Chalkboard Car (11/7/03) - David Bernardy
David Bernardy was born in Vero Beach, Florida and grew up in the northern suburbs of Atlanta. He is currently completing a PhD in Creative Writing from the University of Houston while teaching at the University of Minnesota. He lives in Minneapolis with his new bride, and mostly, they're just trying to get through the winter.

The Ragpicker (11/18/02) - Margie Newman
Margie Newman grew up in Brooklyn, New York. For the past ten years, she’s made her home in St. Paul, Minnesota, with her two children and a big dog. Margie is completing her M.F.A. in Creative Writing at the University of Minnesota. At the moment, she makes her living serving up cappuccinos and espressos, and is active in teaching and promoting Yiddish language in the Twin Cities.

Knowing You In Snow (9/26/02) - Dominic Saucedo
Dominic Saucedo lives in St. Paul, MN. He is a 2002-2003 Winter Fellow at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, MA. While in residence at FAWC, he plans to complete a collection of short stories, Knowing You In Snow.

Betty - The Guardflesh (excerpt) - Zelda Alpern
Betty- The Guardflesh is a novella about two women, Isabel, in her early 20's, and Betty who is in her late seventies and about to die. Betty refuses to "take care of herself," and Isabel in the course of struggling with Betty begins to see both herself and the notion of helping others in a different light. The novella also explores shame- about the self, the past and about race. Zelda Alpern lives in Queens and teaches creative writing to special education students in NYC public schools through Teachers and Writers Collaborative. She is in the Creative Writing Program at City College, at the City University of New York. She's published poetry and short stories in CHAIN and Release.

Cathy's Grade A Café - Elizabeth Noll
Elizabeth Noll has an MFA in creative writing from the University of Minnesota. She was a writer in residence at the Anderson Center in 2000, and she is currently engaged in guerilla employment, slipping stealthily from editing to teaching to making deliveries in her silver 1980 Honda Civic with red wheels.

Fixing Disney - Michael Seward
Michael Seward's fiction has appeared in numerous journals nationwide, including The Rio Grande Review, The Dickinson Review, Folio, Frisk, and the Oakland Review. A former Fulbright Scholar to Germany, he has studied writing with prize-winning authors Susan Power, Bernard Cooper, and Ai. He currently teaches at Minneapolis Community Technical College.

Cruelty, part 1 - Brady Johnson
Cruelty, part 2 - Brady Johnson
Brady Johnson is currently at work on a novel entitled Michiganders, which traces the intersection of the lives of two women who share a brutal and confusing past with that of a desperate County Sheriff's Deputy. "Cruelty" is a product of the process of writing Michiganders.

Shell Mobile - E. Noll