon Programming Team.

Carolyn Kay

Carolyn Kay enjoys writing about an eclectic variety of things, and imagining what normally inanimate objects would do if given life. She is currently collaborating with award-winning illustrator, Chaz Kemp, on the World of Ashelon, a series of novellas set in a steampunk fantasy world. When she’s not writing, she can be seen dancing with Batavia, a tribal fusion belly dance troupe, knitting or playing with her beloved cats. You can catch up on her latest shenanigans at carolynkayauthor.com.

Casey Jones

Catherine Winters

Catherine Winters writes urban fantasy, women’s fiction, and literary fiction. She is an undefeated four-time Chopped champion and a former model. When she’s not writing or cooking, she enjoys teaching French to cats. At least one of these things is actually true.

Chaz Kemp

Bram Stoker Award finalist Chaz Kemp embraces an Art Nouveau style that incorporates vibrancy and color into fantasy and steampunk art in a way that is rarely seen. As an illustrator, the influence of Alphonse Mucha is evident in his award-winning work that combines the artistic energy of the Roaring 20s with the untamed diversity of steampunk and fantasy. You can find his art at ChazKemp.com or better, become his patron at: Patreon.com/ChazKemp

Chris Gilbert

Connie Willis

Connie Willis is the Hugo- and Nebula-Award winning author of DOOMSDAY BOOK, TO SAY NOTHING OF THE DOG, CROSSTALK, and BLACKOUT/ALL CLEAR. She’s a SFWA Grand Master and has been inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame.

Cori

Massage therapy is, first and foremost, a practice of tension release. Healthy touch by itslf is tension-releaving and light and firm tissue work can take that to amazing heights.

In an industry focused on healing, self-improvement, recovery and pretty much any other term that can make you feel like you are unable to relax without our help, Reworks strives to stand out by choosing instead to say that we are simply working together as client and therapist to invoke change: to Rework the body.

Since 2015, Reworks has been providing self-care services to geeks et al, one byte at a time. Now delivering the best to your door for gatherings, events or for yourself let the Wizard Rework, Relax and Return you to your happy, healthy self.

Corie Weaver

Corie Weaver is co-editor of The Young Explorer’s Adventure Guide series, a yearly anthology of science fiction for middle grade readers with a focus on diversity and representation. She and her husband also run Dreaming Robot Press, a small publishing house devoted to middle grade and young adult science fiction and fantasy.

Courtney Willis

Courtney Willis was a science teacher for over 50 years. He was a real teacher for 25 years, teaching high school physics and chemistry. Then for the next 25 years or so he was a physics professor at the University of Northern Colorado. Dr. Willis Started attending Science Fiction Conventions about 40 years ago with his wife who is now a grand master of Science Fiction. He has regularly appeared on science panels and done science demonstrations at Mile High Con, COSine, and Bubonican. He has a large collection of slide rules and more recently started collecting sewing machines. He loves to talk about science, slide rules, and sewing machines at any time.

Cymru Roberts

Cymru Roberts’ first novel The Dark Prince came out in 2012. It’s about two best friends who become drug dealers in order to be cool, and find out what happens when you fly too close to the sun. His second novel Itinerary for the Hopeless was released by Line by Lion in 2017. A spiritual sequel to The Dark Prince, Itinerary follows a young man as he quits college in order to pursue his dreams as a homeless person walking the streets of Las Vegas. For those enchanted by gothic literature and romanticism, look no further.

Dan Dubrick

Dan Dubrick, Aerospace Historian

Known to many in northwest US fandom since1978, Kahboi (pronounced Cowboy in English) has been going to conventions as a panelist since CascadiaCon in 2005. He currently follows most of the Space Agencies in the world, including the European Space Agency, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, Roscosmos, Chinese National Space Administration, and the Indian Space Research Organization.

Dan has also witnessed space launches as an accredited journalist representing SpaceBase (including the US Space Shuttle) and on his annual holidays he can be found prowling the aerospace bone yards of the Arizona desert studying American aerospace history (but they still won’t let him into the B-52 that dropped the X-15).

Dana Bell

Dana Bell enjoys writing regional Colorado tales and has lived in various other places, which serve as settings for her tales. Some star the many cats she’s been owned by. Her works include her novels Winter Awakening and God’s Gift, a cat vampire short story series, and various others. She has edited several anthologies including Different Dragons, Different Dragons 2, Supernatural Colorado, Love ‘em, Shoot ‘em and Extinct? For fun, Dana builds and decorates doll houses and colors in her coloring books.

David Gerrold

David Gerrold is the author of over 50 books, hundreds of articles and columns, and over a dozen television episodes. He is a classic sci-fi writer that will go down in history as having created some of the most popular and redefining scripts, books, and short stories in the genre.

TV credits include episodes from Star Trek (“The Trouble With Tribbles” and “The Cloud Minders”), Star Trek Animated(“More Tribbles, More Troubles” and “Bem”), Babylon 5 (“Believers”), Twilight Zone (“A Day In Beaumont” and “A Saucer Of Loneliness”), Land Of The Lost (“Cha-Ka,” “The Sleestak God,” “Hurricane,” “Possession,” and “Circle”), Tales From The Darkside (“Levitation” and “If The Shoes Fit”), Logan’s Run (“Man Out Of Time”), and others.

Novels include When HARLIE Was One, The Man Who Folded Himself, The War Against The Chtorr septology, The Star Wolf trilogy, The Dingilliad young adult trilogy, the Trackers duology, and many more sci-fi classics.

Additionally, the autobiographical tale of his son’s adoption, The Martian Child, won the Hugo and Nebula awards for Best Novelette of the Year and was the basis for the 2007 movie, Martian Child, starring John Cusack, Amanda Peet, and Joan Cusack.

Dr. Tim Slater

Dylan Edwards

Dylan Edwards is the author of Transposes, which was a Lambda Literary Award Finalist in 2013 for Best Transgender Non-Fiction; Politically InQueerect: Old Ghosts and Other Stories; and Valley of the Silk Sky, which was a DINKy Award finalist for Best Webcomic. His comics have also appeared in numerous anthologies, including the Ignatz Award-winning QU33R (Northwest Press, 2013), the Lambda Literary Award-winning No Straight Lines (Fantagraphics, 2012), and the Lambda Literary Award-winning Beyond Anthology (Beyond Press, 2015). He is the recipient of the National Lesbian & Gay Journalists Association’s 2016 Award for Excellence in Transgender Coverage for his comic “How I Told My Grandma I’m Transgender,” and the 2017 Prism Award for Best Short Form Comic for “Nothing Wrong With Me.”

