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Editor-in-Chief

Suzanne Guess is editor-in-chief of Mud Season Review. She is a writer living in central Iowa, where her family has resided for six generations. She holds an MA in Literature from Iowa State University, and an MFA in Writing from the University of Nebraska. She has work upcoming or already published in The Girlfriend, Brevity, Intercom, and Concurrence. She is also the founder of the Raccoon River Reading Series. When she’s not writing, Suzanne plays flute respectably, but not expertly, in a wind ensemble.

Managing Editor

Mark Lombard is managing editor of Mud Season Review. An editor, journalist and media executive working in newspapers, magazines, online publications and books for the last 50 years, he holds an MA from Syracuse University (SU) and was editor-in-chief and poetry editor of its Syracuse Review. He is the winner of the Catholic Media Association St. Francis de Sales Award recognizing lifetime service for outstanding contributions to journalism and the chair of its media-ethics group. Lombard, former adjunct journalism professor at St. Michael’s College and former teaching assistant in the area of religion and literature at SU, when not working on creative writing in his Vermont studio, can be found practicing his double bass or Gospel singing for a New Orleans choir of which he is a member.

Senior Editors

Paul Chuks is a freelancer, poet and storyteller. He is of Igbo descent and resides in Nigeria. His works have appeared or are forthcoming in The London Magazine, Craftliterary, Strange Horizons, Hobartpulp and elsewhere. He is a senior editor at Mud Season Review.

Meg Harris serves as a senior editor and associate creative nonfiction editor for Mud Season Review. She holds a degree in Literature and Creative Writing and is working on her first novel. She lives with her husband and four kids in rural Virginia, where she writes fiction and creative nonfiction for the pure joy of it.

Copy Editors

Fabián Aruquipa is a Bolivian translator, copy editor and poet, and teaches poetry and creative writing. He has contributed his editing expertise to a variety of literary, diplomatic and pro-bono projects worldwide. His work has earned him accolades, including the 2024 Emma Villazón Poetry Prize and the 2022 GABS Collage Contest.

Fiction Co-Editors

Ann Fisher is fiction co-editor of Mud Season Review. Ann lives, works, and writes at the base of the Green Mountains. Her work has appeared in AcrosstheMargin, The Sonder Review, Heartwood Literary Magazine, ZigZagLitMag, and About Place Journal, among others.

Madeline DeLuca is fiction co-editor of Mud Season Review. She is a writer of prose and poetry who earned her MFA from Fairfield University. She is currently a book editor at Fox Chapel Publishing. She has written a novel, poetry, short stories, essays and a children’s book, and her words can be found in The Portland Review, Hard Freight and Kalliope.

Creative Nonfiction Editor

Lenore Weiss is a poet and fiction writer who lives in Oakland, California. She is a member of the San Francisco Writers Grotto. Lenore serves as the Creative Nonfiction (CNF) Editor for Mud Season Review. She won the Magpie Magazine Clark Closser Memorial Literature Award in Nonfiction and has been nominated for two Pushcart Prizes. Her collection of prose poems, Half-Quilted, was released this year by Bottlecap Press. Her environmental novel, Pulp into Paper, and poetry collection, Video Game Pointers, were published in 2024. Prior poetry collections form a trilogy about love, loss, and mortality. Both her prose and poetry have been widely published. You can read more of her work here.

Poetry Editor

Princess Zuri McCann is the Mud Season Review poetry editor. She is from Connecticut and holds a BA in English, an MFA in Creative Writing and a Master of Library and Information Science from Southern Connecticut State University (SCSU). She is currently a Doctor of Education student at Sacred Heart University. She enjoys working in libraries, reading, writing and mysteries. Her work has appeared in Call + Response Journal, Plainsongs and Here: a poetry journal.

