Authors

MELODY SANTIAGO CUMMINGS is the executive director of O, Miami. A Miami native, she is an alumnus of the National YoungArts Foundation, studied at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University, Boston, and holds a BFA from Massachusetts College of Fine Art. Recognized as a 2019-20 “Miami Leader” by The Miami Foundation, she received a certificate from Indiana University – The Fundraising School in 2019. In addition to contributing to more than 700 projects and events at O, Miami, Santiago Cummings has been a creative strategist specializing in cultural programming for Apple and Pérez Art Museum Miami.

MAYRA SANTOS FEBRES, escritora afro-puertorriqueña de Carolina, Puerto Rico, ha ganado becas internacionales y premios literarios como el Premio Radio Francia Internacional y el Premio Primavera de Novela. Fundadora del Programa de Escritura Creativa de la Universidad de Puerto Rico, ha enseñado en prestigiosas universidades como Harvard y la Universidad Complutense. Creó el Festival de la Palabra y el programa #Quenoseacabenlaspalabras, y en 2016 fundó "Las ancestras", un colectivo que ofrece talleres de escritura creativa en cárceles y albergues. Sus obras han sido traducidas al inglés, francés, italiano, portugués, coreano y rumano. Llega este año a la Feria con La otra Julia (Vintage Español), obra que narra la corta e intensa vida de la poeta puertorriqueña Julia de Burgos García, en la voz de una escritora que lidia con sus propios conflictos y dificultades. Esta novela es la historia de ambas.

JULIE SATOW is the author of When Women Ran Fifth Avenue: Glamour and Power at the Dawn of American Fashion (Doubleday), and, previously, The Plaza: The Secret Life of America’s Most Famous Hotel. She’s a regular contributor to The New York Times, and her work has also appeared on National Public Radio, Bloomberg Businessweek, Travel + Leisure, and elsewhere.

SAM SAX is a queer Jewish writer and educator. They are the author of Madness (Penguin Books), winner of The National Poetry Series, and Bury It (Wesleyan University Press), winner of the James Laughlin Award from the Academy of American Poets. Sax is a two-time Bay Area GrandSLAM Champion, with poems published in The New York Times, The Atlantic, Granta, and elsewhere. They have received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, The Poetry Foundation, and Yaddo, and are currently serving as a lecturer in the ITALIC program at Stanford University. Their first novel, Yr Dead (McSweeney’s) was published in 2024.

ANALEIGH SBRANA is a writer and visual artist. She lives outside of San Francisco with her husband, daughter, and a chonky kitty. Her favorite things to do include wandering through forests looking for the fae, trying new cafés, and scouring used bookstores for hidden gems.

ERNEST SCHEYDER is a senior correspondent for Reuters covering the green energy transition and the minerals that undergird it. He previously covered the U.S. shale oil revolution, politics, and the environment, and held roles at The Associated Press and Bangor Daily News. A native of Maine, Scheyder is a graduate of the University of Maine and Columbia Journalism School.

GESI SCHILLING is a Miami-born photographer. Her work regularly appears in print including in The New York Times, The Financial Times, The Wall Street Journal, The New Yorker, Complex, Vogue, and the Miami Herald, where she began her career in photojournalism in 2010. She has documented more than 200 weddings and a decade of the O, Miami Poetry Festival. She is also the creator of The Sunny Project, a photography-based fundraising platform that provided funds to organizations supporting vulnerable populations during the pandemic. Schilling holds a degree in visual anthropology from the University of Florida. She lives with her husband and two daughters in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

DAVID LERNER SCHWARTZ is the recipient of the Robert Day Award for Fiction from New Letters. His work has been published in Ecotone, Witness, Literary Hub, Rumpus, New York Magazine, and other publications. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of Cincinnati and teaches in the MFA program at the University of Central Florida. Learn more about him at davidlernerschwartz.com.

UNCLE SCOTCHY, aka Eric Garcia, is a storyteller and blues musician who performs as both a one-man band and with his group, Juke. He’s also the composer and performer of The Blues Opera, a one-man autobiographical immersive theater experience.