Eddie Cross

Elizabeth Vann-Clark

Math teacher, costumer, makeup artist,and convention organizer while chasing two sets of twins. Elizabeth is a busy fan with over a decade of experience in the PNW fan community.

Elwin Cotman

Elwin Cotman is an urban fantasy author from Pittsburgh, PA. He is the author of two story collections, The Jack Daniels Sessions EP and Hard Times Blues. As a touring writer, he has read across North America

Emily Hardegree-Ullman

Dr. Emily Hardegree-Ullman is an instructor in the Physics Department at Colorado State University. She earned her PhD from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute where she studied the chemical composition of young stellar systems. Emily discovered the fascinating subject of astrobiology while an undergraduate at the University of Arizona. Her prior research projects include searching for methane lakes on Titan, investigating the evolution of protoplanetary disks, and observing extrasolar planet transits.

Eneasz Brodski

Eneasz spends his free hours writing, producing a bi-weekly podcast on Bayesian rationality (www.TheBayesianConspriacy.com), and a different bi-weekly podcast of rationalist fiction (www.HPMoRPodcast.com). Every summer he can be found wrangling one of the Literature Track rooms at Denver Comic Con. He blogs at www.DeathIsBadBlog.com

His work has previously appeared in Asimov’s Science Fiction and Analog Magazine. One of his works is a 2016 Sidewise Award for Alternate History finalist, another has been reprinted in Wilde Stories: The Year’s Best Gay Speculative Fiction, and he’s a Writers of the Future winner.

Erin Card

Erin is an award-winning aficionado and advocate of all things costume and couture. A seamstress, designer, and costumier 20 years in the making, she loves to bring her wealth of knowledge to the table and convince those in her presence, and not, to come to the shiny, make-it-yourself side (we have brownies).

Frank Carry

Fred Capp

Born in California, he has called Alaska, and Colorado home, has worked as anything from an olive picker in Greece, a shepherd in Norway, a recording studio engineer in Germany, and a industrial draftsman in less exotic climes. Fred has had occasion to be chased by a polar bear, driven under a moose (It was a small car), lovingly licked by a fox and helped rescue wild skunks from getting unnecessarily run-over.
He is also speaker of Esperanto, a Filker, a Vegetarian and a Baha’i. In other words… a really weird guy, some folks even like him.

Guy Anthony De Marco

Guy Anthony De Marco is a speculative fiction author; a finalist for the Scribe and Bram Stoker Awards; winner of the HWA Silver Hammer Award; a disabled US Navy veteran, a prolific short story and flash fiction crafter; a novelist and poet; an invisible man with superhero powers; a game writer; and a coffee addict. One of these is false.

A writer since 1977, Guy is a member of the following organizations: SFWA, ITW, WWA, SFPA, IAMTW, ASCAP, RMFW, MWG, SWG, HWA. He hopes to collect the rest of the letters of the alphabet one day. Additional information can be found at Wikipedia and GuyAnthonyDeMarco.com.

Hal C. F. Astell

Hal is a film critic and author of five books on film who owns and runs the Apocalypse Later International Fantastic Film Festival. He’s a prolific book reviewer for The Nameless Zine and he maintains AZFandom.org, a history of Arizona fandom.

He co-founded and co-runs the Arizona Penny Dreadfuls. He’s Vice Chair and Secretary for LepreCon, Inc. and a member of CASFS and WesternSFA. He was Vice Chair of Westercon 70, where he also ran Publications. He hosts Apocalypse Later Roadshow sets at conventions across the southwest.

Heather Preston

Astrophysicist, planetarium director, filker, Irish music enthusiast and paranomasiac, Heather Preston joins us from SW Florida, where her 13.4-meter dome planetarium is guarded by a 3.5-meter alligator… or two. Heather serves as Planetarium Director for the Calusa Nature Center & Planetarium in Fort Myers, FL. She got her first job in astronomy as an undergraduate at MIT, assisting the Voyager Plasma Physics group during the Voyager 2 encounter with Jupiter. She has done research at Berkeley’s Space Sciences Lab, taught physics at the US Air Force Academy, and been an Operations Astronomer at the (Hubble) Space Telescope Science Institute. She is currently assisting in data reduction and analysis for the Kepler “K2” extended mission but is looking forward to TESS data. About running the planetarium, she says, “It’s all the fun of showing people about the incredibly cool things going on in astronomy and space science, without the grading!” First SF book (age 7) “A Wrinkle

Holly Collins-Tomazin

Holly Collins is the Owner of Adventures in Dance, a Partnership Ballroom, Latin, Swing and Salsa dance studio.

Adventures In Dance teaches everyone from beginning dancers with two left feet to practiced steppers experienced in dance.

For the past several years Holly Collins-Tomazin has been producing Historically accurate princess dances on location at Colorado castles. She then shares these productions with Quest Club for Kids, and Frontier Girls. Children of all ages can then earn badges for learning dance and history.

As a result of Holly’s research, she has been asked to speak on the history of dance at local events and conventions. So take a dance adventure back in time with Adventures in Dance.

Ian Brazee-Cannon

At the dawn of time there was a crack in reality. Through this tear in time and space emerged beings of unfathomable power bent on shaping the destiny of the universe towards their sinister goals. Great battles that would drive any lesser beings insane raged on as reality took shape during this chaotic period. In the end the universe was spared by the self destructive nature of these beings, fighting each other into nonexistence until none were left.

Uncounted ages later, on a small planet that often is unnoticed by the rest of the universe, Ian Brazee-Cannon was born. A story teller from a young age, he became a writer, film maker, game designer and podcaster. Over a dozen of his short stories have seen publication. ‘The Fifth Di…’, ‘Wondrous Web Worlds’, ‘Forgotten Worlds’, ‘Tales of the Talisman’ and various anthologies have featured his works. You can hear him discuss all manner of subjects as one of the founders and regular co-hosts on the Amateur Skeptics podcast.

Ian Thomas Healy

Ian Thomas Healy is an author of superhero and speculative fiction and the creator of the Just Cause Universe of superhero novels. His publishing company, Local Hero Press, focuses upon high-quality crossgenre speculative fiction.

J.A. Campbell

When Julie is not writing she’s often out riding horses in the Colorado mountains, or working sheep with her dogs, Bran and Kira. She’s the author of many Ghost-Hunting Dog stories and other YA and Adult books. She belongs to the Horror Writers Association and the Dog Writers of America Association. Find out more at http://www.writerjacampbell.com

J.D. Harrison

J.D. Harrison is a lifelong horsewoman, often found in the uncommonly intelligent company of her horse, Smoke. She believes in soul satisfying relationships with animals, conversation with genuine people, supporting her friends and reading voraciously.