Art Editor

Michelle Kite is art editor for Mud Season Review. A lifelong maker and mischief maker, she earned her B.F.A. in Photography, Computer Graphics and Mixed Media from Iowa State University. Her career began during the dot-com boom and has since included roles as a web developer, animator, instructional designer and voice artist. Michelle lives in central Iowa, where her family has long-standing roots in farming, law and craftsmanship. When she’s not dreaming up immersive themed parties or repurposing thrifted curtains into elaborate costumes, she’s likely riding cross country on a motorcycle with her husband, hunting for mid-century furniture or plotting how to lure Adam Savage of “Mythbusters” into her art studio for a one-day build.

Consulting Editors

Rebecca Starks is a consulting editor for and a founding editor of Mud Season Review. She teaches literature and writing courses part-time for the Osher Institute of Lifelong Learning program at the University of Vermont. She has a PhD in English from Stanford University and a BA in English from Yale University. Her poems have appeared in Slice, Rattle, Crab Orchard Review, Carolina Quarterly, Raintown Review, and elsewhere. Her fiction has been published in Crab Orchard Review and Tahoma Literary Review. For links to her work visit: rebeccastarks.com.

Danielle Thierry is a consulting editor for and a founding editor of Mud Season Review. Danielle served as managing editor of the journal for its inaugural year. She is a freelance writer, editor, and digital content strategist who plans, creates, and manages content for a wide range of projects, including managing the magazine of a global nonprofit organization. She also blogs for the Flynn Theater in Burlington, Vermont. Danielle holds a BA in radio/television/film and an MA in creative writing and journalism from Rowan University, where she was active in the university’s literary magazine (Avant). She has taught writing and literature in the past and is thankful to be back in a position where she can work with other creative writers to help them hone their craft and strengthen their voice.

Associate Creative Nonfiction Editor

Meg Harris serves as a senior editor and associate creative nonfiction editor for Mud Season Review. She holds a degree in Literature and Creative Writing and is working on her first novel. She lives with her husband and four kids in rural Virginia, where she writes fiction and creative nonfiction for the pure joy of it.

Associate Poetry Editor

Kris Kaila (she/her) is a Punjabi Canadian poet/writer, bookstagrammer and cross-stitching novice. Her poetry has been published in the Usawa Literary Review and Maza Arts Collective and in various anthologies and zines, including being reprinted in the Indian Yearbook 2022 and 2024. Kris is a member of the League of Canadian Poets, was chosen as the poetry mentee for the Writers’ Trust of Canada Mentorship and a reader for Events magazine. You can find out more on My Novelesque Life and @krisesque_life (IG).

Fiction Readers

Natalie Schriefer is a fiction reader for Mud Season Review. She works as an academic editor and freelance writer. A Best of the Net nominee, Natalie’s work has appeared in publications ranging from Wired and NBC News Think to The Journal of Compressed Creative Arts and Canada’s Room Magazine. When she isn’t writing, she’s either gaming or playing sports. Say hi on Twitter @schriefern1 or on her website, www.natalieschriefer.com.

Wendy Swift is the author of a memoir, A Dream Life, as well as essays published in HuffPost, Memoir Magazine, Grub Street Literary Magazine, Barely South Review, Yellow Arrow Journal, Brevity Blog and Lonesome Press. In 2006, Swift earned the Press Club of Long Island Award for her essay “Ritter’s Pond,” and, in 2022, she earned Honorable Mention from the Connecticut Press Club for “The Sentencing.” In addition, Swift is a mentor with We Are Not Numbers, a writing platform for Palestinian writers. Swift serves as a fiction reader for Mud Season Review. She lives in Connecticut and when she is not writing or thinking about writing, she is walking wooded trails with her hound, Lulu. www.wendyswift.com.

Joseph Linscott is a writer living in Providence, RI. He is a TinHouse scholar, and his work has recently appeared in Vol. 1 Brooklyn, Bridge Eight and can be found online and in print elsewhere. He is a lead fiction reader for Okay Donkey. Reach him at linktr.ee/josephlinscott or on social media @prosephlinscott.

Crystal Gross is a fiction reader for Mud Season Review and writes and lives in New Orleans, LA with her two amazing kids and partner, Renee. Crystal is a writing coach at Delgado Community College and holds an MFA in creative writing from Southern New Hampshire University. She has work forthcoming in ISELE Magazine.

