92 pages containing 72 authors. See bios below.
STATUS:

NOW AVAILABLE FOR YOUR AMAZON KINDLE $2.99

This collection of poetry  and prose has been gathered from writers across the country, with a theme about or for children.

If a child is to keep alive his inborn sense of wonder without any such gift from the fairies, he needs the companionship of at least one adult who can share it, rediscovering with him the joy, excitement and mystery of the world we live in.

 ~Rachel Carson (1907 - 1964) writer, scientist, and ecologist.~
 

About the book

Sample of the work:

Fortress of Solitude      Nancy Sollosi Chiseled in Arctic ice, Superman’s Fortress of Solitude thaws beside our sanctuary. brother Joe the architect; me his apprentice engineered from Carolina pine and dirt  hidden on the edge of the deep  woods behind our trailer park hood. Memories flow fierce the softer we become— picking blackberries amid briars and ticks; slogging through cow scat to fish for bream; chokin’ back mama’s boiled okra; or turnips she tried to pass as taters. No wonder kids need a fortress bastion against adultery— mutinous grip on youth secret place to rally and rest. study the sky; lying on our backs, while breezes herd clouds  to pelt us with tears,  remind us what safe really is. Memories from my fort fade into those my tomboy builds. Her fort sounds lavish.  Pine needle floor, Tarzan swing, tadpole creek. Like all the kids before I know where she runs tired  and bruised, suffering  quandaries a day at the fort can’t unjam. When storm clouds mourn her passage,  Mama’s lap is her shelter her Fortress of Solitude. NANCY SOLLOSI of Jamestown, North Carolina is a regular contributor to the Old Mountain Press anthologies.  Daughter to Jacqueline Bobbitt and mother to Bella Sollosi, she gratefully acknowledges the impact both these strong women have on her life and on her writing.  Nancy dedicates this poem to the two women who have most influenced the woman she is today.

Boiled Okra and Me Tom Davis MAMA SAID SHE could just die. Daddy sighed and shook his head. The new preacher’s wife gagged. Aunt Josie rolled her eyes. Paw Paw grinned. And Uncle Bud... was being Uncle Bud.      I hate okra. I can’t stand the sight, the smell, and, most of all, the taste of it. Feeling this way started when I ate too many bowls of Maw Maw’s vegetable soup and got sick. The only memory I have of that occasion is the taste of okra. Ugh!      We were having the new  preacher over for Sunday dinner. Mama, serving boiled okra, declared that I had to try at least one piece. Of course, the preacher just couldn’t help but  chime in how much he loved it and how it was the best okra he had ever had!      I threw that piece of okra into my mouth, thought about the catfish I was going to catch that day, and swallowed hard. It started down fine, but halfway between my mouth and stomach it decided to come back up. Trailing close behind were fried chicken, Mama’s famous mashed potatoes, creamed corn, scrambled eggs from breakfast, and a piece of last night’s pork chops.      Now this wasn’t the namby-pamby kind of throw-up. No sir, I looked like a fire hydrant turned on full force, and it headed directly for the new preacher. It hit him square in the chest and splattered all over his pinstriped suit. I figured he’d change his opinion about Mama’s soon-to-be-famous okra after this.      The new preacher jumped back as anyone would who’d been hit in the chest with that much you-know-what. When his shoulders slammed the back of his chair, he started falling. Attempting to catch himself, he reached for the table but only succeeded in grabbing Mama’s beautiful white laced Sunday dinner tablecloth.      Over he went, taking with him his plate half-full of food and that big bowl of smelly, slimy, boiled okra. His wife and Aunt Josie sat on either side of him. From their faces, you’d have thought he was lying there completely naked.      Everybody’s plate ended up either on the other side of the table or in their laps. Uncle Bud, who had been gnawing a drumstick at the time, broke the silence saying to Mama , “Mary Ann, Tom told you he couldn’t eat that okra.” And pointing his chicken leg at the new preacher, he continued, “Besides, the preacher there did say he dearly loved boiled okra, didn’t he?” TOM DAVIS’ publishing credits include Poets Forum, The Carolina Runner, Triathlon Today, Georgia Athlete, The Fayetteville Observers Saturday Extra, A Loving Voice Vol. I and II, and Special Warfare. He’s authored a collection of short stories, The Life and Times of Rip Jackson; a children’s coloring book, Pickaberry Pig; a how to book on writing a ranger patrol order, The Patrol Order; and an action adventure novel, The R-complex. Tom lives in Webster, NC.