With over a decade of experience squiring at a championship tourney, and a long term love affair with all things medieval and renaissance, she brings to life the culture of jousters and their unorthodox lifestyle. Chivalry isn’t dead, it’s just in hiding.

Gallant Hearts- giving falling hard a whole new impact!

J.L. Forrest

J.L. Forrest is the author of short fiction and novels for the likes of Analog Science Fiction and Fact, Crossed Genres, the Robot Cowgirl Press, and others. His work ranges from hard-science fiction to forays into weird western and nukepunk. His most recent collection of short fiction, Minuscule Truths, is available through Amazon and booksellers everywhere, and he is the author of multiple novels, including the beautiful and haunting Requies Dawn, a tale of the far future and an undying love.

Travelling the world, Forrest studies the cultures, histories, myths, ideas, and hopes of the places and people he encounters. The best fictions, he believes, reflect back upon ourselves and our culture the deeper truths of our own existence. Fiction has the power to transform us.

A nomad of sorts, Forrest has often scribbled from the snowy Rocky Mountains, the misty forests of the Pacific Northwest, the ancient landscapes of Vikings, and the Eternal City of Roma, Italia.

Jack Skillingstead

On his birthday in 2001 Jack Skillingstead learned he was a winner in Stephen King’s On Writing contest. He has been publishing professionally since 2003. Jack’s stories have been reprinted in various Year’s Best volumes and translated into multiple languages. The collection Are You There and Other Stories appeared in 2009, as did Jack’s first novel, Harbinger. In 2013 the novel Life On The Preservation, based on Jack’s short story of the same title, was a finalist for the Philip K. Dick Award. He has also been shortlisted for the Sturgeon Award. In March 2019 John Joseph Adams Books / Houghton Mifflin Harcourt will publish The Chaos Function, a science fiction thriller. Jack lives in Seattle with his wife, writer Nancy Kress.

Jaime Harold

Jaime has a PhD in space plasma physics, and in a previous life used supercomputer models to study “space weather”… how the solar wind affects Earth’s magnetic field, damages spacecraft, and generates aurora. For the last couple of decades he’s focused on science education in out-of-school environments – museums, libraries, and online. He’s done work for the National Science Foundation and NASA, worked with scientists to help them become more engaged in science education, and has been involved in projects ranging from science center exhibits about Mars and life beyond Earth, to digital science games like Starchitect — a Farmville-esque Facebook game about solar system evolution.

James A. Hunter

James Hunter is a full-time ink slinger, a member of SFWA, and the author of the Yancy Lazarus Series (Urban Fantasy), Legend of the Treesinger (Urban Fantasy), the litRPG epic Viridian Gate Online, and War God’s Mantle (High Fantasy)! In addition to writing, James also runs a non-traditional publishing company, Shadow Alley Press, with his wife, Jeanette (who is an amazing business partner and an even better wife).

James is a former Marine Corps Sergeant, combat veteran, and pirate hunter (seriously). He’s also a member of The Royal Order of the Shellback—’cause that’s totally a real thing. And, a space-ship captain, can’t forget that. Okay … the last one probably isn’t true. When not writing or spending time with family, James occasionally finds time to eat and sleep.

James Van Pelt

James Van Pelt teaches high school English in western Colorado part time and writes the rest of the time. His fiction has made numerous appearances in most of the major science fiction and fantasy magazines. He has been a finalist for a Nebula Award, the Sturgeon Award, the Colorado Blue Spruce Young Adult Book Award, and been reprinted in many year’s best collections. His first novel, Summer of the Apocalypse, was released in 2006 and was named a Best Book for Young Adults by the American Library Association. His third collection of stories, The Radio Magician and Other Stories, received the Colorado Book Award in 2010. His latest collection, The Experience Arcade and Other Stories debuted at the World Fantasy Convention last year. He blogs at http://jamesvanpelt.com

Jason Henry Evans

Jason always wanted to be a writer, he just didn’t know it. He grew up in Pasadena, Ca. in the 1980s. Watched way too many movies and too much television. He graduated from UC Santa Barbara in 1996 with degrees in History & Renaissance Studies. After wasting his youth he fell in love with his wife and moved to Colorado in 2004. He taught in Denver Public Schools for nine years before realizing teaching was not his life’s calling. He graduated from the UC Denver in 2012 with a masters in History. Currently Jason lives in Denver with the fetching Mrs. Evans, and way too many pets. He signed with Shadow Alley Press in January.

Jeff Bohnhoff

Jeff Bohnhoff is a professional musician, songwriter and recording engineer/producer. With his wife Maya, he has released 6 CDs including 3 albums of hilarious parodies of classic rock songs, and 3 albums of beautiful original songs. He has also produced albums for Seanan McGuire, Nancy Freeman, Mary Crowell, Betsey Tinney, Twotonic (Katy Dröge Macdonald and Steve Macdonald) and Harmony Heifers, Char McKay and Scott Snyder. Midichlorian Rhapsody, a spot-on parody of Bohemian Rhapsody from Jeff and Maya’s parody album Grated Hits, went viral on Youtube, and won a Pegasus award in 2014. Jeff and Maya have been frequent musical Guests of Honor at cons all over the US and the world, including the UK, Germany and Canada.

Jeff Sturgeon

Jeff Sturgeon’s work has graced hardback and paperback books, ebooks, magazines, CDs and album covers, and video games. His work has been displayed in the Science Fiction Hall of Fame. In a former life, Jeff was a long-time computer game artist/art director, most notably with Electronic Arts Seattle.

Jennifer Rose

J. Rose writes middle grade epic fantasy with the Rocky Mountains outside her window and her ferrets at her feet. In her other life, she’s a trained opera singer. She holds a black belt in Tae Kwon Do, and studies other martial art styles for research, including Jujitsu. When she’s not having fun on the Twins of Orion series, she can be found hiking, biking, or spending time with friends. Since finishing her first ‘novel’ at the age of 15, she continues to have a passion for telling stories that make a difference. While the first book will officially be released November 1st, special pre-release copies will be available at MALCon.

Jessica Lauren Gabarron

Jessica Lauren Gabarron has been enchanted with the written word from the moment she first learned how to write a complete sentence in school. Jessica has lived in many states in the USA, and most recently, has called Colorado her home for the last fourteen years. During the day, she works with the loan department in a bank, but she spends her nights dabbling in more fun hobbies and crafts. When her fingers aren’t busy flying over the keys of her laptop, Jessica is also a licensed massage therapist. Jessica can be found in several places on the internet, including the Sidekicks anthology, Adventures in Zookeeping anthology, Domesticated Velociraptors anthology, and Shatter Your Image anthology.

