Diane Banasiak has her Master’s Degree in Theology and a Post Graduate Certificate in Spirituality. She has been a spiritual companion to her students and is particularly gifted in spiritual direction. She has just completed her first manuscript which she plans to publish in 2012. Her first book is a memoir; she will use her first book as a tool for coaching and as a platform for speaking and teaching. Currently, Diane is pursuing certification as a Life Coach and can be found on the web at www.justdiane.com. Diane has been a teacher for over 25 years and has developed a variety of workshops and retreats for teens, college students, and for pilgrims on the journey!

Elizabeth Beck is a writer, artist, teacher and mother who lives on a pond in Lexington, Kentucky. She is the founding member of the Howl Teen Poetry Series. Her most recent work can be found in Accents Publishing’s anthology Bigger Than They Appear.

Doug Begley: attended Eastern KY University in pre-law and business. Graduated from University of Kentucky in psychology in 1977. Counselor with the Division of Social Services at Lexington city government for 26 years. Retired from Kentucky Army National Guard band in 2006. Presently writing a novel and a family biography/history book. Hosts Monday evening Writing Practice at Carnegie Center.

Nickole Brown’s books include her novel-in-poems, Sister (Red Hen Press), and the anthology, Air Fare, that she co-edited with Judith Taylor. She received her MFA in Creative Writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts and was the editorial assistant for the late Hunter S. Thompson. She has received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Kentucky Foundation for Women, and the Kentucky Arts Council. She worked at the independent, literary press, Sarabande Books, for ten years. Currently, she is the Co-editor for the Marie Alexander Series in Prose Poetry at White Pine Press and works as the National Publicity Consultant for Arktoi Books. She lives in Louisville where she is a lecturer at the University of Louisville and Bellarmine University and teaches at the low-residency MFA Program in Creative Writing at Murray State. She has taught at the Carnegie Center many times, gladly participating as an instructor to the Young Women Writers Project and also giving generative workshops and lectures on topics such as cross-genre work, the graphic memoir, and writing in multiple voices in poetry.

Susan Christerson Brown’s work has appeared in publications including Spirituality and Health, The Louisville Review, Journal of Kentucky Studies, Alive Now, and the online journal, Public-Republic, as well as the anthologies When the Bough Breaks, Tobacco: A Literary Anthology, and Women. Period. She is a founding member of the KaBooM Writing Collective, a Kentucky Arts Council grant recipient, and author of the blog, “Mildly Mystical.” (http://mildlymystical.com) She holds an MFA in Writing from Spalding University and an MA in theological studies from Lexington Theological Seminary.

A native of Minnesota, Kelli Carmean has taught anthropology and archaeology at Eastern Kentucky University since moving to Lexington in 1993. She spent her first sabbatical in northern Arizona, where she wrote Spider Woman Walks This Land: Traditional Cultural Properties and the Navajo Nation, published by AltaMira Press in 2002. Creekside: An Archaeological Novel was published in 2010 by The University of Alabama Press.

Sherry Chandler has an MA in English Literature from the University of Kentucky and is a board-certified Editor in the Life Sciences. She has had support from the Kentucky Arts Council and the Kentucky Foundation for Women. She is the author of Weaving a New Eden, a poetic history of Kentucky spoken by women; she blogs as SherryChandler.com and posts micropoetry as @BluegrassPoet.

Alan Church, Ph.D., is a retired clinical psychologist. He joined Lauri Bottoms’ weekly Book Discussion Group in 1993 and after 7 years became the leader of the present group. Because of his intense interest in literature he has recently audited a number of graduate seminars in the UK English Dept. He enjoys classic and contemporary works including mysteries and SF. His favorite authors include William Faulkner and Henry James.

 Sarah Combs has worked as a high school Latin teacher, college literature instructor, Youth and Teen librarian, and Jane-of-All-Trades at the Carnegie Center, where she teaches fiction writing for youth and adults and has led workshops in the Young Women Writers Program for teens. She is currently at work on Breakfast Served Anytime, winner of the 2010 YA Novel Discovery Contest.

Peggy DeKay is the author of Self Publishing For Virgins and has been Director of Women Who Write for the past three years. She teaches self-publishing workshops at the University of Louisville, Indiana University, Carnegie Center and at regional libraries, book festivals and writers conferences. Her next book due in 2012 is Stealth Marketing For Authors.

Lynnell Major Edwards is the author of two collections of poetry, The Highwayman’s Wife (2007) and The Farmer’s Daughter (2003) both from Red Hen Press. She lives in Louisville, Kentucky where she teaches creative writing at the Kentucky School of Art and the University of Louisville.

