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.
Anne Marie Lutz
Anne Marie Lutz is the author of three fantasy novels. Her Color Mage novels were re-issued as Black Tide and Sword of Jashan in 2019. Her newest novel, Taylenor, was released in July 2019. She has also written several short stories, appearing most recently in Bards and Sages Quarterly. Anne Marie grew up in the Youngstown area, but has lived in central Ohio for many years. She graduated from the Ohio State University twice, with degrees in Journalism and Business, but she has always wanted to write fiction.
Tammie Lyon
Tammie Lyon is the award-winning author and illustrator of numerous picture books for children. Her first authored picture book, Olive and Snowflake, was released to starred reviews from Kirkus and School Library Journal. Let's Hear It For Almigal was recently awarded the Mom’s Choice Award Gold Medal Winner.…
Read MoreTammie Lyon is the award-winning author and illustrator of numerous picture books for children. Her first authored picture book, Olive and Snowflake, was released to starred reviews from Kirkus and School Library Journal. Let’s Hear It For Almigal was recently awarded the Mom’s Choice Award Gold Medal Winner. My Pup and Bugs In My Hair have both been included on the list of the “Top 100 Best Children’s Books” by the Bank Street College of Education. She is known for her work on the Eloise series for Simon and Schuster as well as her new series, Katie Woo, published by Stonearch Books. Visit her online at http://www.mbartists.com.
Nannette V. Maciejunes
Nannette V. Maciejunes has served as Executive Director of the Columbus Museum of Art since November 2003. Prior to that, Nannette began at the Museum as a curatorial research assistant in 1984, with a brief absence while she served as Curator of Collections and Exhibitions (1989-1990) at The Dixon Gallery and Gardens in Memphis. In 1980-1981, she was Director of Denison University’s Gallery. She is a graduate of both Stanford’s Executive Program for Nonprofit Leaders and the Getty’s Leadership Institute for Museum Management (MMI). She has been active as a community leader, serving on numerous boards, including a five-year tenure on the Columbus Art Commission. She has been a member of the Denison University Research Foundation Board since 2003. In 2006, Nannette received the Ohio Governor’s Award for the Arts in the category of Arts Administration and the South Side Settlement House Spirit of Volunteerism Award. In 2009, Nannette was named a YWCA Woman of Achievement. Nannette was named a 2015 Columbus Business First C-Suite Award Honoree.
Under Nannette’s leadership, the Museum adopted and implemented the mission to create great experiences with great art for everyone. She was instrumental in CMA’s acquisition of The Photo League collection and the Philip J. and Suzanne Schiller Collection of American Social Commentary Art, 1930-1970, which is considered to be the most important collection of its kind. In 2011, CMA opened the Center for Creativity, an innovative new space which demonstrates the Museum’s leadership in the field of the visitor-centered museum experience and commitment to creativity. In 2013, the Museum was awarded the Institute of Library and Museum Services’ National Medal, the Nation’s highest honor for museums. Nannette spearheaded the largest and most successful endowment and capital campaign in CMA’s history. In October 2015, the Museum completed its major renovation and expansion, which included the renovation of the historic 1931 building and the addition of a new 50,000 sq. ft. wing and sculpture garden. The Margaret M. Walter Wing was named one of Wall Street Journal’s Architecture Picks of 2015. The Walter Wing was also recognized with the 2016 James B. Recchie Design Award, the 2016 AIA Columbus Architecture Honor Award, and the 2017 AIA Ohio 2017 Design Merit Award. Due to tremendous impact that the Walter Wing has made on the community, the Columbus Museum of Art was awarded the 2016 GCAC Columbus Makes Art Excellence Award, the 2016 Columbus Foundation Award, the 2016 James B. Recchie Design Award, the 2016 AIA Columbus Architecture Honor Award, the 2017 AIA Ohio Award, and the 2017 Design Merit Award.
Dandi Daley Mackall
Dandi won her first writing contest as a 10-year-old tomboy. Her 50 words on “Why I Want to Be Batboy for the Kansas City A’s” won first place, but the team wouldn’t let a girl be batboy. It was her first taste of rejection. Since then, Dandi has become an award-winning author of about 500 books for all ages (from infant to adult) and in every genre. The Silence of Murder (Knopf/Random House) won the Edgar Award for Best YA and ALA-YALSA Best Fiction. Legend of Ohio and Rudy Rides the Rails: A Depression Era Story won Notable Book awards, a Children’s Book Council award, the Angel Award, the “Award of Excellence” from Chicago Book Show. A Girl Named Dan (her own “batboy” story, and a lesson on Title IX) won a Mom’s Choice & the Amelia Bloom. My Boyfriends’ Dogs (now a Hallmark movie, “most watched” 2014), gained her national attention. With Love, Wherever You Are, Dandi’s grown-up novel about her parents, Army Dr. and Nurse in WW2, won the Reader’s Choice Award and earned PW and Booklist starred reviews. Other awards: the Helen Keating Ott Award for Contributions to Children’s Literature; OCIRA Hall of Fame; ALA Best Book; Top Teen Read by New York Public Library; Romantic Times’ Top Pick; Gold Medallions, Christian Book Awards, etc. Dandi is a national speaker, keynoting at conferences and Young Author events, enjoying school visits, and making appearances on TV (ABC, NBC, and CBS). Dandi writes from rural Ohio, where she lives with her family, including horses, dogs, cats, and an occasional squirrel, deer, or raccoon.