Jim Humble

James Humble lives in Colorado and attends or mails artwork to shows across the country. He paints mostly digitally and sculpts in clay. James’ art is mythically themed and was heavily influenced by a three year stay in Europe. You can see his work online at: www.humblestudios.com

Jodi M Franklin

With several published short stories, aspiring author Jodi M Franklin, is currently producing her first novel. She writes in several genres, including steampunk, si-fi, and fantasy.Moonlighting as a bartender by night provides endless inspiration for unique characters and social conflict. She writes by day with her dog Jasper at her feet, and with the support of her fiancee.

John Hertz

Infected fandom with Regency Dancing. Three-time Hugo finalist as Best Fanwriter. Big Heart Award. Fan Guest of Honor at Westercon 57. At cons, leader of SF Classics talks and Art Show tours, panel moderator, Masquerade judge or M.C. Sent to 2007 Worldcon by HANA (Hertz Across to Nippon Alliance), 2010 Worldcon by DUFF (Down Under Fan Fund). Fanzine, Vanamonde; collections, West of the Moon, Dancing and Joking, On My Sleeve, Neither Complete nor Conclusive. Favorite non-SF authors, Chuang Tzu, Maimonides, Nabokov, Sayers.

John Morse

Kate Hatcher

Kate Hatcher is a writer, disability advocate, RPG fan, cs guru, voracious reader, world-builder and stay-at-home mother of an autistic giggle factory named Ireland. The chair of Westercon 72/NASFiC bid 2019, and president of Utah Fandom Organization.

Kathleen Sloan

Kathleen Sloan has been a filker since 1976 and has been reading science fiction even longer. In 2007 she was inducted into the Filk Hall of Fame. Her song “Take It Back” won the Pegasus award for best classic filk in 2016

Ken Lizzi

Ken Lizzi lives in Oregon with his wife, daughter, books, home brewing gear, and antique weapons. And a cat. When he’s not lawyering he writes fiction. All right, he writes more fiction. His novels “Reunion” and “Under Strange Suns” are available from Twilight Times Books. “Thick As Thieves” is available from Alternate Universe Press. He still dislikes writing about himself in the third person.

Kent Bloom

Kent started reading SF before he was 10 years old (a long time ago). He attended Discon II in 1974, MidAmeriCon in 1976, and hasn’t missed a Worldcon since. He joined the Washington Science Fiction Association in 1975, and was active in that club and its Disclave conventions until he was transferred to Colorado Springs in 1991. Kent is a founding member of First Friday Fandom of Colorado Springs. Kent started working on Worldcons at Iguanacon in 1978, where he was a radio operator and operations staff member. He chaired Denvention 3 in 2008. He is currently President of the Worldcon Heritage Organization, which collects and displays artifacts from Worldcons.

He has volunteered at Division Head and Department Head levels at Worldcons around the world, including Great Britain, Canada, and Australia. He has also chaired and been secretary for Worldcon and Westercon Business Meetings.

Kevin Frost

Kevin began in fandom as an avid costumer, and did a stint in the Virginia Opera costume shop to hone his skills. Since a downsizing move, those boxes have never been opened again. He has been a sailor on both naval vessels and tall ships and obtained BS in Math in an attempt to transition to a more respectable lifestyle. Now he has turned hand to writing and editing while sailing the vast sagebrush seas of northern New Mexico. He is lead editor at the Gallery of Curiosities, a retro-vintage oriented fiction anthology podcast and zine.

Kevin Ikenberry

Kevin Ikenberry is a life-long space geek and retired Army space operations officer. A former manager of the world-renowned U.S. Space Camp program, Kevin has a distinguished background in space science education. His debut science fiction novel Sleeper Protocol was a Finalist for the Colorado Book Award and called “an emotionally powerful debut” by Publisher’s Weekly. Kevin’s other novels include Vendetta Protocol, Runs In The Family, Peacemaker, and Honor The Threat. Kevin lives in Colorado with his family and can be found online at www.kevinikenberry.com.

Kevin J. Anderson

Kevin J. Anderson is the author of 140 novels, 56 of which have appeared on national or international bestseller lists; he has over 23 million books in print in thirty languages. Anderson has coauthored fourteen books in the DUNE saga with Brian Herbert, over 50 books for Lucasfilm in the Star Wars universe. He has written for the X-Files, Star Trek, Batman and Superman, and many other popular franchises. For his solo work, he’s written the epic ; SF series, The Saga of Seven Suns, a sweeping nautical fantasy trilogy, “Terra Incognita,” accompanied by two progressive rock CDs (which he wrote and produced). He has written two steampunk novels, Clockwork Angels and Clockwork Lives, with legendary drummer and lyricist Neil Peart from the band Rush. He also created the popular humorous horror series featuring Dan Shamble, Zombie P.I., and has written eight high-tech thrillers with Doug Beason.
He and his wife, bestselling author Rebecca Moesta, have lived in Colorado for 20+ year

Kevin Roche

Kevin Roche, the chair of Worldcon 76, has been making costumes since he was 8. In his secret identity at IBM Research Almaden, he wrangles giant robot vacuum chambers and electrons, and as an IBM Q Ambassador, explains the weird world of quantum computers to audiences around the world.

Kevin and his husband Andy Trembley set out in 2002 to bring Costume-Con back to California, and ~900 costumers showed up. They threw an olive tasting/bid hoax party at Westercon, and ended up co-chairing Westercon 66 for nearly 800 people in Sacramento. Andy chaired the successful SJ in 2018 bid; and now Kevin is now the Chair of the 2018 Worldcon.

He created Thinbot, a barbot that won gold at Robogames 2012, 2013, 2015 and 2016, and often serves visitors to their parties at cons, and for the Worldcon bid, Kevin created the SJ Galactic LIght Tower, a 32’ tall copy of the historic San Jose Electric light tower, including 3000 animated LEDs. It won the gold medal for Static Art Bots at the 2018 Robo

Kevin Standlee

Kevin Standlee was co-Chair of the 2002 Worldcon. He is a director of SFSFC, Inc. (1993, 2002, and 2018 Worldcons, 2000, 2011, and 2013 Westercons) and of CanSMOF (2009 Worldcon), and he is currently Chair of the WSFS Mark Protection Committee. Kevin’s first SF convention was the 1984 Worldcon, and he has worked on conventions in roles from gopher to Worldcon Chairman. Kevin is an expert on the rules of Worldcon and Westercon. His other hobbies include trains and rail transit. Kevin is a computer programmer for an international supply-chain management company, working from his home in Fernley, Nevada.

