Jackie Kessler, Writer Guest of Honor

jackiekessler.com

Jackie Kessler writes about demons, angels, the humans caught between them, superheroes, the supervillains who pound those heroes into pudding, witches, ghosts, vampires, and the occasional Horseman of the Apocalypse. In her spare time, Jackie gets the tar kicked out of her in tae kwon do. Her debut novel for teens, HUNGER (written under the byline Jackie Morse Kessler), hits the shelves on October 18, 2010.

Stephen Hickman, Artist Guest of Honor

stephenhickman.com

Stephen Hickman has been illustrating science fiction and fantasy for over two decades. His work has been inspired by masters of fantasy and science fiction writing—J.R.R. Tolkein, H. P. Lovecraft, A. Merritt, Edgar Rice Burroughs and Clark Ashton Smith. His illustrations have been used as cover work for

many contemporary writers, such as Stephen Brust, Lois McMaster Bujold, Tom Cool, Gordon Dickson, David Drake, Harlan Ellison, Robert Heinlein, Spider Robinson, Anne McCaffrey, Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle, Andre Norton, Mark Van Name and Steve Stirling—earning him critical acclaim.

Since 1976 Hickman has illustrated approximately 375 covers for Ace, Baen, Ballantine, Bantam, Berkeley, Dell, Del Rey, Doubleday, Phage Press, Tor, the annual Tolkien Calendar, Warren Publications and others. In 1988 Hickman wrote The Lemurian Stone (Ace Books), which formed the basis for his Pharazar Mythos illustrations. The Lion Pavillion is one example and is reproduced along with The Archers in the 1994 edition of SPECTRUM.

Other interests include sculpting and scale modeling and advanced FX make-up, and acoustic blues guitar playing. Boomerang crafting and throwing is not mentioned in this context as it is an obsession and not an interest.

In 1994 he was awarded a Hugo Award from the World Science Fiction Convention for the United States Postal Service’s Space Fantasy Commemorative Booklet of stamps, the first official recognition by the government of the SF genre. Other prominent awards include seven Chesley Awards in various categories from the Association of Science Fiction and Fantasy Artists (ASFA) and two Gold Awards from the SPECTRUM annual anthologies, as well as numerous awards from the conventions he has attended over the years, including Best In Show at the World Fantasy Convention in Providence, RI, in 1999.

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Keith DeCandido, Media Guest of Honor

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John Hebert, Special Guest of Honor

The Wombat aka jan howard finder, Special Guest

The Wombat, aka jan howard finder, has been reading SF for more than 60 years and active in SF circles for about 35. He chaired 2 Tolkien conferences, in 69 and 71. After finding fandom in 72 and cons in 73, in the UK, he ran 2 SF cons, 77 and 79. In 93 he was accorded the genuine honor of being named as an Honored Guest at CONFRANCISCO, the 1993 Worldcon. He came out of retirement in 96 to chair ALBACON 96. Still brain dead, he successfully

chaired SFRA 2001, an academic conf. on SF. Survived as Chair of ALBACON 08. He participates in, judged and MC's masquerades. He is one of the best auctioneers found at cons. According to backs that know, he gives the best backrubs north of the South Pole. He put out an award winning fanzine, The Spang Blah. He sold a short story in 81 to Microcosmic Tales and edited an SF anthology, Alien Encounters, in 82, and published his incredible Finder's Guide to Australterrestrials. He is a marsupial groupie. In 99 he attended A3, afterwards he drove about Oz for a total of 174 days looking for wombats. He puts out an irregular fanzine on Arthur Upfield, an Australian mystery writer. He also likes aerobics, learned to scuba, is taking up sailing, learning how to play cricket, has a budding film career, visited Middle-earth in JAN 04 and MAR 06, and trying to save the World with SUTs. Ask him about Yaminons, wombats, BYTELOCK, visiting Middle-earth and other stuff. He is a neat guy. Buy him a Pepsi!