Sandra Ervin Adams is inspired by the ordinary things in life. She enjoys learning about earlier generations and appreciates what others have gone through. Her poems have appeared in all of the Old Mountain Press anthologies. She lives near Jacksonville, NC.

Michael Ashley is a 31 year 9 til 5er, who lives in West Yorkshire, England. He can be found walking his dogs, or sat in a dingy office, and if you are lucky you may also catch him writing a little poetry.

Katherine Russell Barnes lives in Wilson, NC. She is a retired nurse, a wife, mother, grandmother, and great grandmother. She has written poetry for over thirty years. Her poems have been published in Crucible, Pembroke Magazine, Dragonfly and many other magazines and anthologies. She has held offices in the NC Poetry Society and The Poetry Council of NC. 

Fred Bassett is a regular contributor to the Old Mountain anthologies. His poems have been widely published in journals and anthologies, and he has four books of poetry, including The Old Stoic Faces the Mirror: A Life in Poems (Salt Marsh Cottage Books, 2010). His debut novel South Wind Rising was published by ATTM Press in 2010. Now retired from academia, he lives with his wife Peg in Greenwood, South Carolina, near their grandchildren.

Joann Bishop is presently in the process of writing a new poem for her new granddaughter born 5 Nov 2011. Barton Literary Student Journal. She is attending Barton College for a Bachelor’s Degree in Business and Human Resource Management with a minor in Religion and Philosophy.

Jerry Bradley spent thirty years in the US Air Force from which he retired in August 2008. During his career he wrote poetry off and on but now has the opportunity to concentrate on his writing. Most of his poems are related to his faith, his family or the military. Jerry is the President of the Fayetteville Writers’ Ink Guild and he and his wife Laura are currently living in Raeford, NC.

Stuart Burroughs has been involved since childhood in visual art, poetry, and music. She has taught English and art, and her art hangs in many homes. A collection of her poems, Beyond the Hills, can be purchased from Amazon.com or the poet. Stuart lives in Chapel Hill, NC, where she writes, paints, and plays her piano program, Music to Remember, every week at several locations.

Jim Clark is the Elizabeth H. Jordan Professor of Southern Literature and Chair of the Department of English and Modern Languages at Barton College in Wilson, NC.His books include Notions: A Jim Clark Miscellany, Dancing on Canaan’s Ruins, Handiwork, and Fable in the Blood: The Selected Poems of Byron Herbert Reece.He has released four CDs:Buried Land, The Service of Song, Wilson, and Words to Burn.A new CD is forthcoming.

Vicki Collins teaches English at The University of South Carolina Aiken. Her work has appeared in Kakalak, The Teacher’s Voice, Barbaric Yawp, Windhover, MoonShine Review, and several editions of Old Mountain Press.

Sonja Contois is an award-winning author with short stories in Christmas Presence and oodles of Old Mountain Press Anthologies. Her magazine credits include Western North Carolina Woman and Fresh. A former therapist and minister, Sonja is now a full-time writer living in the beautiful mountains of Haywood County, North Carolina.

LEEJ COPPERFIELD lives in Raleigh, North Carolina with her husband and son. She is the Director of the Writing Center and a faculty member at Louisburg College. She is currently working on a collection of Haiku poems with original watercolor paintings. 

Phebe Davidson is the author of twenty-some published collections of poems. She is a contributing editor with Tar River Poetry and a staff writer for The Asheville Poetry Review. A recovering academic and still up to her neck in poems, she lives in Westminster, SC.

