Teachers

Cara Diaconoff is the author of Unmarriageable Daughters: Stories and a novel, I’ll Be a Stranger to You. Her fiction has appeared in Indiana Review, The Adirondack Review, and elsewhere. She teaches writing and literature at Bellevue College. For more information check out Cara's LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/caradiaconoff/.

Nicole Dieker teaches writing, freelancing, and publishing classes (including Hugo House online classes) and works one-on-one with authors as a developmental editor and copyeditor. She’s been a full-time freelance writer since 2012, and spent five years as a writer and editor for The Billfold, a personal finance blog where people had honest conversations about money.

Nicole’s debut novel, The Biographies of Ordinary People: Volume 1: 1989–2000, published in May 2017; The Biographies of Ordinary People: Volume 2: 2004–2016 followed in May 2018. The two books are a Millennial-era Little Women that follow three sisters from childhood to adulthood.

Visit NicoleDieker.com to learn more — including Nicole’s thoughts on writing, money, teaching and the process of taking your work from good to excellent.

Adelle Dimitui is a graphic novelist whose work is heavily influenced by her childhood growing up in Myanmar and the Philippines. She aims to highlight underrepresented narratives and cultures, particularly those centered around life in the Global South. Since her graduation from Princeton University, Adelle has been based in Seattle where she currently works in cybersecurity. Adelle spends her free time singing, songwriting, scuba diving, and flying planes. 

Cass Donish is author of the poetry collections Your Dazzling Death (Knopf, 2024), The Year of the Femme (University of Iowa Press, 2019), and Beautyberry (Slope Editions, 2018); and a nonfiction chapbook, On the Mezzanine (Gold Line Press, 2019).

Peter Donovan is an musical storyteller. His songs span genres and feature narratives based on both real-life and fictitious characters, written with a contemplative heart. After finding success and a dedicated fanbase with Seattle’s All The Real Girls and his side project The Rose Petals (alongside Elijah Ocean), Donovan returned in 2022 with his first proper solo album, This Better Be Good. His previous releases spun expertly-crafted character sketches that earned plaudits from Paste Magazine, Consequence of Sound, American Songwriter, and more. With This Better Be Good, Donovan spreads his wings, combining the plaintive soul of indie rock, the heartfelt sincerity of Americana, and the stirring studio pageantry of ‘70s singer-songwriters, drawing them together to explore more intimate depths.

Anna Dorn is an author, editor, and teacher living in Los Angeles. She has published three books: Exalted (Unnamed Press, 2022), Bad Lawyer (Hachette, 2021), and Vagablonde (Unnamed Press, 2020).

Mark Doty is the author of nine books of poetry, including Deep Lane (April 2015), Fire to Fire: New and Selected Poems, which won the 2008 National Book Award, and My Alexandria, winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the T.S. Eliot Prize in the UK. He is also the author of four memoirs: the New York Times-bestselling What Is the Grass, Dog Years, Firebird, and Heaven’s Coast, as well as a book about craft and criticism, The Art of Description: World Into Word. Doty has received two NEA fellowships, Guggenheim and Rockefeller Foundation Fellowships, a Lila Wallace/Readers Digest Award, and the Witter Byner Prize.

Brandi Douglas (She/They) is a member of the Puyallup Tribe, a descendent of the Muckleshoot and Nooksack Nations and is Mexican and Black American, who currently resides on traditional Puyallup Tribal territory in Tacoma, WA. They are a published writer, having been featured in We Need A Reckoning, an anthology featuring the voices of women and non-binary people of color. Brandi owns Mending Matriarch, where they produce print goods that promote healing, community, humor and the anti-hustle lifestyle. Additionally, they co-operate Bella & Belle, a creative design studio, alongside their brother. Brandi currently works in the communications department at NDN Collective, an Indigenous power-building organization.

RY LUCIA DOZIER-LERUM (they/them) is a fourth-year undergraduate at the University of Washington. They have delighted in writing creatively since they knew how to put words on paper and are ecstatic to finally study it full-time (even if it took trying out two other degrees first). They are also a musician and can be found on Instagram at @ryluciamusic. 

Scott Driscoll is an award-winning instructor (UW, Educational Outreach Award for Excellence in Teaching in the Arts and Humanities 2006), and his debut novel, Better You Go Home, was selected as the Foreword Reviews First Book Contest winner. He was the 1989 winner of the University of Washington’s Milliman Award for Fiction.

Describe your teaching style!

We start by reading examples of the discussion subject for that day, then I go over that element of craft and we discuss it some more and look at further examples. This will usually be followed by a writing prompt or two for practice. Some classes will finish with workshopping and peer review for those who volunteer to submit.

Denise Duhamel’s most recent book of poetry is Second Story (Pittsburgh, 2021). Her other titles from the U of Pittsburgh Press include Scald (2017); Blowout (2013, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award); Ka-Ching (2009); Two and Two (2005); and Queen for a Day: Selected and New Poems (2001). Earlier titles include The Star-Spangled Banner (winner of the Crab Orchard Series in Poetry from Southern Illinois U Press, 1999); and the ever-popular and best-selling Kinky(Orchises Press, 1997). She is a recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. Her poetry has been widely anthologized and has appeared in several of The Best American Poetry annuals; she was guest editor for the 2013 edition. Originally from Rhode Island, Duhamel teaches in the MFA program at Florida International University in Miami.

https://upittpress.org/books/9780822966531/

Zoser is a singer/songwriter and music bender whose music has no boundaries.  With a soulful voice, thoughtful lyrics, and a guitar, his music shifts seamlessly between pop, hip-hop, R&B, and folk.  The writing is personal, the music idiosyncratic, all to capture the feelings and mood of each song. With influences ranging from Ed Sheeran to Childish Gambino, a simple six-string, and mic, Zoser transforms into a “beat box,” lending percussive bass to funky and melodious rhymes.  He made his recording debut in 2019 with the EP release “Genesis” followed by the EP “Evolve” in 2020,  independently recorded and released.  Zoser is currently the Co-Chair of the Totem Star Leadership Collective, a non-profit music and mentorship program for underserved youths.

As an emerging Seattle artist, Zoser began playing guitar when he was just 10-years-old. By the age of 12, he began penning his own lyrics and performing to local audiences in his hometown of Augusta, Georgia. 2 years later, as a mentee of the 100 Black Men of America, he represented the August chapter and performed at the National Convention. Zoser remained a fixture on the local musical scene until relocating to Seattle where he graduated from West Seattle High School. 

While in high school, Zoser was a gold medalist in the Seattle King County NAACP ACTSO competition where he went on to represent the branch at the National convention and was later inducted into the Washington Young Laureates program. Shortly after adjusting to the Seattle music scene, he went on to be a semi-finalist for” SoundOff! 2019”, PNW local music competition, and selected to participate in the More Music at The Moore, a Musician in Residency and Young Emerging Artists program.

By culling and synthesizing seemingly disparate musical forms and influences, Zoser has crafted a sound that is wholly and undeniably his own. The result is something spectacular to behold: a voice that conveys a world-weary ache and a bright optimism, and a sense of musicality that is both rhythmic and infectiously melodic. He is a singer, a storyteller and something of a revelation – not necessarily a soul singer but something rarer and more precious – a singer with soul.