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Inanna Arthen—Inanna Arthen

Inanna Arthen is the author of The Vampires of New England Series: Mortal Touch (2007) and The Longer the Fall (2010). Book 3, All the Shadows of the Rainbow, will be released in 2012. Inanna is a lifelong scholar of vampire folklore, fiction and fact, and runs By Light Unseen Media (http://bylightunseenmedia.com), an independent press dedicated to publishing vampire fiction and non-fiction. She is a member of Broad Universe, New England Horror Writers, Independent Book Publishers Association (IBPA) and Independent Publishers of New England (IPNE). She served as Con Chair for Readercon 22 in 2011.

Deborah Blake—Deborah Blake

Deborah Blake is the author of Circle, Coven and Grove: A Year of Magickal Practice (Llewellyn 2007), Everyday Witch A to Z: An Amusing, Inspiring & Informative Guide to the Wonderful World of Witchcraft (Llewellyn 2008), The Goddess is in the Details: Wisdom for the Everyday Witch (Llewellyn2009), Everyday Witch A to Z Spellbook (July 2010) and Witchcraft on a Shoestring (September 2010). She has published numerous articles in Pagan publications.

Her award-winning short story, "Dead and (Mostly) Gone" is included in the Pagan Anthology of Short Fiction: 13 Prize Winning Tales (Llewellyn, 2008). Deborah’s first novel, Witch Ever Way You Can, was the winner or finalist in many RWA (Romance Writers of America) contests and received the EMILY "Best of the Best" Award. Her fiction is primarily Paranormal Romance, although she also writes Fantasy, Mystery and Young Adult. She is represented by agent Elaine Spencer of The Knight Agency.

Deborah had been interviewed on television, radio and podcast, and can be found online at Facebook, Twitter and her website, above.

When not writing, Deborah runs The Artisans’ Guild, a cooperative shop she founded with a friend in 1999, and also works as a jewelry maker. She lives in a 100 year old farmhouse in rural upstate New York with five cats who supervise all her activities, both magickal and mundane.

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Mary Catelli

Mary Catelli started writing in her teens, when deprived of books to read. After a while, she started finishing the stories. Since then, her short stories have appeared in various Sword and Sorceress anthologies and Weird Tales. Another is forthcoming in Black Gate. She is working on a novel. She lives in Connecticut, where she works as a computer programmer.

Debi Chowdhury

Melissa Crandall

Susan Hanniford Crowley—susanhannifordcrowley.com

Susan Hanniford Crowley is an active member of SFWA, an associate editor with Space and Time Magazine , and a science fiction and fantasy author. Her most popular character being Ladyknight in "Ladyknight" from the Spells of Wonder anthology and

"Piper" in Sword and Sorceress IX . In addition, Susan is a member of RWA, CTRWA, and the Futuristic, Fantasy, and Paranormal chapter of the RWA. She is the founder of the Nights of Passion blog and is the author of the Vampires in Manhattan series. Her latest release, the 4th in the series is Vampire in the Basement. Tease Publishing LLC is also releasing her mythology romance Poseidon's Catch. She is working on a steampunk romance next as well as expanding her series. Susan will be signing her vampire romance novel The Stormy Love Life of Laura Cordelais at Albacon.

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Bianca D'Arc writes mostly SF&F romance, some erotic romance and lots of action/adventure. Her latest books combine a zombie virus with military heroes and brainy heroines. The last book in the 5-story series, DEAD ALERT, is out now in print and ebook formats. Prior books in the series have spent time in the Amazon Top 100 for Science Fiction and enjoyed a wide readership among both romance and mainstream readers. Bianca was at first,

a career scientist, having run a laboratory for several years. Then she went "corporate" and climbed the corporate ladder in the shark-infested streets of lower Manhattan before giving it all up to write. She studied and taught martial arts in her younger days and holds a BS in biochemistry, a doctorate in law and masters in library and information science. She grew up and still lives on Long Island, where she keeps busy with an extensive garden, several aquariums full of very demanding fish, and writing her favorite genres of paranormal, fantasy and sci-fi romance.

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A.L. Davroe

Shannon Delany

Shannon Delany is the author of the 13 to Life (paranormal YA) series through St. Martin's Press. Her novels include 13 to Life, Secrets and Shadows, Bargains and Betrayals and (the upcoming) Destiny and Deception and Rivals and Retribution. Shannon was previously a teacher (having taught every grade and ability level) as well as a professional papercutter (among having a wide variety of other brief occupations) and now

is a farmer living in Upstate New York working on her science-fiction series. Shannon loves to travel and talk to people about writing, technology, the importance of expressing yourself creatively and... nearly anything else. When she is tired (or lacking the proper caffeine to blood ratio) she overuses parentheses and mangles grammar. You can find Shannon most easily online on Facebook, Twitter (@Shannon_Delany) and Goodreads.

