Jason Goodwin is the bestselling author of The Janissary Tree—winner of the 2007 Edgar ® Award for Best Novel—and The Snake Stone, the first two books in his series of novels featuring Yashim. Goodwin studied Byzantine history at Cambridge and is the author of Lords of the... more

Robert Rotenberg is one of Toronto’s top lawyers, defending, as he likes to say, “everything from murder to shoplifting.” He lives in Toronto with his wife, a television producer at CBC News; their three children; and their little dog, Fudge. more

Leanne Shapton is an illustrator, writer, and publisher who was born in Toronto and now lives in New York. She is the art director of the New York Times op-ed page and cofounder of J&L Books, a nonprofit Publishing company specializing in new photography, art, and fiction.... more

William L. Iggiagruk Hensley was a founder of the Northwest Alaska Native Association and spent twenty years working for its successor, the Iñuit-owned NANA Regional Corporation. He also helped establish the Alaska Federation of Natives in 1966 and has served as its... more

Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot is the Emily Hargroves Fisher Professor of Education at Harvard and the chair of the board of the MacArthur Foundation. As a sociologist, she examines the culture of schools, the patterns and structures of classroom life, socialization within... more

Olivier Ameisen, MD, inaugurated the position of official physician to the prime minister of France. He came to the United States in 1983 to join the prestigious cardiology team at New York Hospital and Cornell University Medical Center, where he became an associate... more

Roy Blount Jr. is the author of twenty previous books, covering subjects from the Pittsburgh Steelers to Robert E. Lee to what dogs are thinking. He is a regular panelist on NPR’s Wait, Wait . . . Don’t Tell Me! and is a member of the American Heritage Dictionary Usage... more

In the six months that followed his leaving teaching and the Philadelphia area, Matthew Quick floated down the Peruvian Amazon and formed ‘The Bardbarians’ (a two-man literary circle), backpacked around Southern Africa, hiked to the bottom of a snowy Grand Canyon,... more

Jonathan Carroll's novel The Wooden Sea was named a New York Times Notable Book of 2001. He is the author of such acclaimed novels as White Apples, The Land of Laughs, The Marriage of Sticks, and Bones of the Moon. He lives in Vienna, Austria. more

MARIE BRENNER is Writer at Large for Vanity Fair. Her exposé of the tobacco industry, “The Man Who Knew Too Much,” was the basis for the 1999 movie The Insider. She is also the author of the bestselling House of Dreams: The Bingham Family of Louisville. more

Roxana Robinson is the author of three earlier novels and three short-story collections, as well as a biography of Georgia O’Keeffe. Four of these were named Notable Books of the Year by The New York Times. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Harper’s... more

Ishmael Beah came to the United States when he was seventeen and graduated from Oberlin College in 2004. He is a member of Human Rights Watch Children’s Division Advisory Committee and has spoken before the United Nations on several occasions. He lives in New York City. more

Ishmael Beah came to the United States when he was seventeen and graduated from Oberlin College in 2004. He is a member of Human Rights Watch Children’s Division Advisory Committee and has spoken before the United Nations on several occasions. He lives in New York City. more

JASON GOODWIN is the author of Lords of the Horizons: A History of the Ottoman Empire, among other award-winning nonfiction. The Janissary Tree, his first novel and the first in a series featuring Yashim, was published in May 2006 to international acclaim. more

Jason Goodwin’s previous books include Lords of the Horizons: A History of the Ottoman Empire and On Foot to the Golden Horn. He lives in Sussex, England, is married with four children, speaks French and German and once walked from Poland to Istanbul. more

Colin Harrison is the author of, most recently, The Havana Room (FSG, 2004). He lives in Brooklyn, New York. more

Colin Harrison is the author of, most recently, The Havana Room (FSG, 2004). He lives in Brooklyn, New York. more

Leanne Shapton is an art director, illustrator, artist, and publisher based in NewYork. She has contributed work to The New York Times, Harper’s, The New Yorker, GQ, Jane, Flaunt, and Seventeen, among others. She runs J&L Books with the photographer Jason Fulford. more

Cathleen Schine is the author of The Love Letter and Rameau's Niece, among other novels. She has contributed to The New Yorker, The New York Review of Books, The New York Times Magazine, and The New York Times Book Review. more

Susan Coll is the author of karlmarx.com and Rockville Pike. She lives outside of Washington, D.C., with her husband, the author and journalist Steve Coll, and their three children. more