DONNA SEAMAN is the adult books editor at Booklist. A recipient of the Louis Shores Award for Excellence in Book Reviewing and the Studs Terkel Humanities Service Award, she is a member of the Content Leadership Team for the American Writers Museum and an adjunct professor for Northwestern University’s graduate creative writing program at the School of Professional Studies. Seaman is also the author of Identity Unknown: Rediscovering Seven American Women Artists and River of Books (Ode Books).

LISA SEE is the New York Times bestselling author of The Island of Sea Women, The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane, Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, Peony in Love, Shanghai Girls, China Dolls, and Dreams of Joy, which debuted at No. 1. She is also the author of On Gold Mountain, which tells the story of her Chinese American family’s settlement in Los Angeles. See is a recipient of the Golden Spike Award from the Chinese Historical Association of Southern California and the Historymaker’s Award from the Chinese American Museum. She was also named a National Woman of the Year by the Organization of Chinese American Women. Lady Tan's Circle of Women: A Novel (Scribner) is her most recent book.

JOEY SEEMAN is a graphic designer, painter, DJ, and co-author of Punk Under the Sun: ‘80s Punk and New Wave in South Florida (Neon Books), a second edition of which was published in 2024. In the 1980s, Seeman played bass in several local Miami bands, including Fade II Gray and Naughty Puritans. During the burgeoning South Beach art scene of the early 1990s, he collaborated with artist Tomata du Plenty, lead singer of the seminal Los Angeles punk band The Screamers, staging numerous exhibitions in alternative spaces. His artwork has been published nationally in Spin, Art Alternatives, Ocean Drive, and Juxtapoz Magazine, and has been shown in galleries in Portland, Los Angeles, Dallas, and Miami, and the Museum of Contemporary Art in North Miami. A Miami native, he currently lives in Dallas.

ALEX SEGURA is the bestselling and award-winning author of Secret Identity: A Novel (Flatiron Books), which was a winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Mystery/Thriller, a New York Times "Editor’s Choice," and an NPR "Best Mystery of the Year." He's also the author of the Pete Fernandez series, as well as the Star Wars novel Poe Dameron: Free Fall (Disney Lucasfilm Press), and the Spider-Verse adventure Araña/Spider-Man 2099: Dark Tomorrow (Marvel Press). He lives in New York City with his family.

FERNANDO SEGURA MILLAN TREJO Nacido en Ciudad de México, creció en Argentina. Doctor en Sociología por la Escuela de Altos Estudios en Ciencias Sociales de París. Ha realizado investigaciones de campo sobre diferentes aristas del fútbol en Argentina, Brasil, Francia, Inglaterra, México, Australia, Rusia, Colombia y recientemente Qatar. Ha seguido con atención la carrera de Lionel Messi desde sus inicios. Condujo la serie Tertulias desde Qatar sobre el Mundial 2022 para el Canal 14 de México. Ha sido profesor en la Universidad Federal de Goiás en Brasil, el CIDE en México, investigador visitante en las universidades de Sheffield y Leicester, y el Centro Internacional de Estudios del Deporte (CIES) en Suiza.

SUSAN SEIDELMAN is an alum of New York University's Graduate Film School and began her career in the 1980s when Smithereens became the first American independent film to be accepted into the Cannes Film Festival. Her next movie, Desperately Seeking Susan, starred Madonna and Rosanna Arquette and was a critical and commercial success. Seidelman has directed dozens of other films starring actors such as Meryl Streep, Brooke Shields, and Sally Field since then, as well as the first four episodes of Sex and the City. She lives in New Jersey.

PEDRO SEVCEC Nacido el 14 de julio de 1954, es un periodista y personalidad de la televisión uruguaya, mejor conocido como el ex presentador de Noticiero Telemundo en los Estados Unidos, de 2000 a 2009. Sevcec se desempeñó anteriormente como reportero de Ocurrió Así antes de presentar su propio programa de entrevistas. En la red. Actualmente presenta Sevcec a Fondo en AmericaTeVe desde 2011 y tiene su propio programa de radio vespertino en WSUA Miami- Radio Caracol 1260 AM llamado La Ventana con Pedro Sevcec. Participa este año en la feria dialogando con el autor uruguayo Pablo Vierci.

