Kalamu ya Salaam is a New Orleans — based editor, writer, filmmaker, and teacher. He is director of Listen to the People, a New Orleans oral history project; moderator of e-Drum, a listserv for black writers; and comoderator, with his son Mtume, of Breath of Life, a black music website. Salaam is also the digital video instructor and the codirector of Students at the Center, a writing-based program in the New Orleans public school system.
Julie Smith is the Edgar Award — winning author of two detective series set in New Orleans. A former reporter for the New Orleans Times-Picayune and the San Francisco Chronicle, she lives in the Faubourg Marigny section of New Orleans, which is much funkier than it sounds.
Maureen Tan is the author of the critically acclaimed Jane Nichols suspense novels. Her focus on strong, independent female protagonists and Southern locales continues in A Perfect Cover — set in the Vietnamese community in New Orleans — and in her most recent book, Too Close to Home.
Jervey Tervalon was born in New Orleans and raised in Los Angeles. He has written two novels set in New Orleans, Dead Above Ground and Lita. He’s almost obsessed with Creole Cream Cheese, stuffed Mirliton (militon), and good grits.
Olympia Vernon is the author of three critically acclaimed novels published by Grove Atlantic. Her first, Eden, was written in Uptown New Orleans and was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. In 2006, A Killing in This Town was published to rave reviews. Vernon is a Louisiana native and is now the Hallie Brown Ford Chair at Willamette University.
Christine Wiltz has written five books: a detective trilogy — The Killing Circle, A Diamond Before You Die, and The Emerald Lizard; a novel, Glass House; and a biography, The Last Madam: A Life in the New Orleans Underworld. All of her books are set in New Orleans, where she was born and still lives.