Cynthia Ellingsen is a commercial women’s fiction writer and screenwriter. Her first novel, The Whole Package, was published by Penguin-Berkley in 2011. Marriage Matters, also published by Penguin-Berkley, will hit the shelves in 2012. Cynthia is delighted to note that her first reading ever took place at a Kentucky Great Writers Series open mic and that, come June, she will be featured as one of the main stage Kentucky Great Writers. Cynthia serves on the Advisory Board at the Carnegie Center, the Young Professionals Board for the Lexington Public Library and as an Ambassador for Women Leading Kentucky.

Normandi Ellis writes from the landscape of her Kentucky childhood. She is the author of 3 books of fiction: Going West (Wind Publishing, 2011), Fresh Fleshed Sisters and Sorrowful Mysteries and Other Stories; 4 books of nonfiction: Imagining the World (2012 Inner Traditions), Invoking the Scribes (2011, Bear & Co.),Dreams of Isis and Voice Forms; and a translation from the hieroglyphs, Awakening Osiris. She and her husband operate PenHouse Retreat Center for writers and artists in Franklin County. She is a certified Journal to the Self instructor and former president of the National Association of Poetry Therapy Foundation.

Originally from Lexington, Randi Ewing received her MFA in fiction in 2010 from Washington University in St. Louis, where she taught undergraduate fiction writing classes for two years. Prior to going back to school, she spent much of her time at the Carnegie Center, taking classes, teaching fiction writing for youth, and covering stories for La Voz bilingual newspaper. She is currently splitting her time between Oklahoma and Argentina, while she researches her first novel.

A west coast transplant, Kathy Fallon, has called Versailles, Kentucky home for nearly 13 years. She cut her writing teeth in San Diego, California where she was an award winning writer and producer. Her varied Hollywood career includes five feature length scripts, polishing numerous television scripts and writing and producing everything from a horse racing show to children’s television on PBS. Currently, Kathy is at work on her first novel, which she describes as a cross between Janet Evanovich and Dan Brown with maybe a dash of Annie Lamott, or as Kathy puts it, “If Stephanie Plum fell in love with Robert Langdon they just might have produced her protagonist, Jane Duggan. It’s self-help for the humorously inclined disguised as fiction.”

Frankie Finley teaches fiction and nonfiction writing workshops at the Carnegie Center, where she has also been involved in the Young Women Writers Project. She served as the first woman editor of the long-standing Appalachian literary journal, Pine Mountain Sand & Gravel, from 2006 to 2011. She has worked as a freelance editor, writer, and writing coach since 2001, and works full-time as a writer for an international technology company. Frankie holds a BA in Creative Writing from Ohio University and an MA in English from the University of Kentucky. Her poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction work has been published in literary journals, and she is at work on her first full-length book project, a memoir for which she has received funding from the Kentucky Foundation for Women.

Jennifer Goodlander is currently an Associate Professor of Theatre at the University of Kentucky where she combines creative work, teaching, and scholarship on theatre history, puppetry, Asian performance, and directing. Jennifer has been a member of the 2005 Lincoln Center Director’s Lab, has directed in New York City and regionally, and was a Fullbright Scholar to Indonesia. She loves working on developing and directing solo performance because it allows unique voices to be shared in innovative ways through theatre–”solo performance creates community through individuality.”

Katherine Greene-Owens is beginning her third year as the Carnegie Center’s Office Manager and Events Coordinator. Prior to this position, she served at the center as an intern and an AmeriCorps*VISTA Summer Associate, during her senior year at Transylvania University. Her current capacity keeps her involved with the day-to-day operations within the building, as well as the planning and executing of large-scale events and rentals. Greene-Owens coordinates the Young Women Writers Project, a writing program for 9^th-12^th grade girls across Central Kentucky. She is also in her fourth year of tutoring with the center’s School Year and Summer Tutoring programs. She also represents the center on several boards and committees past and present including the AmeriCorps*VISTA advisory board, the North Lexington Neighborhood Association, and the Carnegie Center’s fundraising committee.

Mireya Hall was born in Venezuela and has lived with her husband and six children in the United States for 28 years. She learned English at the University of Washington and received her High School Diploma in Michigan. She is licensed in Medical Interpreting from the Catholic Charities of Louisville, KY. She is currently working as a Spanish interpreter for Fayette county schools. She has held several leadership positions in her church. She enjoys painting, making movies with her family, Genealogy work, hiking, folk dancing, and teaching Spanish. She is also involved with the Juvenile Cure for Diabetes since her youngest son is type one diabetic.

