Nafiza Azad is a self-identified island girl. She has hurricanes in her blood and dreams of a time she can exist solely on mangoes and pineapple. Born in Lautoka, Fiji, she currently resides in BC, Canada where she reads too many books, watches too many Kdramas and writes stories about girls taking over the world. Her debut YA fantasy, THE CANDLE AND THE FLAME, was released by Scholastic in 2019. 

Melissa Barrientos is a freelance editor, who enjoys spending her days editing manuscripts and helping self-publishing authors share their work with the world. She holds a HBA in English and Professional Writing & Communication from the University of Toronto and a certificate in Publishing from Ryerson University. Melissa is the co-founder of Archetype: A Literary Journal and volunteer for Editors Canada, gritLIT, and Room. When she is not editing or reading, she is writing about life back home in Lima, Peru.

Serena Lukas Bhandar is a Punjabi/Welsh/Irish transfemme writer, water witch, and workshop facilitator living as a settler on Lekwungen and WSANEC lands. Her Pushcart Prize-nominated writing has appeared in Nameless Woman: An Anthology of Fiction by Trans Women of Color and Turn This World Inside Out: The Emergence of Nurturance Culture, among other places. She currently splits her time between providing inclusive sexuality education to middle-schoolers, supporting survivors of sexualized violence with the Anti-Violence Project, and mentoring trans, two-spirit, and non-binary youth through the Trans Tipping Point project.

Meagan Black works part-time for Arc Poetry Magazine, and won Carleton University’s Lillian I. Found Poetry Award in 2012 and 2015. As well as poetry, Meagan is interested in writing for children and young adults (don’t ask about the edits on her YA novel in verse—especially right now!), genre fiction, and finding new ways of telling stories. She has had work appear in Arc, Carousel, ottawater, and The New Haven Review, among other publications.

Adesina Brown is a 21 year-old, queer, non-binary author who centers QTPOC in all their work. They have been previously published in Minola Review, Rigorous Magazine, Exposition Review, and more. Where the Rain Cannot Reach is their debut novel.

Ellen Chang-Richardson (they/her) is an award-winning poet, writer and editor of Taiwanese and Cambodian Chinese or Chinese Cambodian descent. As the daughter of a survivor of the Cambodian genocide, they’re still trying to figure that second part out. Founder of Little Birds Poetry, co-founder of Riverbed Reading Series, and a member of the poetry collective VII, Ellen’s work has been published widely across North America. They currently live and work on the traditional unceded territories of the Algonquin Anishinaabe. Find her online @ehjchang and www.ehjchang.com.

Molly Cross-Blanchard is a white and Métis poet living on Musqueam, Tsleil-Waututh, and Squamish land. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from UBC and a BA in English from the University of Winnipeg. Her debut full-length collection of poetry, Exhibitionist, was published by Coach House Books in Spring 2021.

Karmella Cen Benedito De Barros is an inner-city Indigiqueer with Treaty 6 Mistawasis Nêhiyaw and Afro-Brazilian ancestry. They are a plant loving, community oriented support worker, artist and organizer born and raised in diaspora, as a guest on stolen & unceded Squamish, Tsleil-Waututh and Musqueam territories. Karmella currently works as the Indigenous Brilliance Community Engagement leader with Room Magazine and the Art Ecosystem. They also work as the CRUW Garden Coordinator at xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, and support the Lucid Arts’ Earthseed Youth Book Club. Karmella’s most recent work is featured in Activations Of Solidarity with the Indigenous Curatorial Collective 2021, and Room Magazine issue 44.1 Growing Room.

Emily Dundas Oke is an emerging artist and curator. A 2018 graduate of Philosophy and Visual Art (BA) from Thompson Rivers University, she has been the recipient of numerous awards and is an alumni of the TRU Indigenous Knowledge Makers program. Emily has exhibited nationally and internationally and has been an artist in residence at Nida Art Colony (Lithuania), Ideas Block (Lithuania) and the Kamloops Printmakers Society (Canada). She is currently the organizer and co-curator of the Indigenous Brilliance reading and performance series and holds a FPCC funded Indigenous Curatorial Assistant position at the Contemporary Art Gallery in Vancouver.

Candace Fertile has a PhD in English literature from the University of Alberta. She teaches English at Camosun College in Victoria, B.C. and writes book reviews for several Canadian publications. She joined the collective in 2004.

