Teachers

Meet Our Teachers

Hugo House teachers are at the core of our goal to help writers become better writers. Our teachers are writers; they are selected on the basis of their active engagement in the literary world as well as their love of teaching.

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    Heidi Julavits

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    Beth Jusino

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    Kristiana Kahakauwila

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    Laura Kalpakian

  • Headshot of Ilya Kaminsky

    Ilya Kaminsky

  • Headshot of Rachel Kapelke-Dale

    Rachel Kapelke-Dale

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    Bo Kaprall

  • Headshot of Tim Keck

    Tim Keck

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    Jourdan Keith

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    Irene Keliher

  • Headshot of Megan Kelso

    Megan Kelso

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    JP Kemmick

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    Gloria Kempton

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    Randall Kenan

  • Headshot of Wendy Kendall

    Wendy Kendall

  • Headshot of Rick Kenney

    Rick Kenney

  • Headshot of Reginald Kent

    Reginald Kent

  • Headshot of Saba Keramati

    Saba Keramati

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    Rachel Kessler

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    Porochista Khakpour

  • Headshot of King Khazm

    King Khazm

  • Headshot of Rachel Khong

    Rachel Khong

  • Headshot of Kalehua Kim

    Kalehua Kim

  • Headshot of Kamal Kimball

    Kamal Kimball

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Heidi Julavits

Headshot of Beth Jusino

Beth Jusino

Pronouns: she/her

Beth Jusino has more than twenty years of experience helping writers navigate the complicated space between manuscript and final book. A former literary agent and marketing director, she’s now a writer, developmental editor, and publishing consultant for both traditional and self-publishing authors. She’s the author of the award-winning Walking to the End of the World: A Thousand Miles on the Camino de Santiago and The Author's Guide to Marketing, and she’s ghostwritten and collaborated on half a dozen additional titles for both large and small presses. Beth is a member of The Authors Guild and the Northwest Editors Guild, and has taught at writers’ conferences and book festivals around the world. Visit her online at www.bethjusino.com or on Twitter/Instagram @bethjusino.

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Kristiana Kahakauwila

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Laura Kalpakian

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Ilya Kaminsky

Ilya Kaminsky was born in Ukraine and currently lives in New Jersey. He is the author of Dancing in Odessa and Deaf Republic which was a finalist for the National Book Award and received the Los Angeles Times Book Award.

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Rachel Kapelke-Dale

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Bo Kaprall

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Tim Keck

Tim Keck is the co-founder of The Onion, Portland Mercury, and the Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper, The Stranger. He is currently working on a novel called "Balance Rock." He has told many people that it will be done soon.

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Jourdan Keith

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Irene Keliher

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Megan Kelso

In 1992, Megan Kelso was the first woman to receive funding from the Xeric Foundation to self-publish her comic, Girlhero. In 2007, she was invited by the New York Times to serialize her Watergate Sue comic in the magazine. In November 2022, Fantagraphics published Kelso's fourth book, a collection of graphic short stories called, Who Will Make the Pancakes

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JP Kemmick

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Gloria Kempton

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Randall Kenan

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Wendy Kendall

The result of Wendy Kendall's passion for purses, mystery and romance is an intriguing In Purse-Suit mysteries series. Kat Out of the Bag introduces Katherine Watson purse designer/sleuth, investigating murder as she moves from designer bags to body bags. The prequel, Purse-Stachio Makes A Splash delves into a chilling cold case. The romantic suspense, Snow Kiss Cookies To Die For creates an intriguing tangle of mystery and love. Her 2022 release, Cherry Shakes In The Park blends danger, divas, and frothy summer delights. Wendy enjoys the Pacific Northwest life and time with her two adult sons. She's a blogger, YouTube podcaster, speaker, project manager, and syndicated columnist. Just wait until you see what Katherine Watson and her friends in Bayside face next in the series.

Website – WendyWritesBooks.com

Facebook – WendyKendallMysteries

Twitter – @wendywrites1

Instagram – wendyekendall

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Rick Kenney

RICK KENNEY teaches at the MFA program at University of Washington. .

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Reginald Kent

REGINALD KENT holds a Master of Arts in English Literature from Nanyang Technological University in Singapore and is M.F.A candidate in the prose track. Reggie has been published in The Quarterly Literary Review of Singapore and has work featured in The Best Asian Short Stories 2022 collection. His work focuses on diaspora, queer forms, and the gay experience.

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Saba Keramati

Pronouns: she/her

Saba Keramati is a poet, editor, and educator from California. Her work appears or is forthcoming in AGNI, Michigan Quarterly Review, The Margins, and other publications. She is the poetry editor for Sundog Lit. Go to www.sabakeramati.com for more information.

Twitter: @sabzi_k

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Rachel Kessler

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Porochista Khakpour

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King Khazm

King Khazm is an emcee, producer, and community organizer who over 25 years has become a prominent figure in the Hip-Hop community in Seattle and around the world. Khazm has performed at the World’s Fair & Expo 2020 (Dubai), Galpao Aplauso (Brazil), Strictly Street (Malaysia), and the Folklife Festival (Seattle), sharing stages with the likes of Naughty By Nature, Gza, Kurtis Blow, Zion I, Aceyalone and others. As a producer, he has collaborated with artists such as Afu-Ra, Def-I, Eli Almic, and Gabriel Teodros. 

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Rachel Khong

Rachel Khong is a writer living in San Francisco. Her debut novel, Goodbye, Vitamin, won the 2017 California Book Award for First Fiction, and was a Los Angeles Times Book Prize Finalist for First Fiction. From 2011 to 2016, she was the managing editor and then executive editor of Lucky Peach magazine. With Lucky Peach, she also edited a cookbook about eggs, called All About Eggs. Her second novel, Real Americans, is forthcoming from Knopf in 2024.

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Kalehua Kim

Kalehua Kim is a poet living in the Seattle area. Born of Hawaiian, Chinese, Filipino, and Portuguese descent, her multicultural background informs much of her work. A finalist for the James Welch Prize for Indigenous Poetry, her poems have appeared in Poetry NorthwestCalyx, and ‘Ōiwi, A Native Hawaiian Journal

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Kamal Kimball

Pronouns: she/her

Kamal E. Kimball is a queer Ohio poet. On the editorial team for Muzzle, her work has been published in Crazyhorse, Colorado Review, New South, and elsewhere. She is the author of "The Mouth That Sucks the Bone" (Pitymilk, 2022).