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Julie Dominian

I was born in 1945 in NYC and, after moving to a small town in Sullivan County, NY, I became a SF & fantasy reader by the time I was 11. Thank goodness-because the basic lesson I learned was the world did not have to be as it was in the 1950's. I've been an active reader and fan to this day. And I've never been satisfied with the world as it is. Thus Science Fiction also

prompted my political involvements.

My years in active fandom began in graduate school at Binghamton University. A group of fans started the Terminal Beach Club and brought speakers to the club and the campus that included Joanna Russ, George Zebrowski, Pam Sargent, Jack Dann, Marion Zimmer Bradley, Gardner Dozois and Samuel R. Delaney. We published to "usual" club fanzine. We also arranged for numerous trips to Lunacon, Disclave, PhilCon and various World Cons. When Joanna Russ came from Cornell to teach at Binghamton, she became our club advisor during the years that she was faculty. And that's when I got to know her as a friend.

My professional work has been primarily as a New York State employee in Albany. Prior work experience in Binghamton, after leaving graduate school, includes teaching, book sales and youth advocacy for Teen Pregnancy prevention. When I retired from New York State in 2004, I was an Assistant Director of Personnel at the NYSDOT. From 1978 ton 2001, I worked for the NYS Civil Service Department as a specialist in exams development, payroll processing and hiring and traing management. (Sounds dull, I know- but it wasn't. I've been offered bribes, verbally threatened for the decisions I had to make, and sued.)

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Ty Drago

Jan Dumas — aka Fibrowitch

Jan Dumas is a retired occupational safety engineer. Member of the Zombie Squad, dedicated to teaching fen how to prepare for emergencies. She refuses to grow up, and hopes

to grow old. Jan has some severe food allergies and would like to spend the weekend at Albacon instead of in a hospital. So please be careful around her. We kind of like her. Last (but not least), she has a service dog now. His name is Byron and he goes with her everywhere.

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Rebecca Elson

Greg R. Fishbone—Greg R. Fishbone

Greg R. Fishbone is an author of science fiction and fantasy for young readers. His critically acclaimed Galaxy Games series is a humorous space opera with multicultural themes. His upcoming Dungeons & Dragons novel for Wizards of the Coast is currently

in the hush-hush-don't-talk-about-it stage. Greg is also an assistant regional advisor for New England regions of the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators, two-time NESCBWI conference director, alumnus of the Superguy project, a contributor to the Starship Alethea shared-world anthology, founder of the Class of 2k7 and subsequent author groups, and a former editor of Event Horizon and Mythic Heroes speculative fiction magazines. This summer he participated in the NSF-funded Launch Pad program at the University of Wyoming, intended to provide authors and their readers with better knowledge of astronomy and science literacy.

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J.A. Fludd—The Quantum Blog

J.A. Fludd (Joe) is a writer and artist in Albany, NY. He contributed reviews to the Fantastic Four Website, before it suspended operations. Joe is a fan of all the Star Treks, and was a Screenwriting Intern for

Star Trek Voyager. Joe's interests also include The Twilight Zone, The Outer Limits, Star Wars, Dr. Who, and Heroes. Joe illustrated the super-hero feature Sentinel (later Pride) for Gay Comics. He sells work on eBay and displays at the Quantum Male Art Blog. His work can also be seen at Comicspace. Joe's essays are online at The Quantum Blog. Joe can be found on Facebook under the name J.A. Fludd.

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Nancy Holzner—Nancy Holzner

Nancy Holzner is the author of the DEADTOWN urban fantasy series, which features shapeshifting demonslayer Vicky Vaughn. Nancy grew up in western Massachusetts. In college, she majored in English and then continued her studies to earn a masters degree and a PhD. She began her career as

a medievalist, then jumped off the tenure track to try some other things. Besides teaching English and philosophy, she’s worked as a technical writer, freelance editor and instructional designer, college admissions counselor, and corporate trainer. Most of her nonfiction books are published under the name Nancy Conner.

