Editorial Board

Mariana Damon

Mariana Damon earned a BA from the University of Arizona, an MA from the University of Nebraska at Kearney, and an MFA from Goddard College.  She was a recipient of an honors grant from the University of Arizona, which allowed her to research Colette’s original manuscripts at the Sorbonne.  Subsequently she presented a paper on that research at the Arizona Honors Convention.

Her first novel, Flowers of Gold, is a mystery set in Provence, France. Her second novel, Blood in the Desert, also a mystery, takes place on the Tohono O’odham Indian reservation.  She has completed a third novel set in Cambridge, England.  Damon has published memoir and short fiction in Finding Change and Shark Reef.  She taught English abroad for four years.

Damon is the acquisistions editor of Bridle Path Press.  Her areas of interest include mystery, literary fiction, and young adult.  

 
Marnette Graff 

Marnette Graff is the prize-winning author of four novels, screenplays, essays, short stories, and poems. She writes the Nora Tierney Mysteries, set in England, featuring American writer Nora. The Blue Virgin, set in Oxford, won first place for British Cozy novels from Chanticleer Media. The Green Remains follows Nora's move to the Lake District. The Scarlet Wench, the third novel in the series, is also set in Cumbria.

Graff is also the author of Death Unscripted, the first mystery in the Trudy Genova series.

After writing for Nursing Spectrum for six years, Graff wrote feature articles and interviews for seven years for Mystery Review.  She contributes to Mystery Scene, and has twice been the recipient of month-long writing residencies at the Vermont Studio Center. Her creative nonfiction has been published most recently in Southern Women's Review, Southern Writers Magazine, and Shelf Pleasures. She is a consultant for Investigation: Discovery's show Deadly Affairs for NC cases.

Graff's background includes working in television and motion pictures on scripts and medical scenes, based on her nursing background.  She has taught Creative Writing and Memoir in North Carolina and leads the Writers Read program there.  A member of Sisters in Crime, Graff also writes a weekly crime review blog and can be reached at Auntiemwrites's Weblog, or at bluevirgin.graff@gmail.com.

Graff is the managing editor of Bridle Path Press and writes the Mystery Matters feature.  She and Damon are also mystery editors for the press. 

 
Lauren Small

Denver native Lauren Small earned a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature.  Her scholarly work has appeared in academic journals such as Statement: The Journal of the Colorado Language Arts SocietyMLN, and German Quarterly, and she has published fiction in literary magazines such as FictionStoryQuarterly, and Partisan Review.  Her short story “Livia” was nominated for a Pushcart Prize.  Small has spoken at numerous schools around the country and has presented at the Miami Book Fair International, the Sanibel Island Writers Conference, Florida Gulf Coast University, the annual conference of the Colorado Language Arts Society, and the annual conference of the National Council for the Social Studies. She is an assistant professor of pedatrics at Johns Hopkins Hospital where she co-directs AfterWards, a program in narrative medicine. She also teaches English and Creative Writing at the University of Maryland University College. Choke Creek(Bridle Path Press 2009), her first novel, has been taught in high schools across the nation.

Small is the founder and editor-in-chief of Bridle Path Press. Her interests include literary and historical fiction. You can contact Small through her website, www.laurensmall.com.

 
Melissa Westemeier

Melissa Westemeier earned a BA from UW-Stevens Point and a MS from UW-Madison.  Most of the year she teaches high school English and edits for a variety of writers. She has published essays in Clever Magazine and Finding Change.  She is also a contributor to Teaching Writing in High School and College: Conversations and Collaborations.  She has presented at the Fox Cities Book Festival and UntitledTown, leads a creative writing club and maintains the  blog Green Girl in Wisconsin.

Westemeier's publications include Whipped, Not Beaten, a chick lit novel; Across the River, a literary novel; and Kicks Like a Girl, a karate-themed chick lit novel. 

Westemeier is the general fiction editor of Bridle Path Press.  Her interests include chick lit, women's fiction, and young adult.  She can be reached through her blog, Green Girl in Wisconsin