Elizabeth Bachinsky was born in Regina, Saskatchewan, in 1976, and grew up in northern British Columbia, the Yukon, and BC's Fraser Valley. She is the author of Home of Sudden Service (Nightwood editions), and Curio: Grotesques and Satires From the Electronic Age (BookThug, 2005) and her work has appeared in literary journals and anthologies including Matrix, Geist, The Malahat Review, and In Fine Form: The Book Of Canadian Form Poetry (Polestar, 2005). In 2004, her work received an honourable mention for the Bronwen Wallace Award for Poetry. She is the poetry editor for Event magazine.

Jennica Harper was born in North Bay, Ontario and grew up in Brampton. Her poetry has been widely published in Canadian literary journals, including Grain, The Fiddlehead, The Antigonish Review, Descant, Prairie Fire, The Malahat Review, and PRISM International. Her work also appeared in Larger than Life: An Anthology of Celebrity (Black Moss Press, 2002). In 2003, her long poem, 'The Octopus', was a finalist for a National Magazine Award. Jennica also works as a screenwriter and story editor in the Canadian film industry. She currently lives in BC, where she teaches screenwriting at Vancouver Film School. Jennica holds an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of British Columbia, and a BA in English from the University of Toronto.

Michael V. Smith’s novel, Cumberland (Cormorant Books), was nominated for the Amazon/Books in Canada First Novel Award. In the past two years, Smith has won a Western Magazine Award for Fiction, won four awards for film (including scooping both shorts prizes at Toronto’s Inside Out festival), won a Community Heroes Award for his work in the arts in Vancouver, and was nominated for the Journey Prize. He curates the Robson Reading Series with Matt Rader and is a past organizer for Crash the Indie Writers Fest. Also a comedian, filmmaker, zinester, performance artist and occasional clown, Smith is an MFA grad from UBC’s Creative Writing program. He has been named one of Vancouver’s 25 most influential queer citizens (Vancouver Magazine) and one of Vancouver’s Most Dangerous People (Loop).