JEFF SHAARA is a New York Times, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, and Publishers Weekly bestselling author of 17 novels, including Rise to Rebellion and The Rising Tide, as well as Gods and Generals and The Last Full Measure – two novels that complete his father's Pulitzer Prize-winning classic, The Killer Angels. His latest book is The Shadow of War: A Novel of the Cuban Missile Crisis (St. Martin's Press). Shaara was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey, grew up in Tallahassee, Florida, and lives in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.

ANGELA SHANTÉ is an author and former New York City K-12 teacher by trade. In addition to her writing, she is a multihyphened artist who consults on creative, educational, and culturally relevant projects. She lives in California with her dog, Blue.

DANI SHAPIRO is the author of 11 books and the host and creator of the hit podcast Family Secrets. Her most recent novel, Signal Fires, was named a best book of 2022 by NPR, Time, The Washington Post, Amazon, and others, and is a national bestseller. Her most recent memoir, Inheritance, was an instant New York Times bestseller and named a best book of 2019 by Elle, Vanity Fair, Wired, and Real Simple. Both Signal Fires and Inheritance were winners of the National Jewish Book Award. Shapiro's work has been published in 14 languages and she’s currently developing Signal Fires for its television adaptation. Her book on the process and craft of writing, Still Writing, has just been reissued on the occasion of its 10th anniversary.

FLORENCE SIMMONS co-founded the book review blog "Book Nerds Across America" in 2010. The blog remains active and has expanded to social media, where you can still find her and her friends sharing book reviews, recaps of bookish events, and more. She is a book reviews editor for School Library Journal and an author; her debut novel, The Summer Scrapbook, will be published in the spring of 2026 by Lerner Publishing Group.

STACEY ALBA SKAR-HAWKINS completó su doctorado en literatura latinoamericana en la Universidad de Wisconsin-Madison (1997). Ha publicado traducciones de memorias latinoamericanas con la University of Wisconsin Press y Duke University Press, así como ediciones bilingües de poesía nicaragüense en México, Nicaragua, España y Estados Unidos. Sus traducciones publicadas incluyen obras de varios autores nicaragüenses, como Sergio Ramírez, Gioconda Belli, Francisco de Asís Fernández, Rubí Arana y William González Guevara. Enseña lengua, cultura y traducción en Western Connecticut State University. Este año participa en la presentación del libro Agua sagrada de Rubí Arana en su versión bilingüe, con el cual se dará un homenaje póstumo a la vida y obra de la poeta nicaragüense, con la participación de escritores cercanos a la artista, que compartirán sus poemas y anécdotas más preciadas.

ROBERT SKIDELSKY is a professor emeritus of political economy at the University of Warwick. His three-volume biography of John Maynard Keynes (1983, 1992, 2000) received the Wolfson Prize for History, the Duff Cooper Prize, the James Tait Black Prize, the Lionel Gelber Prize for International Relations, and the Council on Foreign Relations Prize for International Relations. Skidelsky is also the author of Politicians and the Slump; Oswald Mosley; Keynes: The Return of the Master; How Much is Enough? Money and the Good Life, co-written with his son, Edward; Britain Since 1900: A Success Story?; and Money and Government: A Challenge to Mainstream Economics. He was made a life peer in 1991 and a Fellow of the British Academy in 1994.

