Formed by Emily Ryan and sisters Wendy and Amy Yao, who met as teens in Irvine, California, Emily’s Sassy Lime (1993–2001) was a garage-punk rock band. Considered an essential part of the early riot grrrl movement, their scrappy punk sensibility and creative resourcefulness, primarily developed during their high school years, embodies the tumult of adolescence. Recently featured in the 2025 California Biennial: Desperate, Scared, But Social, their installation presented ephemera from their shared youth—posters, photographs, zines, letters, and video footage of their performances—alongside works from their individual practices in drawing, sculpture, and social space.

Bre is a Black and Polynesian artist and zine maker based in Long Beach, CA. After receiving her B.A. in English, Creative Writing in 2019, Bre ventured off into freelance work that involved commissions for popular brands and celebrities like Cricut, Manic Panic, and singer-songwriter Mac DeMarco. Besides her full-time work as an artist, Bre enjoys using her leisure time to create and post zine tutorials and resources to TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube as a way to encourage people to dip their toes into the wonderful, DIY world of zine making.

Erick Aguinaldo is a spoken word poet, professor, a father, brother, fighter, and lover. He was born in LA and raised in the IE. He has some degrees from some fancy universities but has learned the most from his community. From the walls of formal education to the forced segregation of the streets, he draws strength from the resistant and resilient. For him San Bernardino is home. He embraces the good, the bad, and the ugly. He firmly believes true power is in the people.

Sophie Stava received her BA in English literature from UC Santa Barbara. She currently resides in Southern California with her family. COUNT MY LIES is her debut novel.

A read-in-one-night psychological thriller narrated by a compulsive liar whose little white lies allow her to enter into the life of a wealthy couple who are harboring much darker secrets themselves.

You can pre-order her book today at https://www.sophiestava.com.

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Lee Herrick is the California Poet Laureate. He is the author of four books of poems: In Praise of Late Wonder: New and Selected Poems (Gunpowder Press, September 2024); Scar and Flower, finalist for the 2020 Northern California Book Award; Gardening Secrets of the Dead; and This Many Miles from Desire.

He is co-editor of The World I Leave You: Asian American Poets on Faith and Spirit (Orison Books 2020) and Afterlives: An AGNI Portfolio of Asian Adoptee Diaspora Writing. His poems appear widely, in The Poetry Foundation, Academy of American Poets, The Place That Inhabits Us: Poems from the San Francisco Bay Watershed, Indivisible: Poems of Social Justice with a foreword by Common, HERE: Poems for the Planet, with a foreword by the Dalai Lama, and Dear America: Letters of Hope, Habitat, Defiance, and Democracy, among others. Herrick serves on the advisory board of Terrain.org and Sixteen Rivers Press. He co-founded LitHop in Fresno. He has taught in Qingdao, China, and for Kundiman in New York City.

He was born in Daejeon, Korea and adopted as an infant. He lives with his family in Fresno, California and served as Fresno Poet Laureate from 2015-2017. He teaches at Fresno City College and in the low-residency MFA program at University of Nevada Reno at Lake Tahoe. He is the 10th California Poet Laureate, and the first Asian American to serve in the role. In April 2025, he became the first California Poet Laureate to be officially reappointed to a second two-year term.

Read about Our California, Lee’s first term CAPL statewide project. Read the full press release from the Office of Governor Gavin Newsom here.

Bio:

Lisa Alvarez’s poetry and prose have appeared widely including About Place Journal, Air/Light, Citric Acid, Huizache, Los Angeles Times, Santa Monica Review, and in anthologies such as Sudden Fiction Latino: Short-Short Stories from the United States and Latin America (Norton) and most recently, Women in a Golden State: California Poets at 60 and Beyond (Gunpowder Press). For 33 years she has been a professor of English at Irvine Valley College, where she co-directs the PUENTE program. In the summers, she co-directs the writers workshops at the Community of Writers in California's High Sierra. Her debut collection, _Some Final Beauty and other Stories, _was published in August 2025 by the University of Nevada Press, as part of their New Oeste imprint which promotes Latinx writers of the American West.