John Davis, a retired South Georgia Lawyer, is frequently published in the Parker Pages, an exclusive magazine published by the Parker Gun Collectors Association as well as the L. C. Smith Journal a publication of the L.C. Smith Collectors Association. He is also the author of the biography, The Life and Times of Fred Kimble. Kimble was a noted inventor, duck hunter, and world class skeet shooter. John lives in Vienna, GA.

Mary Ann Davis is a retired English teacher who taught the gifted program at the Dooly County High School in Vienna, GA. She holds a BA degree in English and French and a Masters and an EdS in English Education from Georgia Southwestern University and the University of Georgia. She loves reading and writing and is the author of the book Mam Maw’s ABCs, a fun read about the letters of the alphabet. Mary Ann lives in Vienna, GA.

Polly Davis, Ed.D, is retired from the NC Community College System where she served as an English department chair and an administrator. Actively involved in the Cumberland County community, she served as a trustee for the Cumberland County Library and Information Center and chaired its program committee. She is the editor of Daddy Pa’s Diary, and Growing Up Southern in Baconton Georgia. Polly lives in Webster, NC.

Tom Davis’ publishing credits include Poets Forum, The Caroli­na Runner, Triathlon Today, Georgia Athlete, The Fayetteville Observer’s Saturday Extra, A Loving Voice Vol. I and II, and Special Warfare. He’s authored a collection of short stories, The Life and Times of Rip Jackson; a children’s coloring book, Pickaberry Pig; a how to book on writing a ranger patrol order, The Patrol Order; and an action adventure novel, The R-complex. Tom lives in Webster, NC.

Sarah Edwards is a retired clergyperson in the United Church of Christ who previously used her poetry in sermons and retreat leadership.Now enjoying retirement in the North Carolina Sandhills, she has only recently taken an interest in literary contests and publishing.Her work has been recognized by the Weymouth Center for Arts and Humanities and the North Carolina Poetry Society.

Terri Kirby Erickson, a North Carolina native, is the award-winning author of three collections of poetry, including her latest book, In the Palms of Angels (Press 53, 2011).Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Ted Kooser’s American Life in Poetry, 2013 Poet’s Market, Verse Daily, the Christian Science Monitor, North Carolina Literary Review and many others.For more information about her poetry, please visit her website at www.terrikirbyerickson.wordpress.com

Catherine E. Entrocaso thinks in italics. She is a high school English teacher, and resides in Fayetteville, NC. 

Ines Illgen was Born in East Germany after WWII from where she and her mother escaped in 1957. She has made Hendersonville, NC her home since 1977. One son wanted to know more about his German heritage after meeting and marrying a German girl. The other one was more interested in her life before motherhood.Thus she began writing for them what she remembered. Her writing group friends encouraged her to submit to OMP.

Dena M. Ferrari is a regular contributor to OMP, Dena’s poetry are featured in Westchester Community College of NY “Phoenix” (1975); placed several times in Fields of Earth, sponsored by the Writers’ Ink Guild; in Charles Weyant’s book, “An Odyssey in Broken Rhythms and Ragged Lines” (2006). Writers Alliance Poets World-Wide anthologies has many of her works. Dena’s own book, “Poems From the Hearth” (2010) shows diversified writing styles. She and her husband, Peter live in Vass, NC.

Ann Fogelman has a graduate degree in Public Health Nutrition. During WWII she served in the WAVES. Her work has appeared in The Noble Generation, That Thing You Do, Pets Across America, Texas Poetry Calendar, Boundless, Oh! To Jitterbug Again and other anthologies. She is a member of the Bay Area Writers League, The Arts Alliance Center at Clear Lake and Osher Lifelong Learning Institute (OLLI) at University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB), Galveston, TX. Ann lives in Friendswood, TX.

