Author Profiles
Ohio has a rich literary heritage as well as some wonderful contemporary authors. Learn more about them here! You can sort by various categories and see who has participated in our annual book festival by using the category search on the left, or search by keyword (including partial author names) by using the search field on the right.
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Patti Flinn
Patti Flinn is an author of contemporary fiction, romance, and historical fiction from Columbus, Ohio. Flinn’s varied titles reflect her love of all fiction and include: The List (suspense), The Diva of Peddler’s Creek (romantic comedy), Glorious Sunset (edgy inspirational romance), Alaya and Her Sparkling River (children’s), the Ivyhurst series (romantic comedy), and the Véronique Clair series (historical fiction). Flinn delved into biographical fiction with The Last Favorite’s Page series. This immersion into the French Revolution is a trilogy of critically acclaimed novels—The Greatest Thing (2023), The Devil’s Berries (2024), and The Truest Son of France (Spring 2025)—inspired by historical figure Louis-Benoit Zamor (1762-1820). Flinn has been nominated for the Romance Slam Jam’s Emma Debut Author Award, and was a finalist for the More than Magic Contest for Romantic Comedy, and the Harlem Book Fair’s Phillis Wheatley Award for Fiction. Flinn won the Romance Writers Ink Award for romantic comedy. Most recently, she was honored with the 2023 Independent Book Publishing Association’s IPPY Award for fiction, and as a Notable Indie for the 2023 Shelf Unbound Award. A believer in the importance of literature, communication, the arts, and community service, Patti Flinn strives to encourage everyone to fulfill their dreams and find the extraordinary individual within. https://gildedorangebooks.com
Amanda Flower
Amanda Flower is a USA Today bestselling and two-time Agatha Award-winning author of over fifty mystery novels. Her novels have received starred reviews from Library Journal, Publishers Weekly, and Romantic Times, and she had been featured in USA Today, First for Women, and Woman’s World. Her first Emily Dickinson Mystery, Because I Could Not Stop for Death, was an Agatha Award winner and Mary Higgins Clark Nominee. She currently writes for Penguin-Random House (Berkley), Kensington, and Sourcebooks. A former librarian, Flower and her husband own a farm and recording studio, and they live in Northeast Ohio with their adorable cats. http://www.amandaflower.com/.
Jeffery Ford
Jeffrey Ford (well-builtcity.com) was born on Long Island in New York State in 1955 and grew up in the town of West Islip. He studied fiction writing with John Gardner at S.U.N.Y Binghamton and has been a college English teacher of writing and literature for thirty years. He is the author of eight novels including The Portrait of Mrs. Charbuque, The Girl in the Glass, The Shadow Year, and the forthcoming Ahab’s Return: or, The Last Voyage. His short story collections include The Empire of Ice Cream, The Drowned Life, and A Natural History of Hell. Ford’s short fiction has appeared in a wide variety of magazines and anthologies such as The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Conjunctions, and The Oxford Book of American Short Stories. Both books and stories have been translated into nearly twenty languages. Ford is the recipient of the Edgar Allan Poe, Shirley Jackson Award, Hayakawa, World Fantasy, Nebula, and Gran Prix de l’Imaginaire awards. He lives in Ohio in a hundred and twenty year old farm house surrounded by corn and soybean fields and teaches part time at Ohio Wesleyan University.
Lynette Ford
Lynette (Lyn) Ford shares “Home-Fried Tales,” adaptations of folktales “from many places and many faces,” as well as her own original stories and personal narratives. Lyn’s rhythmic, interactive storytelling style encourages language and literacy skills, creative writing, and an appreciation for the oral tradition among all types of learners. Lyn’s storytelling is rooted in her family’s multicultural Affrilachian oral traditions, her research and interest in heritage and folklore, and her own love of stories.
Lyn’s work has been publicized on the PTO Today web site, and in Columbus Monthly and Columbus Parents magazines. Lyn has written for Storytelling Magazine, a national publication; her work is also included in story anthologies and resources for educators, including: the award winning The Storytelling Classroom: Applications Across the Curriculum, Literacy in the Storytelling Classroom (both from Libraries Unlimited), and Social Studies in the Storytelling Classroom (Parkhurst Brothers, Inc.); Sayin’ Somethin’: Stories from the National Association of Black Storytellers (National Association of Black Storytellers, Inc.); The August House Book of Scary Stories (August House), and its accompanying enrichment guide for teachers, and the 2011 publication Storytelling and QAR Strategies (Libraries Unlimited). Lyn’s CD, When the Gourd Broke, won a 2009 NAPPA Honors Award.
