A lifelong writer, Barbara McDonald has had poetry published in anthologies and magazines and spent several summers at the Community of Writers at Squaw Valley, where she worked on Slipsliding by the Bay. She held various positions at Lone Mountain College in San Francisco before it closed: adjunct faculty, director of institutional service, editor and writer, and alumni director. After being a stringer for local papers and managing editor of a magazine, she worked at Dominican University as director of facilities. North American Review commissioned her to write an article on Lone Mountain, its progression and demise. She currently teaches Critical Thinking at the Marin County Jail.

Perched on the edge of San Francisco, Lakeside College is experiencing an identity crisis. John Gudewill is recruited as president to save the college from possible closure—but he is flummoxed at every turn. The faculty, led by secretive English professor Eliot Blanc, is determined to unionize. The alumni want Lakeside to return to its former status as a women-only college. Meanwhile, Sister Magdalena, the college’s infamous artist, is waging war against corporate America through her art, and the students are engaging in their own warfare through sit-ins and protests. With the college besieged on all sides, what is its new president to do?

A hilarious spoof of academic intrigue, Slipsliding by the Bay mirrors the societal turmoil and follies of the seventies.

Ann Z. Leventhal is the author of Life-lines, a novel about a wife who runs away with her husband’s mistress. Her short stories, articles, poems, and reviews have appeared in Vignettes, The Georgia Review, Prairie Schooner, Christopher Street, The New York Times Book Review, and Publishers Weekly.

Though twenty-one-year-old Karla Most manages to bag Saxton Perry, a virtual prince thirty years her senior, she has no idea how to live happily ever after, with or without him. Karla cannot get past her anger at having been deceived by her single, now-dead mother, Mutti, who—supposedly a “Holocaust victim,” complete with tattooed numbers—was in fact a German Christian who got into the United States by falsifying her background. So what does that make her daughter? Before she can answer that question, Karla must track down the actual story of her own existence.

Betsy Teutsch is an artist, blogger, community organizer, and environmentalist who has enjoyed a successful career as an Judaica artist and entrepreneur. As Communications Director of GreenMicrofinance, she wrote about affordable, sustainable paths out of rural poverty. She has also served as a board member for the dynamic Shining Hope for Communities and the Kibera School for Girls, and founded three chapters of Dining For Women, a national network of giving circles meeting monthly to support of women’s grassroots poverty alleviation initiatives. A Fargo, ND, native, she now lives with her husband in Philadelphia, PA.

100 Under $100: One Hundred Tools for Empowering Global Women is a comprehensive look at effective, low-cost solutions for helping women in the Global South out of poverty. Most books on this subject focus on one problem and one solution; author Betsy Teutsch instead spreads her net wide, sharing one hundred successful, proven paths out of poverty in eleven different sectors—including tech, public health, law, finance, and more—in a visually striking book full of images of vibrant, strong women farmers, health practitioners, entrepreneurs, and humanitarian tech stars doing exciting, cutting-edge work. Eye-opening and compelling, 100 Under $100 is an accessible entry point for globally-attuned readers excited about using a broad range of tools to empower women and help alleviate poverty in the developing world.

After suffering from chronic stomach problems for several years, Bella Mahaya Carter adopted a 100 percent raw, vegan diet, which eased her symptoms but didn’t completely heal her. She looked to her mind for answers, and discovered that her own thinking was sabotaging her health and happiness. Anxiety and a desire to heal it holistically—even before knowing what “it” was—is at the heart of this story, which reveals one writer’s struggle to face her fears, release perfectionism, surrender things beyond her control, and find validation within for her life and work. Divided into three sections—body, mind, and spirit—Raw is a chronicle of Carter’s journey, which dragged her, kicking and screaming, into spiritual adulthood.

In Where Do You Hang Your Hammock? seasoned coach and author Bella Mahaya Carter shows writers how to use their present circumstances as stepping-stones to a successful and meaningful writing life, navigated from the inside out. It encourages writers and authors to rethink their ambitions (which may be fueled by the tyrannical demands of the ego) and trust in their heartfelt purpose and values in the journey to becoming, or continuing on, as authors.

Many writers believe their self-sabotaging thoughts are trustworthy and true. They take rejection personally. They surmise that if they don’t achieve their goals they have failed, and lose sight of who they are and what matters most.

This book is for writers looking for inspiration and for authors daunted by the publishing process, who might lack the requisite author platform to get published the way they dreamed, or whose careers may not be unfolding as expected. It aims to be the friend and trusted expert writers turn to when hijacked by their own thinking. Ultimately, it reminds authors that they are infinite creators.

Antoinette Truglio Martin is a speech therapist and special education teacher by training but is a writer at heart. She is the author of Famous Seaweed Soup, and was a visiting author in schools for several years. She was formerly a regular columnist for Parent Connection (In A Family Way) and Fire Island Tide (Beach Bumming). Personal experience essays and excerpts of her memoir have been published in Bridges (2014), Visible Ink (2015), and The Southampton Review (2016). Martin proudly received her MFA in creative writing and literature from Stony Brook Southampton University (2016). As a stage four breast cancer patient, she does not allow cancer to dictate her life. She lives in her hometown of Sayville with her husband, Matt, and is never far from My Everyone and the beaches she loves.

