The Authors Quill Authors Dorothy de Kok Michael T_ Kuester Mark McWatersuture_

Dorothy de Kok skims author bios with mild suspicion—aware they matter, but quietly convinced they are proof that even the greatest writers have writer’s block when they have to write about themselves … and here we are. Her own storytelling journey began at twelve, when she attempted her first novel: an earnest and spectacularly terrible fan fiction of Enid Blyton’s Magic Faraway Tree series. She finished it, reread it proudly, then lost it, which is just as well, as it was a threat to great literature. Since then, Dorothy has collected an unusually broad résumé: high school English teacher, academic editor, safe-house director, real estate agent, and hopeful but horrendous gardener. She has spent years listening to people’s stories—students, clients, and survivors—and those voices sometimes find their way into her fiction. Michael T. Kuester is an engineer by day, science fiction writer by night. An avid hiker and cooking enthusiast, Michael is a passionately curious individual, and lives his life by the motto “In the twenty-first century, there’s no excuse for an unanswered question”. Over the years he’s devoted free time to researching everything from the history of naval warfare to the origins of potato chips. Michael resides in Cincinnati, Ohio, with his partner Jen, their two children, and their freeloader housemate Eddie the Cat. His work will be appearing soon in Analog Science Fiction and Fact, but L. Ron Hubbard Presents Writers of the Future Volume 42 will mark his professional debut. Mark McWaters Mark McWaters has long been a fan of all things that go bump in the night, scratch at the door, or blow cold air on the back of your neck. From a very young age, he carried a pad and pencil around with him, composing poems to give to girls. He devoured all the Hardy Boys and Doc Savage books he could get his hands on and expanded his reading horizons from there. Robert Heinlein, Asimov, and Bradbury, whetted his appetite for Sci-Fi. Ann Rice’s Interview With The Vampire blew his mind. A scene from Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot haunts him to this day. And Watcher by Dean Koontz made him a lifelong fan.