2001 Contributors

Shelle Barton is an Arkansas native, finishing her second year of the MA at Kansas State with an emphasis in Fiction Writing. Her poetry has appeared in the Allegheny Review and she is a former editorial assistant for Crazy Horse. She will be attending the MFA at Colorado State in Fall 2001.

Courtney Angela Brkic is in her second year of the MFA Fiction program at NYU.

Tara Jill Ciccarone is currently enrolled in the University of New Orleans’ MFA program in Creative writing. Her essay, “The Wire Sculptor,” was selected as the winner of this year’s Touchstone graduate fiction contest.

Sheyene Foster Heller is a second year MA student in Creative Writing and Literature at KSU. Her essays have been published in In Brief (Norton’s second anthology of short-short nonfiction), Nebraska Review, Milkwood Review, American Cowboy, and Brevity. She is currently working on a collection of personal essays, titled Another Unfinished Woman.

Jennifer Henderson is finishing her first year of graduate school at Kansas State University where she is a Seaton Fellow studying poetry, creative nonfiction, and cultural studies.

Christina Herbic is currently a senior in English at Kansas State University. Her poem, “Tough Wishes,” was selected as the winner of this year’s Touchstone undergraduate poetry contest.

Cassidy Leavy is a senior majoring in English at Kansas State University. She also hopes to earn an MA at KSU and then to pursue an MFA at the University of Arizona.

John Weslie McClurg is currently enrolled in the MFA program at The University of Maryland, where he studies under the poets Michael Corner and Stanley Plumly. He recently moved to the D.C. area from Athens, Ohio, is recently married, and, most importantly, just got a cat that he named (according to Eliot’s naming of cats principle) “Goo.”

Peter Melman is currently pursuing a PhD in Creative Writing at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. He has published in Puerto Del Sol, Mississippi Review, Connecticut Review, Atlanta Review, Jeopardy Magazine, Southwestern Review, and Louisiana Literature. He has an article forthcoming in English Language Notes.

Rosemary Z. Monaco teaches English and Communications at Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville. She has recently completed a collection of short stories entitled “Girl Missing and Other Stories.” There really is a Nameless Creek, Indiana.

Erin Newport is a graduate student in English at Kansas State University. She completed her undergraduate degree at Saint Mary College in Leavenworth. She and her husband, Tim, live in Topeka with their four children. Her essay, “Lessons from the Unlikely,” was selected as the winner of this year’s Touchstone graduate nonfiction contest.

Christopher Piatt is an undergraduate at Kansas State University majoring in theater. His essay, “No Last Names,” was selected as the winner of this year’s Touchstone undergraduate nonfiction contest.

Josh Shuart is a graduate student in English at Kansas State University. Much of his writing, including “Archaeologist’s Poem,” is inspired by his travels in the Middle East.

Kimberly Shuckra currently lives in Brooklyn, New York, and will be receiving her MFA from Sarah Lawrence College in the Spring.

Jenny Spinner is a doctoral student in English at the University of Connecticut, where she also serves as director of the Creative Writing Program. She received an MFA in nonfiction writing from Penn State and an MA in English from the University of Connecticut. Her dissertation is an anthology of women essayists from the 17th century to present, where she also finds herself one of those rare and loyal lovers of the essay.

Aaron Thornton is a sophomore English major in the creative writing track at Kansas State University. His essay, “A Story About a Guy Who Gets Help From a Foreign Guy He Can’t Understand,” was selected as the winner of this year’s Touchstone undergraduate fiction contest.

Silvana Unciano is earning her MFA in poetry at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. Her book reviews have appeared in Ohioana Quarterly and Mid-American Review, and her poetry appears in the forthcoming EM Literary. She also serves as Technical Editor for Mid-American Review.

DeAnna Stephens Vaughn is a first-year MFA candidate and teaching assistant at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. Her work has appeared in Maelstrom and is forthcoming in the Talking River Review.

Mary Ann Wehler is earning her MFA in poetry at Vermont College. Her poem, “Mason City Ladies’ Sewing Circle,” was selected as the winner of this year’s Touchstone graduate poetry contest.

Last updated May 1, 2003