KaraLynne Mackrory
Award winning author KaraLynne Mackrory is no newbie to the writing world. She made her debut as an author at the tender age of thirteen when she wrote her first set of bad poems. Angsty, emotional, and filled with teenage drama, they were unbelievable disasters. Such contributions to the literary world were so terrible that today they are kept behind lock and key to protect others from their awfulness. As a young adult she steered clear of soap opera-inspired works and achieved a degree in social work. It was not until her late twenties that she returned to her roots in writing. Since then she has published four Jane Austen-inspired novels so full of romantic sensibilities as to give you a toothache and a grin and hopefully a few contented sighs. Her book Haunting Mr. Darcy won a 2015 IPPY Bronze Medal in the category of Romance. Visit her online at karalynnemackrory.merytonpress.com.
Donna MacMeans
Award winning author Donna MacMeans made a wrong turn many years ago when she majored in Accounting at Ohio State University. What the heck was she thinking? Balancing books just can’t compete with crafting plots and inventing memorable characters. While still a licensed CPA in Ohio with an active tax practice, she also writes witty and seductive Victorian historicals and the occasional time-travel.
MacMeans’s books have won numerous awards including the Golden Heart from Romance Writers of America (RWA), and the Romantic Times Reviewers Choice Award for Historical Love & Laughter. Her books consistently receive high praise and glowing reviews and have been published in Japanese, Deutsch, Turkish and Norwegian. Her debut novel was even turned into a manga graphic novel. Who would have imagined that! She’s published six historicals with the Berkley imprint of Penguin Books, a romantic suspense with Samhain Publishing and a rollicking reverse time-travel via independent publishing. A French charm teacher from 1853 suddenly lands in modern day New Orleans in Charming the Professor. It’s a long way from debits and credits.
But maybe not that far…she’s also the current Treasurer for RWA, the recipient of a 2013 RWA service award and the 2014 Pro mentor award. She’s taught Taxes for Writers at RWA University, at the national convention, and at numerous chapters across the country and Plotting workshops for the Nora Roberts Writing Institute. When not at her keyboard, Donna enjoys painting, traveling, and creating luscious alcoholic desserts. An avid reader, she uses the analytical skills learned as an accountant to analyze novels in an effort to constantly improve her own craft – and then teaches those skills in workshops around the country. You can find her blogging with the popular blog group, Romance Bandits. A resident of Columbus, Ohio, she lives with her husband of forty+ years, a daughter who does all the cooking, and a shy vampire-cat with a taste for ankles. It’s never a dull day in the MacMeans household. Please contact her at DonnaMacMeans.com
Beth Macy
Beth Macy is a Virginia-based journalist, the author of Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company That Addicted America, and an executive producer and cowriter on Hulu’s Peabody Award-winning “Dopesick” series.
Erica Magnus
A first generation American, Erica Magnus grew up in rural Connecticut’s natural beauty, delighting in her three freedoms; exploring nature’s wonders barefoot whenever possible, fulfilling her deep love for drawing in color or with sticks in the dirt if that was all at hand, and satisfying her endless passion for stories. Her Norwegian family kept their European culture and values their cornerstone through good times and bad. For them, creative expression was assumed and expected. ! Later, these forces all came together when Erica began her career in publishing. Picture books proved a good home for her wide range of freelance art skills as author and illustrator, and illustrator for others, for over 22 years. She continued to write and illustrate them until her passions for stories drew her to film as storyboard, concept, and creature design artist. Moving to LA to work and live led to exciting creative collaborations in television. She also applied these skills to graphic novel development projects for professional writers. ! Teaching art classes throughout her career continues, providing many opportunities to contribute what she has learned. But most of all, Erica is happy to return to Athens County, Ohio, where she lives again near family and grandchildren, good neighbors and old friends. Her journey brought her back to publishing too. Now her three freedoms bring daily delights once again and a new old way to share them.
Daniel Mainzer
I am 78 years of age and have been a photographer since I was 12. In the meantime, I collected a Political Science degree from Muskingum University in 1968 and worked at various jobs till 1976 when Firestone employed me as a photographer. After four years and some months, I stepped off the deck of that sinking ship into a photographers job at Stouffer's foods.…
Read MoreI am 78 years of age and have been a photographer since I was 12. In the meantime, I collected a Political Science degree from Muskingum University in 1968 and worked at various jobs till 1976 when Firestone employed me as a photographer. After four years and some months, I stepped off the deck of that sinking ship into a photographers job at Stouffer’s foods. That lasted almost three years, and next I became a photographer at General Tire, which transformed itself into GenCorp, a new corporate structure. This turned out to be important because they urged me to start my own studio after 4+ years by letting me and 300 others go after a takeover bid. That was 1987, and I hit the ground running, freelancing for GenCorp and adding many clients to date.