Kim Klimek

Dr Klimek is currently working on a textbook, The Global Middle Ages, a comparative work surrounding medieval concepts on a world stage. Her other projects include the use of graphic novels in history classrooms, and PTSD and medieval Crusade veteran

Kimberly Keane

Kimberly lives a secret life of playing with large data sets, caring for her four-legged, furry dragon, and answering questions for her adult children like: “How do taxes work,” “What’s a copay,” and “Should I opt out of my 401k plan?”

She also writes speculative fiction and spends an inordinate amount of time in coffee and tea shops.

Kris Wildman

Kris Wildman’s varied professional career has included roles in regional musical theatre, national tours as principal soprano with Gilbert & Sullivan repertory company Opera a la Carte, chorister & soloist in various concert & sacred venues. She co-founded Campanile, which took traditional English Handbells into percussion theatre, touring internationally. Kris’s graduation recital (MFA in Voice, CalArts 2006) was all music by living American women, then she met composer Maria Newman and joined her house concert chamber music series. Since moving to rural Oregon (Selma), Kris has formed local house concert partnerships. As a voice teacher, she emphasizes healthy technique for all styles. Introduced to Filking by Filthy Pierre’s Convention Calendar in Isaac Asimov’s SF Mag, Kris first filked with him at LA Con II in 1984. Now a regular at filk circles, Kris also duos as Resounding with Callie Hills (Echo’s Children), & is honored to sing her 1st solo filk concert at Wes

Kristoph Klover

Kristoph Klover is a singer songwriter guitar player and studio engineer, co founder of the bands Avalon Rising and Broceliande. With his wife Margaret Davis, he made the famous Starlit Jewel album. The only American sanctioned LOTR Tolkien album.

Lannie Pihajlic

Lara Beckwith

Lara is a Library assistant At Hoffman Library and grew up doing historical reenacting and sewing. She created the first Sewing Lab at the Aurora Public Library where she teaches all levels and ages to sew.

Laura K. Sida

She has Bachelor of Science in Nursing and studied International Humanitarian Assistance at Fordham University.
She started as a Pediatric Oncology nurse, taking time off to volunteer as a surgical ward nurse on the Africa Mercy, a hospital ship that performs surgery in Africa. She works on a disaster response team for the Federal Government, responding to hurricanes in the U.S. She worked in an Ebola treatment center, and educated on infection control in Freetown, Sierra Leone. She worked in a clinic in a Refugee camp in Iraq. Currently working at Denver Health, in general pediatrics and maternal health.

Laurey (L.F.) Patten

L.F. (Laurey) Patten has often characterized her diverse interests as “A.D.D of the right brain.” Degreed in history and anthropology, her checkered career has included work as an archaeologist on Medieval castle sites in England, a Smithsonian tour guide, history teacher, herbalist,
book editor, actress, singer and pottery/jewelry instructor. She has also been a writer for more than 30 years, publishing both articles and short stories. Her debut novel, the heroic
fantasy The Talent Sinistral, launched at World Fantasy Convention in 2014, was written in loving tribute to fellow right-brainers everywhere

Lee Moody

Losing Lara

Losing Lara is an avid YouTuber, posting weekly videos ranging from nerd-themed songs to convention vlogs. She has been playing guitar and writing music for almost 4 years. Her songs highlight the fandoms of Harry Potter, Firefly, Captain America, and more. She has participated in the Yes All Witches Wizard Rock tour and performed at WhimsyCon 2018, MALCon 2017, and GeekyCon 2016.

Lou J Berger

Lou J Berger is a Denver-based writer who tends to focus on Science Fiction. He’s been writing for nine years and is a full member of SFWA. He’s mostly been published in Mike Resnick’s GALAXY’S EDGE magazine, but also has stories in various anthologies.
His website is: www.LouJBerger.com.

Lou Mayo

Lynn Gold

Musician. Fan. Geek. Lynn writes computer documentation by day and silly music by night. She’s been active in west coast fandom and con-running for decades. This 4th of July baby celebrates her birthday every year at Westercon.

Margaret Davis

Margaret Davis is a singer, Celtic harper, flutist and recorder player who has dedicated her life to performing original arrangements of Celtic and Medieval music. She grew up in Illinois where she was classically trained as a flutist and recorder player and received degrees in Music and French from Knox College. She has recorded 14 CDs with her bands Margaret & Kristoph, Brocelïande, and Avalon Rising, and on them she sings in French, Medieval French, Latin, Provençal, Gallician Portuguese, Gaelic, Spanish, and English. Margaret’s interest in music as a healing modality has led to work with Oakland’s Healing Muses, Stanford Hospital’s Music for Healing Program, and with Vision Journey Facilitator Britt Nesheim. Margaret is past Chairman of the Board of the Bay Area Folk Harp Society and she currently co-runs independent record label Flowinglass Music with her husband Kristoph Klover. As a day job, she works as a calligraphic artist, creating one-of-a-kind illuminated calligraphy commissions for an international clientele. Websites:
www.flowinglass.com/princess/index.html and www.flowinglass.com/art/index.html

Mario Acevedo

Mario Acevedo is the author of the bestselling Felix Gomez detective-vampire series and the YA humor thriller, University of Doom. His debut novel, The Nymphos of Rocky Flats, was chosen by Barnes & Noble as one of the best Paranormal Fantasy Novels of the Decade. He contributed short fiction to the anthologies, Nightmares Unhinged, CyberWorld, and Blood Business from Hex Publishing, and You Don’t Have a Clue, from ArtePublico Press. His novel, Good Money Gone, co-authored with Richard Kilborn, won an International Latino Book Award. He edited the anthology, Found, for Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers, which won a Colorado Book Award. He edited the anthology Blood & Gasoline from Hex Publishers. His most recent novel is book 7 of his Felix Gomez adventures, Sex Slaves of Shark Island. Mario serves on the writing faculty of the Regis University Mile-High MFA program and Lighthouse Writers Workshops. He lives and writes in Denver, Colorado.

Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff

Writer of speculative fiction as the result of a horrible childhood incident involving Klaatu and a robot named Gort, Maya is the New York Times bestselling author of science fiction and fantasy including STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI (with Michael Reaves). Singer, songwriter, performer, Bahá’í. Her short fiction appearances include Analog, Amazing Stories, Interzone, and Baen’s Universe; she’s a Nebula, Crawford, Campbell, Sidewise, and British Science Fiction award finalist. Her first mystery novel, THE ANTIQUITIES HUNTER—a Gina Miyoko Mystery, will release in October 2018 from Pegasus Crime. Maya performs and records original and parody music with husband Jeff, and blogs at www.mayabohnhoff.com, www.bahaiteachings.org, and www.bookviewcafe.com.