Antoinette Martin believed herself to be a healthy and sturdy woman—that is, until she received a stage 1 breast cancer diagnosis. Cancer is scary enough for the brave, but for a wimp like Martin, it was downright terrifying. Martin had to swallow waves of nausea at the thought of her body being poisoned, and frequently fainted during blood draws and infusions. To add to her terror, cancer suddenly seemed to be all around her. In the months following her diagnosis, a colleague succumbed to cancer, and five of her friends were also diagnosed. Though tempted, Martin knew she could not hide in bed for ten months. She had a devoted husband, daughters, and a tribe of friends and relations. Along with work responsibilities, there were graduations, anniversaries, and roller derby bouts to attend, not to mention a house to sell and a summer of beach-bumming to enjoy. In order to harness support without scaring herself or anyone else, she journaled her experiences and began to e-mail the people who loved her—the people she called My Everyone—She kept them informed and reminded all to “hug everyone you know” at every opportunity. Reading the responses became her calming strategy. Ultimately, with the help of her community, Martin found the courage within herself to face cancer with perseverance and humor.

Barbara Santarelli, RN, BS, HCA, has been an employed nurse for more than four decades and an elementary school nurse for the past twenty-five years. She’s authored articles about sex education for teens, and credits her long and varied nursing career to her cryptic sense of humor and persistent optimism. Twice married (currently to husband Nick), Santarelli is a mother, grandmother, avid reader, and cyclist who considers Stella, her nine-pound Dachsund, and Celeste, her road bike, to be members of her extended family.

Life in a middle-class Italian American-Catholic neighborhood in the 1950s Bronx was not supposed to include divorce, Judaism, classical music, political discourse, or poverty in the social construct. So, in the absence of friends, young Barbara takes comfort in the minutiae, the small details available to her in her everyday life that seem to be overlooked by others. But that appreciation for the inanimate world leads her on a path to the acquisition of objects and a quest for identity that dominates her choices—from her marriage and family life to her constant striving for more and more.

Barbara’s chosen nursing career offers validation and some affirmation, but falls short of providing her what’s most elusive—self–esteem—until finally, at age fifty, she abruptly abandons her conventional role of mother, wife, nurse, and neighbor to attempt a three-hundred-mile bike ride from Boston to New York. Poorly prepared, she takes only what she needs to flee her life, and a fierce determination that finally allows her to discover her place in the world—and to find true belonging.

Barbara Ridley was raised in England but has lived in California for more than thirty years. After a successful career as a nurse practitioner, which included publication in numerous professional journals, she is now focused on creative writing. Her work has appeared in literary journals, such as The Writers Workshop Review, Still Crazy, Ars Medica, The Copperfield Review, and BLYNKT. This is her first novel. Ridley lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with her partner and her dog, and has one adult daughter, of whom she is immensely proud. Find her online at www.barbararidley.com.

Coming of age in Prague in the 1930s, Lena Kulkova is inspired by the left-wing activists who resist the rise of fascism. She meets Otto, a refugee from Hitler’s Germany, and follows him to Paris to work for the Republican side in the Spanish Civil War. As the war in Spain ends and a far greater war engulfs the continent, Lena gets stuck in Paris with no news from her Jewish family, including her beloved baby sister, left behind in Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia. Otto, meanwhile, has fled to a village in England, and urges Lena to join him, but she can’t obtain a visa.

When Lena and Otto are finally reunited, the safe haven Lena has hoped for doesn’t last long. Their relationship becomes strained, and Lena is torn between her loyalty to Otto and her growing attraction to Milton, the son of the eccentric Lady of the Manor. As the war continues, she yearns to be reunited with her sister, while Milton is preoccupied with the political turmoil that leads to the landslide defeat of Churchill in the 1945 election.

Based on a true story, When It’s Over is a moving, resonant, and timely read about the lives of war refugees, dramatic political changes, and the importance of family, love, and hope.

Alice McDowell, PhD is a counselor in private practice, retreat guide, and cofounder of Light on the Hill Retreat Center, as well as the founder of the Hidden Treasure program—a three-year training in personal and spiritual growth. A professor of religious studies at Ithaca College for eighteen years, she now facilitates groups devoted to inner work. McDowell has trained with healers, humanist and transpersonal psychologists, Sufi and Buddhist teachers, and Christian contemplatives, and has guided people in their personal and spiritual journeys for over thirty years. She draws upon her diverse training and life experience to help others awaken to their true selves, their divinity within.

Do you long to live a more authentic life but feel you might be getting in your own way? In Hidden Treasure, author Alice McDowell reveals five personality patterns that cause unnecessary suffering and block individuals from living a full and radiant life. These patterns can be so ingrained that they influence body shape and even who a person thinks they are. Through a series of exercises, compelling true stories, fun cartoons, and spiritual insights, McDowell offers individuals and groups an opportunity to learn about and break free of these patterns, and provides guidelines for readers to join or create a Hidden Treasure group for ongoing exploration. No matter a person’s age or background, Hidden Treasure can light the way to softening and healing these patterns—and restoring their true self and spiritual identity in the process.