Link to website: https://www.lisaalvarez.com/

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Emmy Award-winning bilingual journalist and communications strategist, Ashley Hernandez, leverages over 15 years of experience to deliver impactful results. At CBS News, she currently leads creative and editorial strategies, reaching an audience of 15 million+ through social media platforms, streaming, and traditional broadcast channels. Ashley has a background in high-pressure news environments, including roles in line and field producing, feature writing, and coordinating live coverage of critical events. This has honed her expertise in crisis management, logistical planning, and compelling storytelling.

Ashley’s MBA in Organizational Leadership and Management complements her media experience, providing her with a unique ability to conduct thorough research, distill complex data, and drive strategic solutions. She excels in project management, cross-cultural communication, and leading teams in high-stakes situations. This combination of skills has enabled her to successfully expand into corporate communications, where she has served as a strategist and consultant for national and international companies.

Ashley is passionate about using her communication skills to make a positive impact, with a proven track record of crafting data-rich, character-driven narratives. This in turn resonates with diverse audiences, including consumers and investors, and drives engagement for organizations, including those in the non-profit sector.

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Writer and Visual Artist Eliza Fisherman talks loneliness, connectedness, and the decision to devote one's life to art with Olivia.

Eliza Fisherman holds a degree in Fine Arts, a BA in Creative Writing, and an MBA. She is a writer and a painter, whose body of work focuses on existential bravery and the steadfast philosophies that carry people through time.

Instagram: @eif Email: elizafisherman@gmail.com

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> Jebediah Dunn is an emerging artist who explores and experiments across a plethora of mediums and themes. Most notably, he works in oil painting, drawing, sculpture, and larger scale installation work. Within these works, he explores the themes of identity, the natural world, and the transgender experience. Beyond his own practice as an artist, he is also extremely dedicated to the art of education and currently works as a museum art educator at the UCI Langson Institute and Museum of California Art. > Follow Jeb on Instagram @jebediahart and check out his website on jebediahdunn.com!

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Follow her on instagram @sarahnmosqueda!

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Sarah began her career at Santa Ana College, writing and editing for the award-winning el Don student newspaper and started freelancing for her local alternative weekly while still a student. After transferring to the University of Southern California's Annenberg School for Communication, she earned a BA in Communications and an MA in Specialized Journalism with an emphasis on arts and music criticism, all while editing local media and maintaining bylines in the L.A. Times, Los Angeles Magazine, CNN, Paper Magazine, NBC News, Thrillist, L.A. Weekly, OC Weekly, Culture Magazine and more.  

After graduation, she became the executive editor of the Long Beach Post, where she implemented new digital strategies that turned the former political blog into one of the city's most respected online news outlets. She has since consulted with a handful of newsrooms to help them develop news products with audience engagement and growth in mind. 

When she's not teaching full-time at Santa Ana College, Sarah remains active in building local opportunities for media experimentation and self-publishing. She co-founded PLACE LB --a volunteer-run community print studio, zine hub + DIY media lab --and is on the board of Long Beach Public Media, which manages low-power FM station KLBP. She is a co-founder of the Long Beach Zine Fest and believes everyone should exercise their right to a free press in a free society.

Support her and her projects! @eldonnews @place.lb @lazinefest @klbpfm

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Nunzio Randazzo is a Los Angeles based screenwriter and filmmaker. He founded the acclaimed sketch group Boat Comedy, which headlined several major comedy festivals and has been honored as a Comedy Central Comics to Watch. He has written and starred in shorts that have twice gone to Sundance. Working with his writing partner, Amos Vernon, he has worked on feature scripts for Sony Animation, Illumination, Netflix, Amazon, and Disney+. Nunzio and Amos' original comedy spec BLOW UP THE CHAT was featured on the 2023 Blacklist.

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Mary Camarillo is the author of two award-winning novels: “Those People Behind Us” and "The Lockhart Women." Her poems and short fiction have appeared in publications such as the California Writer’s Club Literary Anthology, Inlandia, 166 Palms, The Ear, and the Sonora Review. Mary lives in Huntington Beach, California with her husband who plays ukulele and their terrorist cat, Riley, who makes frequent appearances on Instagram and on Substack at Life With Riley | Mary Camarillo | Substack

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