Melanie Bryant

Melanie Bryant is an award-winning costume designer and model with a creative background that includes writing, apprentice work under Jim Henson Company and Broadway alumni, study with world-renowned art jeweler Lexi Erickson, and film production with COMCAST Entertainment Television.

Presently, she’s employed as a laser jockey, and has worked on projects for Amazon, IBM, The Bellagio Hotel and Casino, Visa, Lockheed Martin, Paypal, CSU, several international airports and hospitals, and a little startup called Google.

She is currently based in Colorado, and enjoys playing video games, getting lost in the mountains, and volunteering with wildlife rescues.

Melanie Unruh

Melanie is an artist and maker of decorative and functional pottery, and sartorial arts, ranging from historical to fantasy, Viking to Victorian, and hats to spats. Melanie uses juxtapositions between mechanical and organic motifs, metal against fabric, and things hidden and revealed, and Asian influences in her work.

She is one of the instigators in the Denver Victorian & Steampunk Society, and Vice-President of the Arapahoe Ceramics Guild. Melanie lives in the Denver area. Her work is shown at the Fun & Funky gallery in Bailey, CO, and she participates in two Guild shows each year.

Melissa Koons

Melissa Koons is a former English teacher who now works as a writer and editor for Spine Press + Post author services. She still contributes to education as a tutor, and academic writing. She has one novel published, multiple short stories, and has ghostwritten over 60 novellas. Her novel, “Orion’s Honor” is available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and her own website Write Illusion. Her short story “Reconciling the Dragon” is featured in Wordfire Press’ “Dragon Writers” anthology available on Amazon and other platforms with a new short story featured in their next “Undercurrents” anthology to be released soon.

Mem Morman

Mem attended her first Worldcon (and her first SF convention) at Baycon in Berkeley in 1968. This eye-opening weekend led her into both the Tolkien Society and the Mythopoeic Society and she attended (and volunteered at) Mythcons and Westercons for the next decade while she finished college, married, and even had babies – reading SF all the while. The birth of her third child, and a new job with IRS kept her too busy for active fandom for a couple of years, but she returned to cons and con running on the east coast in the 1980s working on Darkovercons, Disclaves, Datclaves, and Worldcons. In the late 80’s mystery fandom won out briefly over SF fandom as she created and chaired the first few years of Malice Domestic (a DC area mystery con). Now married to Kent Bloom, and attending Worldcons and SMOFcons annually, Mem has worked site selection, information, newsletter, registration, events, and even taken a turn as a program participant. Her performance on the banjo is legendary.

Michael McAfee

Michael a self-taught artist living in Albuquerque, NM for 35 years. Spawning from his love of Art, Fantasy, Science Fiction, Games, and Role Play Games, a repertoire of digital artwork blossomed. Today, he works on commissions, album covers, posters, and book covers.

After building confidence, and skills, Michael started working on commissions he was familiar with Fantasy, Science Fiction, and Role Play Games. After countless commission images for free and pay, he was approached by Robert Eaton who commissioned him to make the covers for ‘The Hero Always Wins’, and ‘The Hero Gets The Girl’.

Michael currently works with Highmark Publishing producing book covers for Mason Elliott’s Citation, and Space Clan Series. He also worked on the covers for the two juvenile covers for Naero Novelettes.

He’s also a fanboy, so feel free to speak to him about your ideas for art.

A collection of his artwork can be found at http://gngraphis.daportfolio.com.

Michelle Reeves

Michelle Reeves has been in the Denver Sci-fi community for over 10 years. As a mother of 3, she knows the importance of including the next generation of geeks in conventions and strives to create fun and innovative panels for all ages and abilities.

Mike Cervantes

Mike Cervantes is a graduate of creative writing and communication from The University of Texas at El Paso. He is a humorist, a cartoonist, a steampunk enthusiast, a regular contributor to Denver’s many local conventions, and just a swell person besides. He writes and publishes stories featuring his steampunk hero characters ‘The Scarlet Derby and Midnight Jay’ regularly on his website, TheScarletDerby.com.

Mitzi Bartlett

Mitzi Bartlett is a local polymer clay artist who specializes in small, whimsical figurines of a fantasy and science fiction nature. She has been focused on this for the last fifteen years, and hopes to keep doing so for as long as life allows.

Nancy Kress

Nancy Kress is known for her Hugo and Nebula-winning novella Beggars in Spain. Kress won the Nebula Award for Best Novella in 2013 for “After the Fall, Before the Fall, During the Fall”, and again in 2015 for “Yesterday’s Kin”.

Nicholas Gross

Dr. Nicholas Gross is a Ph.D. physicist who works closely with other experts in the space physics community to prepare the next generation of space and solar scientists. Dr. Gross is recognized as an expert in the development and delivery of interactive and engaging STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) education programs for a wide range of audiences including: public audiences, undergraduates, graduate students, and science teachers.

Nikki Ebright

Executive Director for Shiny Garden and convention chair for Myths and Legends Con, WhimsyCon, and HexaCon.

Nissa LaFete

Olivia Wylie

Olivia Wylie is a blogger, comic artist, professional horticulturist and illustrator whose works revolve around the themes of self-determination, freedom and the natural world throughout folklore and history. She is currently focused on the projects ‘Smoke And Roses: A Steampunk Language of Flowers’ and Parmeshen, the steampunk webcomic she serves as artist. She owns the small landscaping company Leafing Out Professional Gardening centered in downtown Denver.

Her comic work can be viewed at http://parmeshen.webcomic.ws/
Her horticultural work can be viewed at
http://www.leafingoutgardening.com/

Paul Lell

Sci-fi/Fantasy author Paul Lell currently resides in Westminster, Colorado with his family; a wife, two sons, a giant dog, and two equally giant cats. Paul writes daily, reads everything he can, and works on refining his stories, and games at all hours. Paul has ten novels, numerous short stories, and three going on five RPGs in print today.

Peri Charlifu

Peri Charlifu was born in 1962 in Alamosa Colorado, his Father was an art teacher and his Mother was a social worker. His Mother is now retired and living in Aurora Colorado. He grew up in Denver and Aurora Colorado, studying art from an early age and continuing to this day. He attended Metropolitan State Collage and studied Art, Psychology and combined his studies using Art as therapy. He now does Art full time.