An unexpected benefit from the 10 years in the rubber industry was a large body of work documenting the life of the workers and the destruction of the factories. Being a self-taught and photographer, I felt compelled to do this and felt I was operating in the same vein as Lewis Hine, Paul Strand and others who documented the world around them. At least there is a record of the factory work and the people who did it. Some of this photography has been published (1998) in a book ‘Wheels of Fortune’, a history of the rubber industry in Akron published by the Akron university Press. It is my hope that this body of work will be recognized and find a permanent home so people will remember their legacy.
Most of my work is commercial: studio product shots, location events, industrial, advertising and auto racing photography. The racing photography started when General Tire began a motorsports program in 1984, and is now a third of our current business. A branch of the business is panoramic stadium shots for professional and collegiate football and baseball. This started when my wife took a print of the Indians baseball stadium, Jacobs Field, to work and came home with 50+ print orders. I was the official photographer for the All American Soap Box Derby from 1980-2012.
Throughout my career I have always photographed landscapes, flowers, and the world in general. Being a self- taught photographer has allowed me to enjoy it as an avocation, in addition to my vocation; something I will always do. From 1969 to 1976, I assigned myself to make a finished b/w print a day and with few exceptions stuck to this routine until accepting my position at Firestone.
Landscapes have always been a relaxation to me even though they demand scouting, great light, technique, and patience. My commercial clients purchased the few landscapes that we displayed in the studio, and thus the move into gallery sales, shows and some contests.
I would like to have viewers feel as if they were standing next to me as i first see and photograph a scene. It is like we experience the impact of what we are seeing together. This is not about me in any way, but what i want to share with the viewer in terms of emotion, the beauty of the world we live in and whatever we feel viewing what i have done.
Amit Majmudar
AMIT MAJMUDAR is a poet, novelist, essayist, translator, and the former first Poet Laureate of Ohio. He works as a diagnostic and nuclear radiologist and lives in Westerville, Ohio, with his wife and three children. He is the author of seventeen books so far in a variety of categories, with different bodies of work published in the United States and in India.
POETRY: His poetry collections include 0’, 0’ (Northwestern, 2009), shortlisted for the Norma Faber First Book Award; and Heaven and Earth (2011, Storyline Press), which won the Donald Justice Prize. These volumes were followed by Dothead (Knopf, 2016) and What He Did in Solitary (Knopf, 2020). His poems have won the Pushcart Prize and have appeared in the Norton Introduction to Literature, The New Yorker, and numerous Best American Poetry anthologies as well as journals and magazines across the United States, UK, India, and Australia. Majmudar also edited, at Knopf’s invitation, a political poetry anthology entitled Resistance, Rebellion, Life: 50 Poems Now. Majmudar’s forthcoming volume, a hybrid of prose, drama, and poetry, is Three Metamorphoses (Orison Books, 2024).
NONFICTION: Majmudar’s essays have appeared in Marginalia at the Los Angeles Review of Books, where he is a contributing editor, as well as The Best American Essays 2018, The New York Times, and the Times of India, among several other publications. His collection of essays, focusing on Indian religious philosophy, history, and mythology, is Black Avatar and Other Essays (Acre Books, 2023). Twin A: A Memoir (Slant Books, 2023) is a memoir, in prose and verse, about his son’s struggle with congenital heart disease.
FICTION: Majmudar’s work as a novelist includes two works of historical fiction centered around the 1947 Partition of India, Partitions (Holt/Metropolitan, 2011) and The Map and the Scissors (HarperCollins India, 2022). His first children’s book also focuses on Indian history and is entitled Heroes the Colour of Dust (Puffin India, 2022). Majmudar has also penned a tragicomic, magical realist fable of Indian soldiers during World War I, Soar (Penguin India, 2020). The Abundance (Holt/Metropolitan, 2013), by contrast, is a work of contemporary realism exploring Indian-American life. Majmudar’s long-form fiction has garnered rave reviews from NPR’s All Things Considered, The Wall Street Journal, Good Housekeeping, and The Economist, as well as starred reviews from Kirkus and Booklist; his short fiction won a 2017 O. Henry Prize.
MYTHOLOGY: Majmudar’s work in Hindu mythology includes a polyphonic Ramayana retelling, Sitayana (Penguin India, 2019), and The Book of Vows (Penguin India, 2023), the first volume in a trilogy that retells the ancient epic poem, Mahabharata. The forthcoming volumes are entitled The Book of Discoveries and The Book of Killings. He has also composed a forthcoming original mythological story cycle called The Later Adventures of Hanuman (Penguin India, 2024).
TRANSLATION: His work as a translator includes Godsong: A Verse Translation of the Bhagavad-Gita, with Commentary (Knopf, 2018), available both in the United States and India.