Brooke Harris is a graduate student, who is receiving her MFA in Creative Writing at Spalding University. She graduated from Asbury College in 2007 with a B.A. in Journalism, minor in art. She interned with the Carnegie Center in 2006 and has been an instructor for the Young Women Writers Program. Brooke loves to write, read, draw and Irish dance. She is a dance coach at the McTeggart School of Irish Dance in Lexington, KY.

Dave Harrity is the co-founder of Antler Collaborative, a teaching, publishing and community building organization devoted to teaching writing as a practice for spiritual growth. His poems have appeared widely in magazines and journals and his chapbook, “Morning and What Has Come Since,” (Finishing Line Press 2007) was nominated for a Pushcart Prize and Kentucky Literary Award. Connect directly with him at thisisantler.com.

Lori-Lyn Hurley holds a BA in studio art from Transylvania University and an MFA in fiction writing from Sarah Lawrence College. She is a writer, reiki practitioner and blog enthusiast. She has taught several classes at the Carnegie Center, including Personal Writing, fiction, Divining the Self through Words and Movement (yoga + writing), and more.

Jan Isenhour is the former director of the Carnegie Center, a teacher, a writer, and a lifelong learner. She leads writing workshops and facilitates book discussion groups. When she’s not reading or writing, she enjoys gardening, traveling to French-speaking countries, and spending time with her six grandchildren, all of whom enjoy a good book as much as she does.

Grayson Johnson is a Lexington native, a UK graduate and holds a MFA in filmmaking from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. He has written multiple screenplays and his debut film, RAFTBAG, recently won Best Feature Comedy at the DIY Film Fest in Hollywood, CA. Grayson works as a Producer/Director/Editor at Video Editing Services in Lexington.

Christopher Kelder was a tennis pro at The Lexington Tennis Club for many years, and now devotes his time to writing. He has self-published a religious/inspirational short novel, A TIME FOR HEALING; and is publishing his new book, THE SECRET OF COBB CREEK, A Short Novel & OTHER STORIES. He will facilitate the new Tates Creek Library Writer’s Group, meeting the first Thursday of each month, beginning April 1. He has tutored and volunteers at many writer’s events at the Carnegie Center.

Katerina Stoykova-Klemer is the author of the bilingual poetry book, The Air around the Butterfly (Fakel Express, 2009), and the English language chapbook, The Most (Finishing Line Press, 2010). Her poems have been published in the US and Europe, including The Louisville Review, Margie, Adirondack Review and others. Katerina is the founder and leader of poetry and prose groups in Lexington, Kentucky. She hosts Accents – a radio show for literature, art and culture on WRFL, 88.1 FM, Lexington. In January 2010 Katerina launched Accents Publishing – an independent press for brilliant voices. Accents has published or announced books by local, national and international authors. Katerina holds an MFA in Writing from Spalding University in Louisville, Kentucky

Leatha Kendrick has taught writing for more than 35 years. She’s taught at the University of Kentucky, Prestonsburg Community College, Morehead State University, and at many workshops, including the Appalachian Writers Workshop and the Kentucky Writers Workshop. For the past decade she’s been teaching classes at the Carnegie Center, including Poetry and Life Writing workshops, as well as Poetry and Non-fiction Master Classes. Her third book of poetry came out in 2008. In addition to teaching writing, she’s taught journalism, public speaking, seventh grade, and kindergarten and loved them all. Visit her website for more information!

Gail M. Koehler holds an MA from the University of Toronto. Her work has appeared in the anthology I to I: Life Writing by Kentucky Feminists, the Lexington Herald-Leader, and she is a contributor to the anthology When the Bough Breaks as a member of the KaBooM Writing Collective (http://kaboomwriters.com/). She also edits Peaceways, a newsletter published by the Central Kentucky Council for Peace and Justice. Gail leads the Friday noon Writing Practice at the Carnegie Center and other occasional writing classes.

Hannah LeGris after getting her B.A. in English from the College of Wooster, in Wooster, Ohio, Hannah Legri sreturned to Kentucky to work as an AmeriCorps VISTA (Volunteers in Service to America) member at the Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning. As part of her job at the center, Hannah planned youth and family programs, which sometimes include obstacle courses, baby animals, seedling plantings, and hula-hoop contests. In the past four years, Hannah has been involved in a variety of service initiatives in addition to her AmeriCorps work, mainly in environmental sustainability and college campuses and rallying students to organize around similar causes. As a result, she has a background in event planning and promotion, which she plans to use in her involvement with the Lexington Film League. Hannah’s academic focuses are creative writing, critical feminist theory, film theory, and altered bookmaking; her Senior Thesis at Wooster was entitled “Pushing the Book to Assemble Meaning: Expanding the Boundaries of Form and Function.” She continues to write and make altered books and mixed-media work for friends and exhibits in local shows.