DARE FREEMAN FORD, of Hendersonville, NC, has a background in education.  Ford published Don’t Make Me Turn this Bus Around, a chronicle of her adventures as a teenage bus driver in her native Anson County, NC.  Her work has appeared in several regional publications and Old Mountain Press anthologies. She also contributed to Christmas Presence, Clothes Lines, and Women’s Spaces, Women’s Places edited by Celia Miles and Nancy Dillingham

James Gibson (Northville, Michigan) combined his love of the American West with his fascination with Native American culture to write the five novels of the Anasazi Quest series. He has also written a traditional Western novel, The Last Ride, set outside Tucson, Arizona. His Anasazi Quest novels are available at www.Pentaclespress.com and through Old Mountain Press, Amazon.com, and Barnes & Noble. 

Steffan Gilbert, of Gainesboro, TN, was born in Washington, D.C. He has won awards for his television and film work. His material has been performed in venues across the country, at The National Theater in Washington, and on PBS. His recent work, Stories From the Hollow, a collection of short stories has been published by the international company JustFiction. 

BJ Gillum retired in 1994 and lives near Rockwood, TN with his wife, Saundra. Since he retired he authored six novels and one travelogue, co-founded Roane Writers Group and Watts Bar Wine Club. BJ is responsible for a county-wide Student Writing Contest for students in grades four through twelve. 

Marian Gowan is author of Notes from the Trunk, published by Old Mountain Press (www.oldmp.com/mariangowan.htm). She contributed to American Patchwork, St. Martins Press. Her work has appeared in several Old Mountain Press anthologies, as well as Christmas Presence, Clothes Lines, and Women’s Spaces Women’s Places edited by Celia Miles and Nancy Dillingham. She retired to Hendersonville, NC in 2001.

Phyllis Jean Green blesses the day she set foot in what writer Willie Prince rightly dubbed The Southern Part of Heaven.In time, she and her husband Ray became UNC-Chapel Hill alumni. Phyllis always loved to write, and NC is home to many fine writers.Her poetry, fiction, and other works have appeared widely. Some of her credits can be found at www.authorsden.com/phyllisjeangreen.That they include Old Mountain Press pleases her mightily. 

Kerri Mai Habben lives in Raleigh, NC where she is a writer, photographer, and local historian. A graduate of Peace College and North Carolina State University, her articles, essays, and poetry have appeared in literary journals, the News and Observer, and other publications. She is currently at work on a collection of her essays.

MaXine Carey Harker and husband Berkley, have lived 58 years in the little one-stop-light town of Grifton, NC, reared 5 children who have produced grandchildren and great grandchildren in far-flung places. Published in national, state and local publications. She prefers non-fiction, sonnets, and haiku. Taught Writing for Publication for 30+ years at Community Colleges, now Rec Center in New Bern. MaXine is 83, her doctor tells her she is 65. Her included poem won the Children’s category of the North Carolina Poetry Society’s (NCPS) poetry contest several years ago.

Catherine Murphy Haymore was born in Westerville, Ohio and lived in Columbus, Ohio until leaving to travel to Europe. She graduated from Whitehall-Yearling HS and attended Ohio State University. She is currently a member of the Writers’ Ink Guild of Fayetteville, NC where she conducts writing workshops concentrating on the sonnet. She is also a member of the Cape Fear Mineral & Gem Society where she pursues an interest in geology and jewelry design. She has been an avid horsewoman with a keen interest in dressage all of her life. Catherine lives in Sanford, NC.

Joseph Haymore is a regular contributor to Old Mountain Press. A former president of the Writers’ Ink Guild of Fayetteville, he attributes what knowledge of poetry he may possess to his wife and mentor, Catherine Murphy Haymore. Joe lives in Sanford, NC.

Elizabeth MacKenzie Hebron grew up in Detroit, MI.She was editor and publisher of a small literary journal, Eratica: Half a Bubble Off Plumb, for the four short years of its life.Her work has appeared in a variety of places, as well as in previous OMP anthologies.Elizabeth lives in Westland, MI, with her husband, Randy, and their 12-year old dog, Bailey.

Robert Hewett, Sr. resides in Louisville, KY with wife Martha. He writes in many genres, including for children. He has published 3 books. A book of story poems titled Down The Road We Came and a Novelette titled Thunderfoot about a Kentucky Thoroughbred. He plans to publish a two volume Old West Romance/Adventure story this summer. You can find him and some of his work on www.hubpages.com.