Peri has been selling his work for 34 years, and has been selling almost exclusively in the science fiction convention market for almost 11 years. He teaches workshops and seminars in Pottery, sculpture and theory on a regular basis. He is Guild master for Art and Artisans and a founding member of the Stoneleaf potters guild.

Although an accomplished and proficient graphic artist, Peri’s first love is pottery. He is highly skilled in both Wheel thrown and hand-built work. He mixes all his own stains and glazes, and has developed an underglaze technique that he uses in 90%

Rebecca Moesta

Rebecca Moesta (pronounced MESS-tuh) is the bestselling author of many science fiction and fantasy books, both solo and in collaboration with her husband Kevin J. Anderson, including the STAR WARS: YOUNG JEDI KNIGHTS series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Little Things, Star Trek TNG: The Gorn Crisis graphic novel, the original CRYSTAL DOORS trilogy, the Grumpy Old Monsters graphic novel, and the STAR CHALLENGERS trilogy.

She holds a Master of Science in Business Administration from Boston University and is a founding member of Superstars Writing Seminars. She is the co-publisher of WordFire Press and has more than 25 years of experience as a professional editor.

Richard E. Friesen

Richard just loves telling stories, and has found novels to be an ideal length-anything under 75,000 words is too short for him. His first fantasy series, The Dreaming King Saga is complete. All 5 books are available now: The Tower of Dreams, Oathbound Sisters, An Uncivil War, and On Black Mesa, and The Gates of Heaven. He also has several short stories available online (and one free one on his website). He is now working on a humorous superhero story where the hero’s power is to fall asleep, and take you into his dreams. After that, there is the first book in the Wetware Wizards series.

Robin Baylor

Robin is a veteran (notable: extensive training on how NOT to blow things up) , an engineer with an aerospace company and a musician who can harmonize at will and play almost anything with strings to some extent (except for mandolins). She has lived in 4 timezones, and is fascinated with tech past, present and future. Currently living in Colorado has given her a chance to attend local fiber fesivals and seriously up her game on knitting, crocheting, spinning, and other fiber arts.
Formerly of the group N-Strings Attached with now-husband Fred Capp and singer Lynn Gold, she has written a tidy collection of song parodies and is featured on 3 collections (alas, all out of print) .
Lives with husband, two teenaged daughters, a dog and a cat. (Not a cat person)

Ruben Gamboa

Rubiee Tallyn Hayes

Rubiee is a renaissance Pooka who sings, writes, blends geeky loose-leaf teas, and creates functional pottery. It is said that her mischievous grin, and bright laugh herald her arrival. She owns Dryad Tea and Dryad Pottery, where her art is available for purchase. Find her in the vendor area or online at www.dryadtea.com!

Sandra Wheeler

Scott Crosson

Scott Mecca

Sean Patrick Fannon

Sean Patrick Fannon (aka “Big Irish”) has been professionally involved in tabletop RPGs, computer games, and entertainment for over a quarter-century. His dozens of projects have included Hero Games’ Champions product line; both West End’s and Fantasy Flight’s Star Wars RPGs; various World of Darkness books; and the Savage Worlds Epic High Fantasy setting, Shaintar.

Sean now focuses on his own gaming company, Evil Beagle Games (“Bad Dog. Good Games”), as well as serving as the Pinnacle Entertainment Brand Manager for the Savage Rifts line. He’s also the lead writer and designer on Freedom Squadron, a Savage Worlds setting book that’s a love letter to 80s Action Hero cartoons, comics, and toys (based on the VENOM Assault board game from Spyglass Games). He’s also well underway with co-designing Prowlers & Paragons: Ultimate Edition, a fantastic new superhero game created by Evil Beagle Vice-President Len Pimentel, for which he’s creating two settings: Modern Gods and Unending War.

Seth Phillips

Seth Phillips is Colorado’s own geek songwriter.
Every couple of weeks when he runs out of Fritos and Mountain Dew, he straps on a guitar and emerges from his basement with tales of love, loss, and science fiction.

Shamelessly plugging his latest album “Tradition Change Geekery,” he plies clever wordcraft and time-honored chord progressions for a thoroughly entertaining set.

Also look for Seth fronting his geek rock band “Zero Day Exploits” around the greater Front Range.

Stace Johnson

Stace Johnson is a Colorado writer, musician, and IT guy. He has published fiction in Edward Bryant’s Sphere of Influence, poetry in cream city review and Tales of the Talisman, and won an Apex Book Company poetry contest in 2013. He has also written numerous non-fiction articles for computer magazines. For more information, please visit http://www.lytspeedconsulting.com/publications/.

Stacia Seaman

Stacia Seaman has edited numerous award-winning titles, and with co-editor Radclyffe won a Lambda Literary Award for Erotic Interludes 2: Stolen Moments. Their anthologies include Women of the Dark Streets: Lesbian Paranormal and Myth and Magic: Queer Fairy Tales. Stacia has short stories in several anthologies, and her essays appear in Visible: A Femmethology (Homofactus Press, 2009) and Second Person Queer (Arsenal Pulp Press, 2009).

Stant Litore

An emerging voice in weird fiction, Stant Litore is the author of the series The Zombie Bible, which retells history (and the Bible) as a series of encounters with the restless dead, as well as The Ansible Stories, in which twenty-fifth century Islamic explorers become trapped in alien bodies on alien worlds. Litore has been featured in “The Year’s Best New Sci-Fi” at NPR (March 2014), as an Author Success Story on the Amazon.com homepage (November 2013), and in Weird Fiction Review and SF Signal. Litore recently released Write Characters Your Readers Won’t Forget, a handbook for young writers, and has been featured on the same topic in Jeff Vandermeer’s Wonderbook: The Illustrated Guide to Creating Imaginative Fiction. Asked what he does for a living, Litore says, “I chronicle zombie apocalypses from 3,000 years ago and I build colosseums for tyrannosaurs.”

Stant Litore lives in Colorado with his wife and three children, where he is working on his next novel.

Thea Hutcheson

Thea Hutcheson’s writes across multiple genres under several pen names. Her work has appeared in such places as Hot Blood XI, Fatal Attractions; M-Brane Issue 12; Baen’s Universe Issue 4, Vol. 1; the Beauty and the Beast Issue of The Enchanted Conversation; Realms of Fantasy’s 100th issue, and Fiction River’s Recycled Pulp, No Humans Allowed, and Haunted anthologies. She lives in an economically depressed, unscenic, nearly historic small city in Colorado with four rescued cats, 1000 books, and an understanding partner.