Stacy Gardner is a member of the Writers Guild of Canada and Playwrights Guild of Canada, recipient of Columbia’s Scholastic Press Association Award in NYC for non-fiction, and a Toronto Arts Council Grant for Playwriting to support her staged production of Worms for Sale at Toronto’s longest running feminist theatre: Alumnae Theatre. Stacy has published poems with Room, Black Moss Press, and Discord & Din; essays for WANL’sWORD, and creative non-fiction for Gailey Road. Stacy’s play, After the Sirens, premiered at the St. John’s Short Play Festival in September 2018, and she is currently producing and curating a youth-engaged play for the same festival in September 2019; and slowly but surely working on a full-length play Not My Circus, Not My Monkey – an exploration into trauma and attachment of children in foster care. A background in social work and journalism, Stacy’s life and work has always revolved around ‘story’ she currently holds the position of Local Immigration Partnership Coordinator in St. John’s, NL, where she lives with her young son, and facilitates creating writing workshops in her house.  http://www.stacygardner.ca/

Ruchika is an editor, writer, reader, and settler, currently living on the territory of the Anishinabek, Huron-Wendat, Haudenosaunee and Ojibway/Chippewa peoples, in Ontario. She is finishing up her degree in English and Cultural Studies, and Women’s Studies at McMaster University, and pursuing a certificate in Restorative Justice at SFU. When she’s not reading for school, she’s reading for fun, and you can either find her in the non-fiction section of the library, or endlessly scrolling through Tik Tok, desperately trying to understand Gen-Z. Ruchika is passionate about transformative justice, community care, reading more stories by writers of colour, and Mexican chocolate ice cream. Find her at @rgothoskar on Instagram, and Twitter (and Tik Tok, if you’re into that).

Michelle Ha is a second generation Chinese Canadian artist and editor, whose main interest lies in painting, writing, and editing. Although she enjoys staring at a blank canvas or page every now and then, she also has other interests that include archery, photography, writing letters to penpals, playing cozy games, and reading more “own voice” stories by marginalised folks. Much of her work in the literary world and in her personal life revolves around supporting and uplifting the voices of Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour, along with folks of the LGBTQIA+ community. She is currently an active editorial member for Room. Michelle has graduated from the University of Victoria with a bachelor’s degree in English and a minor in Professional Journalism and Publishing.

Kendra Heinz is a Montreal-based reader, writer, editor, and former lawyer. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from Carleton University and a Juris Doctor from the University of Calgary. Kendra is an editor at a children’s book publisher and spends much of her free time working one-on-one with emerging writers to edit and evaluate short stories and manuscripts. In addition to her role at Room, Kendra is a member of Editors Canada, a volunteer with The Malahat Review, and reading a new book or graphic novel every few days.

Holly Lam is a Chinese/Scottish/Irish settler living on the territories of the Lekwungen people. She studied creative writing at the University of Victoria and her fiction has been published in carte blanche, Plenitude, and Grain. Holly currently works in theatre administration and loves storytelling for its ability to create compassion, representation, and change. When not reading and writing, she listens to podcasts, absorbs moderately useless knowledge about queer celebrity news and TV shows, and cares for her many house plants.

Hope Lauterbach is a poet and writer with Zambian roots. She is currently enrolled in The Writer’s Studio at Simon Fraser University. In addition to her role at Room, Hope is the Community and Outreach Coordinator for Learn Writing Essentials, an online creative writing studio, and the host of Unbound Reading Series, a quarterly reading and conversation that highlights Black creative voices.

Annick MacAskill’s poems have appeared in journals and anthologies across Canada and abroad, including Room, Plenitude, Prism, Canadian Notes & Queries, Arc, The Fiddlehead, Best Canadian Poetry, and The Stinging Fly. Her debut collection, No Meeting Without Body (Gaspereau Press, 2018), was nominated for the Gerald Lampert Memorial Award and shortlisted for the Atlantic Book Awards’ J.M. Abraham Poetry Award. Her second collection is due to be published by Gaspereau in the spring of 2020. She currently lives and writes in Kjipuktuk (Halifax) on the traditional and unceded territory of the Mi’kmaq.

Nara Monteiro (she/they) is a writer, editor, and nerd born in Brazil and raised on Treaty 13 territory in Toronto. They’ve worked with the communications and marketing team at the Forest City Film Festival, with the Digital Editorial team at The Walrus, and at Iconoclast Collective, Western University’s arts, culture, and politics magazine. Nara is currently completing a Master of Publishing at Simon Fraser University. In their spare time, you can find them reading speculative fiction and garden planning. Keep in touch @notesfromnara on Twitter and Instagram.

Rose Morris has been a member of Room’s editorial collective since 2013. She holds a Masters degree in literature from the University of Victoria. In addition to her role at Room, Rose is a content writer for a marketing agency, a volunteer for The Malahat Review, and occasionally a poet.