WYNNE HUDDLESTON (Little Rock, MS) is a board member of both the Mississippi Writers Guild and the Mississippi Poetry Society. Workshop Leader for the 2011 Mid-South Poetry Festival in Memphis, TN, she has been published in numerous publications, but most recently in Deep South Magazine, Eratio Postmodern Poetry, Raven Chronicles, and Death Head Grin Anthology. Wynne is the proud grandmother of Jude and Julia. For more info see www. wynnehuddleston.wordpress.com

Arnie Johanson is a retired philosophy professor from Minnesota, now living in Durham, NC (summers in Minneapolis). His poetry has appeared in numerous journals and anthologies, and he has published two chapbooks.

Jerry Judge lives in Cincinnati, OH with his gorgeous wife, Michele, two imperial felines and a former shelter dog named Luna who stole his heart one year ago. He’s the author of seven chapbooks and has published in many journals. Michele and Jerry are proud of their two grown sons, Nick and Devin.

Hannah Hodges Kennedy was born in 1894 in Lenoir County, N. C.From the time she was a kid, she liked to write in the margins of books and wrote quite a few of her best works there.She loved to conjure, wrote lovely and meaningful letters, and tried her hand creatively on many occasions.From the included poem you can tell that Hannah was a very caring lady who had fun with aspects of life.This comical poem was found on the back binding of a biographical essay of Robert Burns by Thomas Carlyle written in 1828.She was obviously somewhat perturbed with Alonzo.Her future family is glad they made up.

K.D. Kennedy Jr. has published three (3) books of poetry, short stories, and essays Our Place In Time, Waiting Out In The Yard, and For Rhyme Or Reason.He has published works in over twenty anthologies and periodicals. He has four (4) children who are (1) A Broadway Leading Lady (2) A President of a Corporation (3) A Real Estate Developer and (4) A Mother of four (4) grandchildren.He humbly gives thanks to his wife of 46 years, Sara Lynn.

Jo Koster teaches at Winthrop University, where she spends too much time on administration and not enough on writing. She was a 2010 finalist for the Carrie Allen McCray fellowship of the South Carolina Academy of Poets, and a new chapbook is due out in late 2012. She and her cats Max, Neville, and Tippy live in comfortable chaos and in Rock Hill, SC.

Patsy Kennedy Lain lives in Hubert, NC. She has published works in several anthologies and magazines, The Lyricist and Aunt Chloe, including an online magazine, The Dead Mule, as well as a local newspaper. Patsy was honored as an Adult Student recipient of the 2009 Eastern North Carolina’s Gilbert-Chappell Distinguished Poets Series. She has been awarded several ribbons and gold medals in local Senior Games Literary Arts competitions, and maintains membership with the NC Poetry Society and the Onslow Poetry Consortium.

Blanche L. Ledford’s work has appeared in Remember When, Old Time Mountain Music, Traveling Time, Just Between Us, They That Go Down to the Sea, Echoes Across the Blue Ridge, and other anthologies. Blanche resides in Hayesville, NC. Her hobbies include reading, writing, and gardening.

Brenda Kay Ledford lives in Hayesville, NC, and holds a MA in Education. Her work has appeared in Remember When, Old Time Mountain Music, Traveling Time, Echoes Across the Blue Ridge, and other anthologies. Brenda won the 2012 Royce Ray Poetry Award from Aries: A Journal of Art and Literature. She recently released a historical video, Happy Birthday, Clay County, NC.

Valerie Macon lives in Fuquay-Varina, NC. Her poetry has appeared in a number of e-magazines, in several NC anthologies including OMP’s Remember When, and was recently featured in Spare Change News (Boston). Shelf Life, her first book of poetry published in October 2011, was nominated for the Push Cart Prize. 

Celia Miles, a Jackson County native, lives and writes in Asheville, having retired from the NC Community College system. Her website is www.celiamiles.com

Jerome Norris currently lives in New Bern, NC. But for the inexplicable insensitivity of his readers, Jerome would have been in the forefront of Twentieth Century American Letters. As it is, he is content to write doggerel, memoirs, short stories and (unpublished) novels. Nobody has ever heard of him until just now.