Therese Szymanski

Therese (Reese) Szymanski, a Detroit and D.C. veteran, is the bestselling, award-winning author and playwright of nine mystery/thrillers (eight in the groundbreaking Motor City Thrillers series featuring Brett Higgins, starting with WHEN THE DANCING STOPS), four novellas (including ONCE UPON A DYKE: NEW EXPLOITS OF FAIRY TALE LESBIANS), six controversial plays (four produced to great acclaim) and several dozen short stories, essays, articles, columns, reviews and feature stories, every word true, except when it’s not. She’s a marketing guru whose every fiction-editing turn—including five anthologies—has been shortlisted for an award.
When she’s not writing, editing, designing, playing with her sword collection or committing other acts of mayhem, she enjoys visiting red pandas around the world.
You can find out more about Reese and her work at www.BigBadButch.com.

Thomas A Fowler

Thomas A. Fowler is the author of nerdy things, primarily sci-fi. He helps authors market & publish themselves as the Marketing Director at Spine Press & Post & is a cohost of the Geeky Gab Podcast.

Head to ThomasAFowler.com to get social on the internet and find out everything he does in life and writing.

Thomas Berger

Todd A. Walls

Todd A. Walls is a writer as the result of a truce. The stories that keep clamoring for attention will calmly await their turn, as long as Todd keeps writing them down. In childhood, authors like C. S. Lewis and Piers Anthony inspired him to exhaust the juvenile section of his public library and to beg his teachers for more books to read.
Today, with the calm and quiet of Colorado’s eastern plains outside—and the majestic Rocky Mountains marking the horizon—Todd’s characters speak to him of their dreams and accomplishments, along with their failures and shame. Todd’s imagination is a conduit to the end of time, riding the many failures of humanity to their inevitable outcomes, and embracing the heroic efforts of those who refuse such a fate.

Tomas O’Dreams

Liam Bootzin has been entertaining adults and children with his stories since 1987.

Tonya L. De Marco

Tonya L. De Marco is a local Costume Designer, Cosplayer, published Model, and published Author.
She’s been hooked on costumes and costuming since she was a preteen. Growing up reading about the wonderful characters and places created by authors such as Ursula K. Le Guin, J.R.R.Tolkein, and Frank Herbert, Tonya turned to costuming as a way to immerse herself more deeply into those fantastic worlds.
Her love of the written word also encouraged her to pursue a writing career and she has several short stories published. Much of her work is dark in nature and Tonya is a member of the Horror Writers Association.
Tonya cosplays across multiple genres including anime, sci-fi, steampunk, Disney, comic book, and pin-up. She attends several conventions per year across the country and enjoys meeting and talking with people about cosplay and writing. Tonya has been involved in costume contests/masquerades as both a participant and a judge.

Travis Heermann

Freelance writer, novelist, award-winning screenwriter, editor, poker player, poet, biker, roustabout, Travis Heermann is a graduate of the Odyssey Writing Workshop and the author of The Ronin Trilogy, The Wild Boys, Rogues of the Black Fury, and co-author of Death Wind, plus short fiction pieces in anthologies and magazines such as Apex Magazine, Alembical, the Fiction River anthology series, Historical Lovecraft, and Cemetery Dance’s Shivers VII. As a freelance writer, he has produced a metric ton of role-playing game work both in print and online, including the Firefly Roleplaying Game, Battletech, Legend of Five Rings, d20 System, and EVE Online.
He enjoys cycling, martial arts, torturing young minds with otherworldly ideas, and zombies. He has three long-cherished dreams: a produced screenplay, a NYT best-seller, and a seat in the World Series of Poker.
In 2016, he returned to the U.S. after living in New Zealand for a year with his family.

Van Aaron Hughes

Van Aaron Hughes is a SFWA member whose stories have appeared in F&SF, Writers of the Future, IGMS, and various other magazines and anthologies. He is the father of three amazing children. In real life, he is a lawyer and has argued before the U.S. Supreme Court, which he says was fun but nowhere near as cool as selling a $50 story.

Vennessa Robertson

Vennessa Robertson began her love affair with writing as a young child. Her publishing credits include college magazines, the county paper and her Victorian paranormal series, Arcane Adventuress. She holds a bachelor’s degree in English Language Arts and a bachelor’s degree in history with a focus on European history, both from the Metropolitan State College of Denver. She is an avid reenactor and is active in steampunk, writing and historic reenactment communities.

She taught advanced placement high school English in Colorado and Alaska until a traumatic brain injury in 2009. Now, she lives in rural Colorado where she runs a homeschooling website and a large and small animal rescue ranch with her husband and their two small children. When she is not writing or homeschooling she is managing their ever-growing menagerie.

Veronica R. Calisto

Masseur of people and plot lines. Singer of songs inside her own head and in a local choir. Author of Diary of a Mad Black Witch, A Griffin Scorned, and the first in SparkleTits Chronicles: Starfish & Coffee.

Vivian Caethe

When not fighting crime or tinkering with Tarot spreads, Vivian Caethe writes weird fiction, science fiction, fantasy, quirky nonfiction and everything in between. She also crafts, crochets, and goes on long quests to find the perfect knitting pattern. She lives in Colorado with a super villain cat. She can be found as a writer at VivianCaethe.com and as an editor at WordsMadeBeautiful.net.

Vonie’ Stillson aka Lady Vo

Vonie’ received a MA in Dance Movement Therapy (DMT) & Counseling from Antioch, a BA in DMT from Naropa, and has 10+ years Certified Aquatic Rehabilitation Specialist. She is a past recipient of American Dance Therapy Association’s Outstanding Achievement Award, former Southern Chapter President and current Rocky Mountain Chapter President. She’s presented DMT at mental health conferences, aquatics conferences, community-based workshops and pop culture conventions, as well as introduced other professionals to the wonderful world of fandoms. A lifelong comic book reader and sci-fi fan, she advocates geek culture as positive for mental health, leads ADTA’s Multicultural and Diversity Affinity Group for geek culture and is Captain of Airship Iron Opal, a NOCO based all ages social steampunk group that stresses that without Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathmatics there would be no steampunk.

W.J. Cherf

Wil McCarthy

William

Sir William is the 2017 Colorado Bootblack. Not sure what a bootblack is? Swing by the atrium and bring your leather. He will be providing leather care services for those interested. Prices will be posted at the booth. He will be there sharing his knowledge as well and willing to answer all questions.

Zero Day Exploits

From the software development trenches of Colorado’s Front Range comes Zero Day Exploits!
Proudly blending Star Wars, Database Code, Comic Books, and Rock.
Rated E for Everyone.