Zig Zag Claybourne: Hailed by Book Riot in 2021 as one of the “6 Black indie SFF writers you should Be reading,” Zig Zag Claybourne is the author of the newly released fantasy Breath, Warmth, and Dream (2024). Other works include The Brothers Jetstream: Leviathan (2016) and its sequel Afro Pu?s Are the Antennae of the Universe (2020); By All Our Violent Guides (2013); Neon Lights (2011); and Conversations with Idras (2021). His stories and essays have appeared in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Apex, Realm (formerly Serial Box), Galaxy’s Edge, GigaNotosaurus, Strange Horizons, The Year’s Best African Speculative Fiction (2021), and numerous anthologies. A 2021 Kresge Literary arts Fellow, Claybourne is a frequent speaker at libraries, conventions, and learning institutions.
Keith A. Owens is a veteran journalist who has won a number of awards and worked at a variety of newspapers across the country, including the Detroit Free Press, the Fort Lauderdale Sun Sentinel, and The Denver Post. A nationally syndicated columnist in the early ’90s, he also authored the biweekly column “Free your mind” for five years in the Detroit Metro Times, ending in 2006. Born and raised in Denver, Colorado, Owens moved to Detroit in 1993, and is the author of the three- book The Mayonnaise Murders series (2013– 23), Fire and Wanda (2014), and the children’s book Who Stole the Zmulobeast? (2014). a professional musician for more than the Windsor Blues Festival, and the international Blues Competition in Memphis, Tennessee. In 2019, Owens cofounded the literary journal Detroit Stories Quarterly, featuring science fiction, fantasy, horror, nonfiction, and experimental narratives based in (and around) the Motor City. In 2025, he was inducted into the Michigan Journalism Hall of Fame.