Originally from Harlan County, Kentucky, George Ella Lyon works as a freelance writer and teacher based in Lexington, where she lives with her husband, writer and musician Steve Lyon. She has published over 40 books for readers of all ages. Recent titles include All the Water in the World, The Pirate of Kindergarten (winner of the American Library Association’s Schneider Family Book Award), You and Me and Home Sweet Home (a Jane Addams Honor Book) and “Which Side Are You On?” The Story of a Song. Visit her online at www.georgeellalyon.com.

Elise Mandel has a Masters in Education from UMass Amherst, and many years of teaching experience. She once ran a one-room schoolhouse in New Jersey and taught French, Spanish, and Calligraphy at a Quaker school. She has taught Special Education and Student Teachers, and she works with private students in all subjects (except Science!) At the Carnegie Center, Elise teaches teach Spanish, Calligraphy, GRE Preparation, Brain Power, youth math, and more!

Jessica Merriman has been in the graphic/printing industry for over 14 years. After graduating from Eastern Kentucky University in 1998, she worked her way up to Plant Manager of a printing company, Creative Director of a local magazine, and recently set out to open her own business, Merriman Design Group.

Ed McClanahan , a native Kentuckian, is the author of The Natural Man, Famous People I Have Known,, and four other books, including, most recently, I Just Hitched In from the Coast: The Ed McClanahan Reader (Counterpoint, 2011). He has taught at a number of universities, and has been awarded a Wallace Stegner Fellowship in Creative Writing, an Al Smith fellowship, and two Yaddo fellowships. He now lives with his wife Hilda in Lexington, where he teaches an annual three-week seminar in the University of Kentucky’s Gaines Center for the Humanities.

Born & raised in Eastern Kentucky, Jay McCoy now makes his home in Lexington. He holds B.A. degrees in English and Biology from Transylvania University and an M.A.Ed. in Educational Administration from The University of Akron. As a blogger and an active member of the Poezia writing group, Jay writes mostly poetry, but also dabbles in short fiction and creative non-fiction. He was selected for the Appalachian Writers Workshop for the past three summers. His poetry has appeared in Still: The Journal, the Single Hound, and is forthcoming in Now & Then, and Pine Mountain Sand & Gravel. Editors of The Naugatuck River Review selected Jay’s poem, “On the Kentucky Side of the Tug Fork,” as a semi-finalist for their Narrative Poetry Contest and will publish it in their Winter 2012 volume. He has contributed poems to anthologies including Bigger Than They Appear: An Anthology of Very Short Poems from Accents Publishing and Motif 3: All the Livelong Day from Motes Books. He was a feature poet for the Holler Poets Series in December 2011. Along with Elizabeth Beck, Jay co-founded the Teen Howl Poetry Series, Lexington’s only open mic specifically for the under-21 creative community.

Stephen R. (Stevie) Moore is a fine artist and illustrator from Lexington. Stevie was interested in art from an early age, with his foremost and earliest subjects of choice being vehicles, science fiction, and natural history subjects. Self-taught until college, he began to explore traditional techniques and theory at the University of Kentucky, where he specialized in printmaking and oil painting. Having a lifelong affinity for Biology, Ecology, Geology, and other Natural Sciences, Stevie’s intentions were to bridge the gap between the rigidity of science and the supple aesthetics of artwork. Later in his education he discovered that illustration was his true calling due to the highly realistic and descriptive nature of his work. Having completing the B.A. degree program Stevie continues creating and exhibiting artwork pertaining to natural history subjects from his personal studio in Lexington. He currently works primarily in oils to complete works for exhibitions and commissions; however, he is learning and experimenting with digital media. For updates and information on his art, please check out his blog.

Andrew H. Owens is a 2010 graduate of the College of Design, School of Architecture master’s program. He has been involved with the Carnegie Center since 2007 teaching Architecture and Graphic Design classes for middle school students and Adobe Creative Suite computer courses for adults.

Lynn Pruett is the author of the novel Ruby River. Her stories have been published in the Michigan Quarterly Review, Border Crossing, On the Mason-Dixon, and When the Bough Breaks, among others. She’s been awarded the Al Smith Fellowship from the KAC, and fellowships from the KY Foundation for Women and Yaddo. She teaches in the low-residency MFA program at Murray State University and at the Carnegie Center in Lexington.