Martha O’Quinn’s poetry and non-fiction have appeared in a number of regional publications, previous OMP anthologies and in on-line publications. Mother of two, grandmother of four and now a great-grandmother, her work reflects a true southern heritage. She and her husband retired to Hendersonville, NC in January 1997. 

Margaret L. Parrish’s poems have appeared in Mountain Time, The Lyricist, Poem, Poets for Peace and other publications. She lives and works in Raleigh, NC.

Michael Potts is Professor of Philosophy at Methodist University in Fayetteville, North Carolina. His novel, End of Summer was recently published by WordCrafts Press in Tullahoma, Tennessee. His poetry chapbook, From Field to Thicket, won the 2006 Mary Belle Campbell Poetry Book Award of the North Carolina Writers’ Network. He has poems published in several literary magazines.

Jordan Rhodes’ poetry has appeared in the Old Mountain Press. He is a professional actor and playwright. Jordan’s credits include over 200 roles in film, television and stage. He co-wrote the award winning film, PAPA the man, the myth, the legend which was the filmed version of the critically acclaimed play of the same title. He is married to actress, singer, writer, Lynn Moore.

Edwina Rooker grew up in Warrenton, NC. She holds an A.B. in English from Duke University and a M.S.L.S. from The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She taught English or worked as a media coordinator in Southern Pines, Virginia Beach, and Warrenton. Her work has appeared in several OMP anthologies. Her column, Observations, appears in The Warren Record.. She lives at The Courtyards of Berne Village in New Bern.

(Dr.) Lynn Veach Sadler, (former) college president, editor, poet, fiction/creative nonfiction writer, and playwright, is widely published in academics and creative writing. She has seven chapbooks (another in press) and three full-length collections published. One story appears in Del Sol’s Best of 2004 Butler Prize Anthology; a novel will soon join her novella and short-story collection. From Sanford, NC, she has traveled around the world five times and works full time writing and editing.

Heather Sapp, a wife, mother of two boys and coffee shop owner writes poetry for pleasure as well as for her sanity.Most of her poems relate to her family, and her life encounters, good and bad, happy or sad and sometimes just plain craziness. She is currently a member of the Fayetteville Writers’ Ink Guild and lives with her family in Raeford NC.

Joanna Catherine Scott’s latest poetry collection is An Innocent in the House of the Dead, written in collaboration with John Lee Conaway, one of North Carolina’s innocents whom she met while he was on Death Row. Joanna and her husband recently welcomed John into their family as a legally adopted seventh child. His name is now John Lee Scott.

Marian Kaplun Shapiro, a previous contributor, is the author of a professional book, Second Childhood (Norton, 1988), a poetry book, Players In The Dream, Dreamers In The Play (Plain View Press, 2007) and two chapbooks: Your Third Wish, (Finishing Line, 2007); and The End Of The World, Announced On Wednesday (Pudding House, 2007A resident of Lexington, she was named Senior Poet Laureate of Massachusetts in 2006, in 2008, in 2010, and 2011.

EMILY SHORT’S work has appeared in [Broken Ink] at USC Aiken. Born and raised in the middle class southern lifestyle, she continues to study and live in beautiful Saluda, SC. 

Rishan Singh is a poet. He was born in the country of South Africa, in the city of Durban which is based in the province of KwaZulu-Natal.He currently lives in Durban, South Africa, where he continues to write for all audiences, races and cultures. His poetry has been published before.

Nancy Sollosi of Jamestown, North Carolina is a regular contributor to the Old Mountain Press anthologies. Daughter to Jacqueline Bobbitt and mother to Bella Sollosi, she gratefully acknowledges the impact both these strong women have on her life and on her writing. Nancy dedicates the poem in this anthology to the two women who have most influenced the woman she is today.