Nelly Shulman is a fiction reader for Mud Season review. Her prose has been published in numerous literary magazines and anthologies and she has authored three collections of short stories. She is a member of The Society of Authors (UK). www.nellyshulman.blog.

Neepa Sarkar is a fiction reader for Mud Season Review and at present a writer, freelance editor and a researcher. She has taught in the Department of English, Mount Carmel College, Bangalore and was the Coordinator for MA English there. She has a Ph.D in English Literature and her thesis was on Literature and Collective Memory. She has presented papers in international and national conferences and has published chapters and articles in books and journals including History Today and Middle West Review, Irish Studies Review, The Confidential Clerk, Melus Melow Journal, Journal of Literature and Aesthetics (2015), Glocal Colloquies and The Himalayan Journal of Contemporary Research, H.P. University, Shimla. She won the Issac Sequiera Memorial Award (2018) for her paper on Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities. Two of her chapters on Partition Literature and Postcolonialism and Ecocriticism respectively have been published by De Gruyter Press and Lexington Books.  Also, her poetry has been published in an anthology brought out by Cyberwit publishers, India and Daath Voyage Journal (ISSN: 2455-7544). Her poems were shortlisted for the Srinivas Rayaprol Prize (2015). Her interests are Film Theory, Creative Writing, Memory Studies, Science Fiction and Literary Theory. Find her work at https://filmsliteratureandphilosophy.wordpress.com/.

Alli Schroeder is a fiction reader for Mud Season Review and a Pittsburgh native. This born-to-be-mild Penn State alum has work published in Oddball Magazine, Schlock! Webzine and Moss Puppy Magazine, among others. Her latest poetry chapbook, Asking for it, is available on Lulu Press. Currently she is a substitute high-school teacher and creative-writing-club sponsor. She can be found across the ‘Burgh searching for the coziest coffee shop to write in. allischroeder.com. @aschrosgreatest_hits.

Chinaza James-Ibe writes and practices photography in Nigeria. Her work has appeared in 20.35 Africa: Anthology of Contemporary Poetry Vol. VIII, Luminary Lines, Poetry Column-NND, Poetry Sango-Ota, Akewi, Isele Magazine, Lolwe, The Shallow Tales Review, Agbowo, Brittle Paper and elsewhere.

Jasmine Harrell is a fiction reader for Mud Season Review. She has been published by The Missing Slate, Star Line Magazine, the Bacopa Literary Review, IHRAF Publishes, Scarlet by Jaded Ibis Press, and Fraidy Cat Press. She lives in Fort Washington, MD, with her partner and their son. Say hello on Substack @eveningjazz.

Creative Nonfiction Readers

Emily Mack is a creative nonfiction reader for Mud Season Review. She is a writer and editor, based in Chicago. In 2020, she earned her creative writing degree from Columbia University, where she edited The Columbia Review and won the department’s inaugural Ellis Avery Prize for Creative Writing. Currently, she is the senior editor of Chicago Agent magazine and, outside of work, keeps busy crafting her own stories. In addition to reading for Mud Season Review, she occasionally edits.

Jen Bryant is an editor at MUTHA Magazine and a creative nonfiction reader for Mud Season Review. Her work has appeared in The Sun, Ms., BUST, Cleaver Magazine, Hip Mama, Anodyne Mag, In a Flash and elsewhere. Jen is a 2025 Ucross Foundation Fellow, and her writing has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best American Essays. Originally from the South, she currently lives in the Midwest.

Maggie Hart is a graduate student at the University of Oklahoma, where she studies medical rhetoric, rhetoric of the body, embodied research methodologies and narrative medicine. As a writer, Maggie is a Pushcart Prize nominee and her creative nonfiction has been featured in Narratively, The Audacity, The Blood Project, Mud Season Review, December and elsewhere. Outside of writing and schoolwork, Maggie enjoys long-distance hiking, running and traveling.

