Festival Authors

Krystyna Poray Goddu is author of the middle-grade biographies Becoming Emily: The Life of Emily Dickinson and A Girl Called Vincent: The Life of Poet Edna St. Vincent Millay, winner of the SCBWI 2017 Golden Kite Honor Book for Nonfiction, as well as a picture-book about Alicia Markova, An Unlikely Ballerina, and a collective biography, Dollmakers and Their Stories: Women Who Changed the World of Play, and is co-author, with Krystyna Mihulka, of Krysia—A Polish Girl’s Stolen Childhood During World War II: A Memoir.

Gates is the author of the novels Jernigan (Knopf, 1991) and Preston Falls (Knopf, 1998) and two collections of stories, The Wonders of the Visible World (Knopf, 1999) and A Hand Reached Down to Guide Me (Knopf, 2015).

Thom Francis is the president of Albany Poets and has been organizing, promoting, and hosting open mics and poetry / spoken word events in Albany such as Nitty Gritty Slam, School of Night, Albany Poets Presents…, Brass Tacks, and the Word Fest for over 20 years.

Jennifer Dugan is a writer, a geek and a romantic, who writes the kind of stories she wishes she’d had growing up. She is the author of Some Girls Do, Verona Comics, and Hot Dog Girl. which has been called a “great fizzy rom-com” by Entertainment Weekly and “one of the best reads of the year, hands down” by Paste Magazine.

Carol Daggs is an educator and multi-faceted creative. Her work was included in the 2017 anthology Before They Were Our Mothers: Voices of Women Born Before Rosie Started Riveting (Patricia Nugent, editor, Journal Arts Press).

Armando Lucas Correa is an award-winning journalist, editor, author, and the recipient of several awards from the National Association of Hispanic Publications and the Society of Professional Journalism.

Peter Cameron is an award-winning novelist and short story writer. Born in Pompton Plains, New Jersey, he moved to New York City after graduating college in 1982.

Frances Cha is a former travel and culture editor for CNN in Seoul. She grew up in the United States, Hong Kong, and South Korea.

Joseph Bruchac is a highly acclaimed Abenaki children’s book author, poet, novelist, and storyteller, as well as a scholar of Native American culture.

Jesse Bowman Bruchac is a Native American author and language teacher from the Abenaki tribe.