Cara Nelissen is a queer writer currently living on the traditional, ancestral and unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh peoples (Vancouver, BC). She’s the author of the chapbook “Pray For Us Girls” (Rahila’s Ghost Press, 2019) and her work has been published in Plenitude, CV2, Vallum, untethered, and Grain.

Lue Palmer is a storyteller with roots in Portland Jamaica. Most recently, their short story “I Swallow Creatures Whole” won runner up for the Grouse Grind Contest for Short Forms and is forthcoming in PRISM Magazine. Lue is currently completing their first full length collection of afrofuturism, A Whistling Woman.

Omi is a Jamaican writer weaving stories from Tkaronto. Their artistic focus lies in documenting and reimagining the Black Atlantic, with an emphasis on the Caribbean. They are surrendering to history as their ancestors tell it.

Rebecca Russell is a freelance editor, teacher, and arts administrator. She has held various positions in publishing, ESL education, and film and theatre and, apart from a year spent abroad, has lived in Toronto for the past several years. She holds a BA in English and women & gender studies from the University of Toronto.

Ivy Sarker is an Indian writer currently living in Tkaronto. She writes her burning questions into fantasy prose and reintroduces herself to her culture through food. When she’s not writing or working at the local bookstore, she spends her time fighting her ever growing pile of books and rewatching Merlin.

Ellie Sawatzky is a poet and fiction writer from Kenora, Ontario. Her debut poetry collection, None of This Belongs to Me (Nightwood Editions), a selection of which was shortlisted for the 2019 Bronwen Wallace Award, was released in October 2021. A past winner of CV2’s Foster Poetry Prize and runner up for the Thomas Morton Memorial Prize, her work has been published widely in literary magazines across North America. She works as an editor for FriesenPress and curates the Instagram account @impromptuprompts, a hub for prompts and literary inspiration. Ellie lives in Vancouver with her partner and a cat named Camus.

Geffen Semach, originally from Vancouver, now lives in Toronto where she works at Penguin Random House Canada. For the last few years, she was living in London, England, where she worked as a Literary Agent’s Assistant at Aitken Alexander. Geffen has also worked at Profile Books and in foreign rights at Andrew Nurnberg Associates in London. She has been an online editor, a creative copywriter at a marketing agency, as well as held an editorial assistant position with The Nabokov Online Journal. Geffen completed the Columbia Publishing Course at Oxford University in 2017.

Asna Shaikh is an aspiring storyteller. Born in Mumbai, India, she currently lives on traditional Musqueam, Tsleil-Waututh, and Squamish land. She holds an MA in English from Simon Fraser University and has some experience in writing, marketing and communications. She is obsessed with cooking, keeping warm in the winter, and articulating untold stories of unseen people. She can’t help but laugh at all puns, no matter how bad.

Jane Shi is a queer Chinese settler living on the unceded, traditional, and ancestral territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations. Her writing can be found in Poetry Is Dead, LooseLeaf Magazine, Canthius, and PRISM International, among others. She wants to live in a world where love is not a limited resource, land is not mined, hearts are not filched, and bodies are not violated. You can find her online at @pipagaopoetry. 

jaye is a libra sun, sagittarius rising, scorpio moon. jaye is a displaced indigenous person living, creating & occupying on xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), səl̓ilwətaɁɬ (Tsleil-waututh), and sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish) First Nations territories. they are a co-organizer of the Indigenous Brilliance reading series, a collaborative series between Room Magazine and Massy Books celebrating Indigenous women/2SQ storytellers. you can find them and their hot takes on twitter at @jayesimpson94.

Sylvia Symons grew up in northern B.C. and currently lives with her family in Vancouver, where she teaches ESL at a community college. Her work appears in lit-mags and anthologies including EVENT, Geist, Best Canadian Poetry 2016, Room, CV2, and Prairie Fire. Walking up or down a non-moving escalator requires all her focus and courage.

Shristi Uprety (she/her) is a Nepali writer from Kathmandu, currently living on the unneeded territory of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh peoples in Vancouver BC. She is a MFA candidate at the University of British Columbia, where she is wading through her first novel. You can find her on Twitter @_ShristiUprety.

Délani Valin is a Cree-Métis writer living on Snuneymuxw traditional territory. She holds a B.A. in Creative Writing from Vancouver Island University. Her poetry has been awarded The Malahat Review’s Long Poem Prize, subTerrain’s Lush Triumphant Award, and was nominated for a National Magazine Award in 2018. She has read for Room’s Indigenous Brilliance series, and her work has also appeared in Exile Editions’ Those Who Make Us, Adbusters, and Soliloquies Anthology, among others.