Andrea Jarrell has written about relationships, recovery, parenting, self-esteem, yoga, travel, and education for The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Christian Science Monitor, The Huffington Post, and many literary and popular magazines and websites. An LA girl who grew up traveling the world thanks to her determined mother, she now lives with her family in suburban Washington, DC.

As featured in the New York Times “Modern Love” column * a Redbook Magazine must-read * Rumpus, Hello Giggles, Bustle, and Southern Living magazine Fall book pick

Fugitives from a man as alluring as he is violent, Andrea Jarrell and her mother develop a powerful, unusual bond. Once grown, Jarrell thinks she’s put that chapter of her life behind her—until a woman she knows is murdered, and she suddenly sees that it’s her mother’s choices she’s been trying to escape all along. Without preaching or prescribing, I’m the One Who Got Away is a life-affirming story of having the courage to become both safe enough and vulnerable enough to love and be loved.

Barbara Sapienza is a retired clinical psychologist who practiced in San Francisco. At sixty-six she enrolled in the graduate program in Creative Writing at SFSU. She writes, paints, dances, practices taiji and meditation, and volunteers in a school program in Marin City. She lives in Sausalito with her husband and enjoys her granddaughters, Milla and Isa.

Fifteen-year-old Elena lives in a church attic in San Francisco’s Richmond neighborhood, where she is cared for by her guardian, a kind Russian priest named Father Al. Six days a week, Father Al sends her out of Our Lady, across the meadows and ponds of Golden Gate Park, and all the way to Baba Vera’s house on Taraval Street for Baba’s version of school.

Unlike regular school, however, Elena’s learning is unnerving. Baba Vera’s preposterous demands, dizzying antics, and house—which is full of skeletons, brooms, strange implements, and guinea pigs, among other oddities—seem straight out of a Russian fairy tale Father Al used to read to Elena . . . not life in 2020. If not for her beloved doll, Kukla—bequeathed to her by the mother she never got to know, but of whom she often dreams—Elena would be overwhelmed. Yet she works hard at every task given her, understanding intuitively that there is a purpose to every one of her grandmother’s strange assignments.

Frank, a young taxi driver, enters Elena’s world on the day he delivers a strange, witch-like woman named Anya to Our Lady. Upon meeting Anya and Elena, a dream-world begins to spin for him—and he feels a deep, protective pull toward Elena. In the days that follow, Frank devotes himself to saving her from the harm he is sure Anya intends toward her. What he comes to understand, as he enters more deeply into Elena’s story, is that she has magic of her own. He thought he was supposed to save her—but in the end, the two of them may just save each other.

Twenty-six-year-old Lavinia Lavinia is burdened by her unknown heritage—but her uncle Sal, who raised her in San Francisco, has always kept silent, refusing to reveal the devastating secret of her origin. And now, following the death of his wife, he’s left for Italy.

In the wake of her uncle’s departure, Lavinia has quit school. Now she works as a personal laundress to a diverse cast of San Francisco residents—people with stories as complicated as her own. As time progresses, through the sacred ritual of washing clothes—and with the help of a friend and her nurturing, flamenco dancing mother—Lavinia begins to recover memories of her mother. Gradually, her gifts of receptivity multiply, and she communes with nature, finding messages from birds and the leaves of her garden’s fig tree. And when she recovers Raggedy, a beloved doll that accompanied her from Naples when she was four years old, she experiences a tangible connection to her mother.

Even as Lavinia makes these discoveries, she is busy building new relationships—discovering healing dance with her lover, a barista in a North Beach coffee shop; learning to understand Time and forgiveness with an elderly client; and even getting to know her father, a man who has never been a part of her life. Poetic and poignant, The Laundress is a coming-of-age story for anyone who’s ever sought to understand where they came from in order to figure out who they’re meant to become.

Sixty-year-old Frances Pia lives alone on a thirty-foot sailboat anchored near Sausalito, where she communes with the fog, sea lions, cormorants, and two sailor friends, Otto and Russell. She performs random acts of public defacement—painting drainpipes, public restrooms, and murals on the sides of houses—which she believes are beautification projects, and struggles with bouts of depression and mania. Frankly, she’s a bit of a nutcase.

But Frances wasn’t always this way. She was once a Catholic nun with a sister, Anne, who loved her dearly. But then she slept with her brother-in-law, Greg—and ashamed and pregnant, she fled, leaving Anne, her art, and her vocation behind. When she also lost her baby, Nicola, in a freak accident, she lost faith in God and became a keeper of sorrows.

Through a series of wacky adventures, including bouts with the cops and the sea, Frances opens her heart to love for the first time in years—and begins to really paint the town, redeeming herself with Anne and freeing herself from her guilt over Nicola’s death along the way.