Teachers

Risa Denenberglives on the Olympic peninsula in Washington state where she works as a nurse practitioner and volunteers with End of Life Washington. She is a co-founder and editor at Headmistress Press, publisher of lesbian/bi/trans poetry and curator of The Poetry Café, an online meeting place where poetry chapbooks are celebrated and reviewed. Her poetry and poetry book reviews have been published widely.

Nicola DeRobertis-Theye’s debut novel The Vietri Project will be published in March 2021 by Harper. She was an Emerging Writing Fellow at the New York Center for Fiction, and her work has been published in Agni, Electric Literature, and LitHub. A graduate of UC Berkeley, she received an MFA in Creative Nonfiction from the University of North Carolina, Wilmington, where she was the fiction editor of its literary magazine Ecotone. She has taught creative writing at the University of North Carolina, Wilmington and the South Carolina Governor's School for the Arts. A native of Oakland, CA, she now lives in Brooklyn, New York.

Writer and writing coach Stephanie Dethlefs helps people get their stories onto the page with ease and self-compassion. She is the author of the middle grade novel Unspoken, and her writing can be found in a variety of publications.

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.

Elizabeth Dilley is a Seattle-based actor, dancer, business owner (RadiantPilatesNW.com), and mom of two. Before family, her life was dedicated to performance in NYC with a small stint in London. As her babies are now school-aged, she’s excited to dive back into the industry and discover what Seattle and the Pacific Northwest market have to offer. Elizabeth is represented by Big Fish Northwest. 

Elizabeth holds a BFA in dance (cum laude) from Cornish College of the Arts, a Diploma in Theater Arts from the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, and a Certificate in Performance from the Laban Centre London. 

A few of her favorite roles include Helen in “Life on the Moon,” Baker Theater Workshop, Natasha, “Three Sisters,” The Modern Theater Project and Becca in “Snow Drift,” Aching Dogs Theater. Next up, see Elizabeth with AMD Improv at Jules Maes Saloon on March 28th. 

ElizabethDilley.com.

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.

Asha Dore is a writer and illustrator working on a book about fawning. Bylines include The New York Times, The Cut, and Slate. She hosts “Totally Biased Reviews,” a literary interview podcast. Her work can be found at www.AshaDore.net or on Instagram @adjsbb

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.