Nancy lives in Ithaca, New York with her husband Steve, where they both work from home without getting on each other’s nerves. She enjoys visiting local wineries and listening obsessively to opera. Her Deadtown series, published by Ace, currently consists of three novels: DEADTOWN, HELLFORGED, and BLOODSTONE. The fourth, DARKLANDS, will be published in 2012. RT Book Reviews calls the series "highly addictive," and Fantasy Literature says, "If you love urban fantasy, then buy Nancy Holzner’s books right this minute."

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Cat Johnson—CatJohnson.net

An award-winning author of contemporary erotic romance in sub-genres including military, cowboy, ménage and paranormal, Cat Johnson uses her computer so much

she wore the letters off the keyboard within a year. She is known for her creative marketing and research practices. Consequently, Cat owns an entire collection of camouflage footwear for book signings and a fair number of her consultants wear combat or cowboy boots for a living. In her real life, she’s been a marketing manager, professional harpist, bartender, tour guide, radio show host, Junior League president, sponsor of a bull riding rodeo cowboy, wife and avid animal lover.
Visit the authors website at www.CatJohnson.net
Or email the author at Cat@CatJohnson.net

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KT Pinto—KT Pinto

You don't know who KT Pinto is? How is that possible? Well, it's time we fixed that!

Stella Price—stellaandaudra.com

The elder of two sisters, Stella Price has been a model, ice cream designer, bartender, web wizard, retail slave and snowboard instructor.

Now in her 30's, shes the older half of Stella and Audra Price, authors of all things dark and romantic, and has over 18 books to her and her sisters credit. Aside from writing, Stella maintains a career as a graphic designer and art director for Tease Publishing. She is also the managing director for the Authors After Dark convention each year and believes happy endings dont always have to be sweetness and light.

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Robert C. Roman

Chuck Rothman —Chuck Rothman

Chuck Rothman has been publishing science fiction for over a quarter of a century, with one novel and over 40 short stories published in places like Asimov's, Fantasy and Science Fiction, Realms of Fantasy, Strange Horizons, Space and Time, and other markets living and dead.

Pamela Sargent

PJ Schnyder—PJ Schnyder

Born and raised in the North East, PJ Schnyder spent her childhood pretending to study for the SATs by reading every fantasy and sci-fi novel she could borrow from the local and school libraries. She scored fairly high in the verbal portion. She was introduced to the wonderful world of romance a decade later by her best friend at an anime convention in Seattle. She now lives somewhere temperate watching the seasons go by with her two dogs and super stealthy ninja kitty, writing her stories. She is a writer of paranormal and sci-fi romance, steampunk and urban fantasy.

Ryk Spoor—The Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)

Ryk E. Spoor is a professional science-fiction and fantasy writer with five books published by Baen; his most recent, both out this year, are Grand Central Arena and Threshold (with Eric Flint; sequel to Boundary). His "day job"

is R&D Coordinator for International Electronic Machines in Troy, NY, where he writes proposals for high-tech research projects and oversees a number of such projects in wireless sensing, smart sensor design, and multispectral imaging, among others. He has worked as a project manager and QA director for another small company, performed editing, proofreading, and other technical writing, worked in retail, and a number of other diverse jobs, as well as game design work for Wizards of the Coast. A Great Old One of the Net, he sent his first Email in 1976 and ran the first play-by-email RPG campaign in 1977; he is also a well-known anime fan on the East coast and online. He lives in Troy with his wife Kathy and their four children Chris, Gabe, Vicky, and Domenica.

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Michael A. Ventrella—michaelaventrella.com

Michael A. Ventrella was born in Richmond, Virginia on August 3, 1958. His father was an artist who did commercial graphics and his mother did her best

to control Michael, his two brothers, and a sister. Michael was dramatic from an early age, acting in community theatre and writing his own plays with his siblings. He also wrote puppet shows and performed them for his school. His earliest desire was to be a cartoonist and his drawings adorned school newspapers and posters. Later, he discovered music and taught himself to play guitar and piano, writing simple songs with his friends.

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George Zebrowski