Lyn is also a Thurber House mentor to young writers. In 2012, Lyn was among the first 30 teaching artists from across the country to participate in professional-development sessions on the arts and Common Core State Standards at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts; Lyn’s participation as an Ohio Teaching Artist in The Ohio State-Based Collaborative Initiative of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts has provided additional opportunities for Lyn to share professional development workshops for educators and other mentors, in interactive sessions pertinent to benchmarks of academic content standards and diverse ways of learning. Lyn makes connections between the oral tradition and core reading and writing skills, in conjunction with the 21st Century Learning Skills:
- Collaboration and teamwork
- Creativity and imagination
- Critical thinking
- Problem solving
In the summer of 2007, Lyn received an Oracle Award for Leadership and Service from the National Storytelling Network. Lyn received a 2008 Friend of Education Award from Reynoldsburg public schools, for her ongoing contribution of creative learning and enrichment experiences as Herbert Mills Elementary School’s storyteller in residence. In 2012, Lyn was inducted into the National Association of Black Storytellers’ Circle of Elders. In 2013, Lyn received the National Storytelling Network’s Circle of Excellence award, for her continuing efforts and achievements in storytelling. In 2016, Lyn was recognized by the National Storytelling Network’s Youth, Educators and Storytellers Alliance (YES) for her past work as co-chairperson, advisor, and special projects chairperson.
For more than 25 years, Lyn has provided stories for public libraries’ summer reading programs, keynote and closing presentations, and workshops at universities, education and literacy conferences, and storytelling conferences and festivals. Lyn has appeared at the National Storytelling Festival in Jonesborough, Tennessee, and presented workshops for the National Storytelling Conference. Lyn has also been a storyteller-in-residence at the International Storytelling Center in Jonesborough. Lyn was named the winner of the Liars’ Contest (for tall tales, not lies!) at the 2005 National Association of Black Storytellers Conference and Festival; she has also shared stories and workshops at the TalkStory Festival in Hawaii, and at other national gatherings, including the St. Louis Storytelling Festival, the Timpanogos Storytelling Festival in Orem, Utah, the Eugene (Oregon) Multicultural Festival, the Northlands Storytelling Conference in Madison, Wisconsin, the Cape Clear Storytelling Festival in Ireland (with a return visit in Fall 2018), and the 2018 Sydney International Storytelling Conference in Australia. Since 2016, Lyn has been a keynote speaker or workshop facilitator for the Transformative Language Arts Network’s (Goddard College) Power of Words Conference; Lyn has also offered writing sessions through the Transformative Language Arts Network’s online classes, and spoken/written word sessions through the John C. Campbell Folk School in North Carolina.
Lyn’s first publication as an individual author, 2012’s Affrilachian Tales: Folktales from the African-American Appalachian Tradition, has received a 2013 Anne Izard Storytellers’ Choice Award, and a 2013 Storytelling World Resources Award. The book is a compilation of stories from Lyn’s childhood memories, enriched with information on Affrilachian culture, and published by Parkhurst Brothers, Inc. Lyn’s second collection of Affrilachian folktales and family folkways, Beyond the Briar Patch: Affrilachian Folktales, Food and Folklore, received the 2015 Anne Izard Storytellers’ Choice Award. Both books, as well as Lyn’s collection of original, creepy twists on folk and fairytales, Hot Wind, Boiling Rain (which includes variants, resources, and creative writing exercises for older students and adults) are available from Parkhurst Brothers, Inc. through its website at http://www.parkhurstbrothers.com, Amazon.com, and other book merchants. 2017 saw the publication of a book co-authored with friend and fellow storyteller/teaching artist Sherry Norfolk: Boo-Tickle Tales: Not-So-Scary Stories for Ages 4-9, by Parkhurst Brothers. Lyn and Sherry are also proud of three recent or in-the-works publications: Storytelling Strategies for Reaching and Teaching Children with Special Needs (2017, ABC-CLIO); Supporting Diversity and Inclusion with Story: Authentic Folktales and Discussion Guides (2020, ABC-CLIO), and Speak Peace: Words of Wisdom, Work, and Wonder, from Parkhurst Brothers Publishing (Fall, 2019).
Lyn is currently a member/committee member of the following organizations: The Storytellers of Central Ohio and their community outreach committee, Columbus Story Adventures; The Ohio Storytelling Network; the Northlands Storytelling Network; The National Association of Black Storytellers; The National Storytelling Network, and the Transformative Language Arts Network (a partnership with Goddard College).