Monique Roman has been teaching French, her native language, for more than 15 years. She has been teaching at the Carnegie Center for the past 6 years, and has previously taught at the Alliance Française in Orlando, Florida as well as private lessons at home. Monique loves to share her enthusiasm for French language and culture with her students. Her dedication to her work is well noted by all who know her. Once a month, Monique hosts a Salon Francophile in her home. Monique enjoys traveling the world, tango dancing and has a great interest in history.

Johanna Schafer has been working with youth and family programs at the Carnegie Center since she served as an AmeriCorps VISTA in 2005. She holds a B.A. in Communication from Greenville College in Greenville, IL and a M.A. in Christian Education from Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, KY. Her “day job” is with Apprisen Financial Advocates, but her love for kids and passion for teaching has kept her involved in leading math classes, book clubs, tutor trainings, as well as the occasional summer camp at the Carnegie Center.

Frederick Smock is associate professor of English, and director of Creative Writing, at Bellarmine University, in Louisville. He has published four books of poems with Larkspur Press, most recently The Blue Hour. His other books include Pax Intrantibus: A Meditation on the Poetry of Thomas Merton and Poetry & Compassion: Essays on Art & Craft.

Affrilachian Poet and Cave Canem Fellow, Bianca Spriggs, is a freelance instructor of composition, literature, and creative writing. She is a Kentucky Humanities Council Lecturer and the creator and programmer of the Gypsy Poetry Slam featured annually at the Kentucky Women Writers Conference.  Heralded as “the new standard bearer for the Affrilachian Poets” by founding member, Frank X Walker, Bianca Spriggs is the author of Kaffir Lily (Wind Publications).

Sara Talbott graduated from Eastern Kentucky University with a degree in general dietetics. After graduating she completed internships with University of Kentucky Cooperative Extension and later became employed as a Family and Consumer Sciences Agent. Sara enjoys working with youth and families on better health and nutrition in the community.

Richard Taylor, Keenan Visiting Writer at Transylvania University, is the author of 2 novels, 7 collections of poetry, and several non-fiction books, mostly relating to Kentucky history.His most recent books are Fading into Bolivia (Accents Publications, 2011) and Rare Bird: Sonnets of the Life of John James Audubon (Larkspur Press, 2011). He is currently working on a series of poems relating to the life of emancipationist Cassius M. Clay. A former Kentucky poet laureate and the winner of two creative writing fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, he and his wife own Poor Richard’s Books in Frankfort, Kentucky.

Milt Toby is an author and attorney who has been writing professionally about horses for almost 40 years. He is Chair of the Contracts Committee for the American Society of Journalists and Authors and he is a frequent presenter on copyright and publishing contracts at national, state, and local events. Milt is the author of six books, including Dancer’s Image: The Forgotten Story of the 1968 Kentucky Derby, a 2011 release from The History Press. Visit his website at www.miltonctoby.com.

Oscar Trujillo has been working at Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning for the past four years. One of the most important goals in his job is to encourage the Spanish students to learn this language through an active participation at their own pace. Oscar is originally from Colombia and has been living in Lexington for the last five years. He has also been working as a Spanish Instructor at Transylvania University and Bluegrass Community and Technical College (BCTC), and as a community organizer at the Kentucky Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (KCIRR). Ever since he came to Lexington, has been interested in teaching Spanish. For over 15 years, he taught Philosophy and Humanities in High School and in the University. Oscar has a Masters Degree in Education and Social Research from the Pontificia Universidad Javeriana in Colombia. His Bachelors Degree is in Philosophy at the Universidad Santo Tomás in Colombia and Pontificia Universidad Urbaniana (Roma).

Jeff Worley, a former writer-in-residence at the Carnegie Center, has published four books and four chapbooks of poetry. His latest book from Mid-List Press, Happy Hour at the Two Keys Tavern, was named 2006 Kentucky Book of the Year in Poetry and was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. Most recently, Jeff edited the anthology What Comes Down to Us: 25 Contemporary Kentucky Poets (University Press of Kentucky, 2009). He has published poems in nearly 500 magazines, including Poetry Northwest, The Georgia Review, New England Review, Shenandoah, and The Southern Review.

British-born Fiona Young-Brown has lived in Lexington for a little over ten years. She has a BA in American Studies and a MA in Interdisciplinary Studies. Her second local history book, Wicked Lexington, was published in 2011.