The annual WriteAngles conference and the on-line journal are produced by WriteAngles, Inc. Jean-Marie Ruiz is president of WriteAngles, Inc., Cheryl Malandrinos is treasurer, Jan Whitaker is clerk, and the trustees are Joan Axelrod-Contrada and Ellen Meeropol.
The following profiles are for conference volunteers who work behind the scenes, as well as some of the officers and trustees of WriteAngles, Inc.
Joan Axelrod-Contrada is the managing editor of WRITEANGLES JOURNAL and chair of the WriteAngles’ grants committee. A longtime correspondent for The Boston Globe, she is the author of over 15 books for children and young adults. She has also written and produced three murder-mystery dinner theater plays. Her articles about the craft and business of writing have appeared in Children’s Book Insider and The Writer. She holds an MFA in Writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts.
Ellen Meeropol is the author of three novels, KINSHIP OF CLOVER, ON HURRICANE ISLAND, and HOUSE ARREST. Recent essay publications include The Writer, Guernica, The Cleaver, Necessary Fiction, Fired Up! and The Writers Chronicle. Ellen has an MFA in fiction from the Stonecoast program at the University of Southern Maine. She is a founding member of Straw Dog Writers Guild and its current Board president.
Jean Marie Ruiz coordinates the conference planning committee. She holds an MFA from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. Her poetry has appeared in print in Jacaranda Review, West/Word, Rain City Review, and the anthology LOVE’S SHADOW: STORIES BY WOMEN (Crossing Press, 1993). Her short story Pilgrim’s Progress was published in the online journal MARY in 2004. She is currently working on a novel about an American woman adrift in Spain.
Jan Whitaker is the website editor for WriteAngles. She is the author of three books. SERVICE AND STYLE: HOW THE AMERICAN DEPARTMENT STORE FASHIONED THE MIDDLE CLASS and TEA AT THE BLUE LANTERN INN: A SOCIAL HISTORY OF THE TEA ROOM CRAZE IN AMERICA were published by St. Martin’s press. Her book on worldwide department store history, THE WORLD OF DEPARTMENT STORES, was published by Vendome Press in 2011 in the US, UK, and France and in Germany in 2013. She writes a blog on restaurants called Restaurant-ing through history.
WriteAngles Conference 