Lyn’s work has also branched out even further. Lyn is a Certified Laughter Yoga Teacher, sharing pre- and post-test relaxation techniques, workshops, keynotes, and icebreakers that incorporate both story and laughter exercises. Lyn is also a member of the Writers Council of the National Writing Project, which is comprised of writers who “want to bring greater attention to the importance of writing and the work of NWP…Writers Council members share NWP’s belief that writing is vital to thinking, creating, communicating, and participating in the world.” (quoted from the NWP website).
Lori Foster
Lori Foster, a popular and prolific author, Foster has produced more than seventy novels since her first book was published in 1996. She writes romantic novels as Lori Foster, and in recent years has also branched out into the genre of urban fantasy under the name L.L. Foster. Her 2008 book Hard to Handle reached #2 on the New York Times best-seller list. Foster lives in West Chester, Ohio. Visit her website, http://lorifoster.com/.
Shelby Frasher
S. Frasher (also Eliza Beth) is a fantasy romance author from SW Ohio that loves morally grey MMCs, enemies to lovers, and forced proximity.
Abigail Fredelake
As the daughter of an Army Colonel, Abigail spent her childhood in a variety of cities and countries. But over the years spent abroad, her family kept strong ties to Ohio and frequently visited relatives in Columbus. Abigail attended Auburn University, and moved to Columbus after graduating in 2007. For the past 9 years Abigail has been the owner and editor of The Scout Guide Columbus. Abigail lives in New Albany with her husband Andrew, her son Hugo and their golden, Gus. She wrote this book as a tribute to Carl, her first and beloved English golden retriever: “This book was created to take Carl to places that he wasn’t able to explore himself and to show that families can look like and mean many different things.”
Siaara Freeman
Siaara Freeman is from Cleveland Ohio, where she is the current Lake Erie Siren & a teaching artist for Center For Arts Inspired Learning and The Sisterhood Project in conjunction with the Anisfieldwolf Foundation. She is a 2021 Premier Playwright fellow recipient with Cleveland Public Theater. She is a 2020 WateringHole Manuscript fellow, a 2018 winter tangerine chapbook fellow and a 2018 Poetry Foundation incubator fellow. Her work appears in, The Offing, BOAAT, Tinderbox, Josephine Quarterly and elsewhere. She has toured both nationally and internationally. She is the co-founder of Outsiders Queer Midwest Writers Retreat. Chances are she’s by a lake, thinking about Toni Morrison and talking to ghosts. In her spare time she is growing her afro so tall God can use it for a microphone and speak through her. Learn more at: https://www.siaarafreeman.com/
Jessica Fries-Gaither
Jessica Fries-Gaither is an award-winning author of books for children and teachers. Her writing introduces readers to the wonder of the natural world and the work of scientists, past and present. Her first children’s book, Notable Notebooks: Scientists and Their Writings, was named an Outstanding Science Trade Book for Students K-12 by NSTA and the Children’s Book Council and was read aboard the International Space Station by astronaut Joseph Acaba as part of the Story Time From Space program. Exemplary Evidence: Scientists and Their Data, her second title, was also named an Outstanding Science Trade Book for Students K-12. Her third picture book, Nature’s Rule Breakers: Creatures That Don’t Fit In, was published by Millbrook Press in October 2023. Jessica holds bachelor’s degrees in Biological Sciences (B.S.) and Anthropology (B.A.) and a Master’s in Education (M.Ed.) from the University of Notre Dame (Go Irish!). In addition to writing, she is the Science Department Chair and Lower School Science Specialist at Columbus School for Girls. She lives in Columbus, OH with her husband and four lovable but rambunctious dogs. She also enjoys reading, cooking and baking, and spending time outside. She is represented by Tricia Lawrence at Erin Murphy Literary Agency. Learn more at her website, http://www.jessicafriesgaither.com and follow her on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/jfriesgaither, on Twitter and Instagram at @JessicaFGWrites, and on Blue Sky at @jessicafgwrites.bsky.social
Ellen Fritz
Ellen Fritz is a retired teacher and high school counselor. Over the years of teaching reading and English to students in grades seven through twelve before becoming a counselor, she had the great opportunity to discuss numerous favorite books with students and also took their recommendations for her own reading.
She finally found herself with the time to give life to the stories that have always been patiently waiting in her head for an audience. Ellen wrote Mira to appeal to those middle grade/teen readers that she found so inspiring through her career as an educator.