SECRET AGENT 23 SKIDOO is a Grammy-winning, internationally touring, purple-velvet-tuxedo-wearing family funk phenomenon. Combining the positive, primal power of hip-hop with the surreal storytelling of science fiction, 23 Skidoo has concocted a potent potion that wows family crowds across the planet. The ingredients of his magic spells include reverence for the boundless mind states of young children; respect for the culture and DNA of hip-hop, funk, and soul music; and a deep belief in the power of the imagination to change the world in positive ways, both personal and universal. If you can imagine a band with Jim Henson on guitar, Shel Silverstein on bass and PIXAR as the lead vocalist, you’ve pretty much got it. And if George Clinton and Q Tip stopped by the party, that might clarify things even more. Basically, if Dr. Seuss and Dr. Dre had a baby, it would be the music of Secret Agent 23 Skidoo. Nuff said! As well as releasing six full-length albums, two books, one record, a line of hot sauce, and an EP that combines the entire Asheville Symphony with beats and rhymes, 23 Skidoo has written and produced the music for the U.S. Library’s Summer Reading Program for six years running. He was its official New York State spokesperson in 2010 and its official “Reading Champion” in 2017, because books are awesome. And he’s taught countless kids to write their own rhymes in workshops across the country.

SARAH SMARSH has reported for The New York Times, Harper’s Magazine, The Guardian, and many other publications. Her first book, Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth, was a finalist for the National Book Award. Her second book, She Come By It Natural: Dolly Parton and the Women Who Lived Her Songs, was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Smarsh is a frequent political commentator and speaker on socioeconomic class. She lives in Kansas.

ANDREW SMITH has worked as a critic and feature writer for The Sunday Times, The Guardian, The Observer, and The Face, and has penned documentaries for the BBC. He is the author of the international bestseller Moondust: In Search of the Men Who Fell to Earth (Harper), about the nine remaining men who walked on the moon between 1969 and 1972; Totally Wired: The Rise and Fall of Josh Harris and The Great Dotcom Swindle (Grove Press, Black Cat); and Devil in the Stack: A Code Odyssey (Atlantic Monthly Press). He was raised in the United Kingdom and currently lives in Brooklyn, New York.

PATTI SMITH is a performer, author, and visual artist. Her memoir, Just Kids (Ecco) received the National Book Award. Smith was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame; named Commandeur des Arts et des Lettres and the National Legion of Honor by the French Republic; and received Sweden’s Polar Music Prize for significant achievements in music. Her books include Just Kids; Auguries of Innocence: Poems (Ecco); Woolgathering (New Directions); M Train: A Memoir (Knopf); Collected Lyrics 1970-2015 (Ecco); Devotion: Why I Write (Yale University Press); Year of the Monkey (Bloomsbury); and most recently, A Book of Days (Random House). She is a featured writer on Substack, where her twice-weekly writings and readings are available to subscribers.

BEN SMITH is the editor-in-chief of Semafor, a global news company, a former media columnist for The New York Times, and the founding editor-in-chief of BuzzFeed News. Before that, he was among the first reporters to adapt the tools of the internet to political journalism for The New York Observer, the New York Daily News, and Politico. Smith lives in Brooklyn, New York, with his wife and three children.

CYNTHIA LEITICH SMITH, author of On a Wing and a Tear (Heartdrum), has written books for all ages, including Rain Is Not My Indian Name, Indian Shoes, Jingle Dancer, Sisters of the Neversea, the Blue Stars series, Harvest House, and Hearts Unbroken, which won the American Indian Youth Literature Award. She is the anthologist of Ancestor Approved: Intertribal Stories for Kids and was named an NSK Neustadt laureate. Smith is also the author-curator of Heartdrum, a Native-focused imprint at HarperCollins Children's Books, and served as the Katherine Paterson Inaugural Endowed Chair on the faculty of the MFA program in writing for children and young adults at Vermont College of Fine Arts. She is a citizen of the Muscogee Nation and lives in Austin, Texas.

DANEZ SMITH is the author of four collections of poetry, including Homie, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, and Don’t Call Us Dead, winner of the Forward Prize for Best Collection and a finalist for the National Book Award. Their work has been also awarded the Minnesota Book Award in Poetry and the Kate Tufts Discovery Award, and was named a finalist for the NAACP Image Award in Poetry. A former co-host of the Webby-nominated podcast VS, they live in Minneapolis. Bluff: Poems (Graywolf Press) is their most recent collection.