Dorothea Spiegel, 90 years old in February 2012, moved from Hiawassee, GA to live with her daughter just outside Gainesboro, TN, surrounded by mountain forest. She belonged to writing clubs in GA and NC. She says she has always written poetry, her mother had one of her poems published in the newspaper when she was a teenager, and she has had many published in anthologies and magazines. She studied reading and poetry writing at John Campbell Folk School and at Tri-County College.

Tonya Staufer found her way back to writing a few years ago. She is a real estate investment broker by day and a writer by night. She and her husband call Saluda, NC home. Her stories have appeared in Spirit of the Smokies, A Long Story Short, Western NC Woman, Moonshine Review, and numerous anthologies.

Shelby Stephenson(Playing Dead: Finishing Line Press, 2011) lives with his wife Nin on Paul’s Hill, near Benson, NC.

Shannon Camlin Ward was raised in a renovated slaughterhouse on the outskirts of Wilmington, Ohio, and is currently working on her first collection of poetry, Blood Creek. She received an MFA from NC State in 2009 and now teaches at Methodist University. She is the recipient of a 2012 Anderson Center Residency and a 2011 Vermont Studio Center Artist’s Grant. Her work has appeared in The Superstition Review, Tar River Poetry, and Marginalia. She lives in Fayetteville, North Carolina

Charles F. “Hawk” Weyant lives in Fayetteville, NC. where he has been a member of Writers’ Ink Guild for nearly thirty years. His work appears in more than a dozen anthologies and two military web sites. He read on public radio for ten years, and his book An Odyssey In Broken Rhythms And Ragged Lines was nominated for a Pushcart Award. He is a battle scarred veteran of three tours in Vietnam.

Stella Ward Whitlock (widow of a Presbyterian minister, mother of four, grandmother of seven) is a writer, teacher, and traveler. She has camped in all forty-eight contiguous states, traveled in Alaska and Hawaii, and toured more than forty-five countries. Her stories, poems, and articles have been published in numerous journals, magazines, and anthologies. Her chapbook Florida Heat was published in 2008. Stella currently lives in the Glenaire Retirement Community, Cary, NC.

Glenda S. Wilkins grew up on an eastern NC tobacco farm, and believed she’d never live beyond the county line. Decades later, she moved to Europe for almost a dozen years. Her poems are published in the U.S.A., Canada, Spain, Luxembourg, Switzerland, and Great Britain. Along the way, she has won several poetry awards. Today, she lives with her husband on an airstrip outside Winterville, NC. 

Brenda Loy Wilson is a member of the Burlington Writer’s Club and Friday Noon Poets in Chapel Hill.Awards include NC Senior Games Literary Event Best in Show 2009 and Alamance/Burlington Senior Games Literary Event Best in Show 2011 and the Burlington Writer’s club for poetry, fiction and children’s poems. Her collection of poetry Transitions www.oldmp.com/transitions.htm was published in 2012. Brenda resides in Graham, NC.

Barbara Ledford Wright’s stories are in sixteen Old Mountain Press anthologies including Remember When. Barbara’s work has appeared in Muscadine Lines: A Southern Journal, Express Yourself 101 Vol 2 For Your Eyes Only, Kaleidoscope, Fireflies and June Bugs, Yesterdays Magazette, Christmas Presence, Clothes Lines, Fresh, Mused, Bread ‘N Molasses, Women’s Spaces Women’s Places, and Coffee-Ground Breakfast. She’s an educator, quilter, family historian, and writes stories about her family. Barbara, lives in Shelby, NC.

C. Pleasants York wrote “The Storybook Shuffle” while waiting for her daughter after a Brownie Scout meeting. The literary characters were beloved by her children Adam, Emily, and Jonathan, and grandson, Noah.York is the author of two poetry books, Pleasantries and Weaver of Destiny and a novel, Dream Within a Dream published by Tom Davis of Old Mountain Press.York teaches Creative Writing and volunteers at Boys and Girls Club in Sanford, NC.

Joseph Youngblood writes for pleasure and about things that matter deeply to him. He lives in Fayetteville, NC with his family and his works have appeared in several previous anthologies.