David E Kelly, Lieutenant Colonel USMC, Retired, has written three books based on his interviews with combat Marines serving in Iraq. He served 29 years in the Marine Corps, active and reserve. He volunteered to return to active duty in 2004 to deploy to Iraq and interview Marines in the field during combat operations. He taught Social Studies and other subjects in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia high schools, retiring after a 41 year career.

Miriam Seidel’s latest book, Tesla’s Opera (Fomite Press), explores the life of the inventor Nikola Tesla through the opera about him. She also wrote the libretto for the opera, Violet Fire, which has been performed in New York, Belgrade, and Philadelphia. Her novel, The Speed of Clouds (New Door Books), takes place at the intersection of science-fiction fandom and fantasy. As Mir Seidel, her short fiction and essays have appeared in Bourbon Penn, Into the Ruins, the New York Review of Science Fiction, Calyx, and elsewhere. She blogs at miriamseidel.com.

Larry was born in Pittsburgh, PA. He is an award-winning and best-selling author and now lives on a farm where he grows his stories in peaceful climes. His fifteen novels and one after-dinner play, full of clever, outspoken characters, are set anywhere from the star trails of the Galactic Rangers to a balcony on Social Security Headquarters’ third floor. Find him at larryenright.com.

Mike Smith, a Delco native for over 60 years, grew up in Lansdowne, and co-owned the Balcony in 69^th Street 1969-1988. Mike shared his unique experiences of being in retail business with his brother in his first book, My View from the Balcony: (a Memoir). Currently Mike is a successful real estate agent with a prominent Media firm.  A Ghostly Wind in Delco marks Mike’s inaugural work of fiction. The novel recounts the tale of determined female ghosts, former victims of a drug ring operating out of a grand house called “the Castle”.  To avenge their untimely deaths, the ghosts collaborate to haunt those responsible, leaving behind clues to help unravel the truth and bring about justice. Ghostly Wind is chock full of references and allusions to places that will resonate with anyone familiar with “Delco”. 

A native of Lansdowne, David Amadio received his MFA in Fiction from Bowling Green State University in 2001. Since 2004, he has taught Creative Writing and Composition at Lincoln University, America’s oldest degree-granting HBCU. His work has appeared in Talking River, Nerve Cowboy, Cleaver, Packingtown Review, Adaptation, and The San Francisco Examiner. Additionally, David is head writer of The Minor Prophets, a three-man comedy troupe with over 30 award-winning short films to its credit. For his debut novel, Rug Man, David won the 2023 Athenaeum of Philadelphia Literary Award in Fiction.

Daniel Simpson’s most recent book, Inside the Invisible, published by Nine Mile Books in November, 2022, won the inaugural Propel Poetry Prize and has been nominated for the American Academy of Poets Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize. Other books include Border Songs: A Conversation in Poems, co-authored with Ona Gritz (Finishing Line Press, 2017) and School for the Blind (Poets Wear Prada, 2014). His work has been anthologized in About Us: Essays from the Disability Series of the New York Times, Welcome to the Resistance: Poetry as Protest, and Beauty Is a Verb: The New Poetry of Disability, and has appeared in Prairie Schooner, The Cortland Review, and many other journals. He serves as flash nonfiction editor for Wordgathering, and leads, along with Ona Gritz, online workshops in poetry and flash memoir. He sings with the Mendelssohn Chorus of Philadelphia and works as a technical support specialist for the Library of Congress’s braille and audio book download service for the print-impaired. Dan moved to Lansdowne in 1993 and lives here now with his wife Ona Gritz, their rescue Chihuahua Portia, and Dan’s guide dog Boone.

Ona Gritz’s true crime memoir, Everywhere I Look won the Clara Johnson Award in Women’s Literature, the Readers’ Choice Gold Award for Best Adult Book, a Pencraft Best Book Award in Memoir, and was named an Independent Book Review 2024 Must-Read, a Kirkus Reviews “Indie Worth Discovering” and the StoryTrade Nonfiction Book of the Year.

 She is the author of two young adult verse novels, The Space You Left Behind, a Children’s Book Council Disability Pride Month Recommended Read, and Take a Sad Song, a Kirkus Reviews’ best YA title of 2024. Her poems and essays have appeared widely, including in The New York Times, The Guardian, Ploughshares, Brevity, River Teeth and Salon. Ona’s most recent book is If You Find This Letter, a middle grade verse novel about friendship, family, grief, and time traveling letters. Children’s author, Kimberly Behre Kenna calls it “a gem of a novel… that’s as accessible as it is profound.”

Thom Nickels is the author of 17 books, including: Philadelphia Architecture (2005), ‘Out in History’ (2005), Literary Philadelphia, 2015, Philadelphia Mansions, 2018 and ‘Death in Philadelphia: The Murder of Kimberly Ernest,’ 2023. Nickels was nominated for a Lambda Literary Award for Two Novellas (1990) and awarded the 2005 Philadelphia AIA Lewis Mumford Award for Architectural Journalism. He writes for City Journal New York, Frontpage Magazine, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Huff Post, and Philadelphia Magazine. He is the Arts & Culture Editor-at-Large for Fideri News Network & Broad + Liberty Philadelphia. His book, ‘Ileana of Romania: Princess, Exile and Mother Superior’ was released in 2026.

Mike Madaio is a food and wine writer based in southeastern Pennsylvania. In addition to authoring the books A History of Philadelphia Sandwiches and Lost Mount Penn, his writing has appeared in publications such as Wine Enthusiast, VinePair, Edible Philly and more. He has also achieved Italian Wine Ambassador certification from the Vinitaly International Academy. His website is Lifeattable.com and he can be found on social media @lifeattable.