Greta McGee (they/them) is a trans nonbinary Black American-Italian short story writer and collage artist on the Autism spectrum from New York City. They received their Bachelor’s degree in 2021 from Sarah Lawrence College. Their work explores the relationship between the body, spirit and mind—both their connection and disconnect—while focusing on themes of intimate relationships, the darker elements of human existence, the honesty in discomfort, gender and queerness. Greta has published works of fiction in Scoundrel Time and Great Ape, and is currently attending Northwestern University in pursuit of their MFA in Fiction and Creative Nonfiction.

Barrett Bowlin is the author of the story collection, Ghosts Caught on Film (Bridge Eight Press). His essays and short fiction appear in places, like The Best American Mystery & Suspense anthology, TriQuarterly, Barrelhouse, Ninth Letter, The Rumpus, and Mud Season Review. He lives and teaches and rides trains in Massachusetts.

Poetry Readers

Maria McKinney is a poetry reader for Mud Season Review. She originally hails from Greensboro, NC and has loved poetry from a young age, beginning with Mother Goose. In college, at North Carolina State University, she tried her hand at writing poems and had a piece published in the school’s literary magazine, Windhover. Still more adept at the reading side of poetry and literature, she currently works part-time at the Greensboro Public Library. Her favorite poets include e.e. cummings, Anne Sexton, Mary Oliver, T.S. Eliot, Langston Hughes and Sylvia Plath.

David Kann is a poetry reader for Mud Season Review and is at present professor emeritus of American Literature at Cal Poly University, San Luis Obispo, where he taught American literature, poetry and poetry workshops. After a temporary walkabout in the arid outback of academic administration, he gratefully returned to teaching and writing exclusively. Some years ago, David wrote and published some poetry. However, life managed to get in the way. Then, he attended poetry readings that included his immensely talented daughter, Rachel. He found most of the poetry (excluding Rachel’s) pretty tiresome. When he complained to his friend and superb poet Lisa Coffman, she responded by asking him if he thought he could do better. He decided to take the dare, and apparently, he’s been successful, having had four chapbooks published. And his book Ishmael On the Farm is forthcoming from Fernwood Press.

Christa Fairbrother, MA, has had poetry in Bellingham Review, Crannog, Epiphany, Pleiades, and Salamander, among others. Currently, she’s Gulfport, Florida’s poet laureate and a poetry editor at Phylum Press. She’s been a finalist for the Leslie McGrath Poetry Prize, The Prose Poem Competition, and The Wilder Prize, and was a Pushcart Prize nominee. www.christafairbrotherwrites.com.

Herb Kitson is a poet living in western Pennsylvania (where the trees outnumber the people 4:1). He shares his home and his life with his cat, Gertrude Stein, and with RJ, a lumberjack-handyman-caregiver 40 years younger than he. Herb is professor emeritus in English at the University of Pittsburgh-Titusville. He has two books (translations of French poems and literary letters) with University Press of America and two chapbooks with MAF Press, as well as individual poems in such magazines as The Atlanta Review, The Comstock Review, Ballast, The New York Quarterly, The Pittsburgh Quarterly, Free Lunch, Poetry East, The Prachya Review, Penstricken, Poetry Depth Quarterly (aka PDQ), and The Redneck Review of Literature.

Ama Anyafulugo is a Nigerian-American poet. Her work explores cultural memory, grief, and spiritual inheritance, with focus on the tensions between absence and belonging. She writes to memorialize both the mundane and the remarkable, often through image-driven lyric forms rooted in emotional precision and restraint. Ama favors poems that avoid sentimentality, even when addressing grief or intimacy. She is interested in poems that prioritize specificity over broad universality; the more grounded a poem is in its own world, the more expansive it becomes. She is inspired by the Harlem Renaissance, specifically the work of Langston Hughes, as well as contemporary poets who merge vulnerability with craft. Ama is currently completing her debut chapbook, Ember.

Her writing has been featured in The Washington Post, and her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Eunoia Review, Academy of the Heart and Mind, The Kalahari Review, and other journals.