Staff List

Meet the People of Poets & Writers
 

 

ADMINISTRATION

Melissa Ford Gradel – EXECUTIVE Director

Melissa joined the Poets & Writers staff as managing director in January 2010; in 2021 she was appointed the organization’s executive director. Her previous roles include development director at Poets House from 2003 to 2006, where she helped to secure a secure a permanent home for the organization in Battery Park City, and consulting to help raise millions of dollars for a range of arts and cultural organizations, including Brooklyn Public Library, Brooklyn Children’s Museum, Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Prospect 1: New Orleans, and International Center of Photography. Early in her career, she assisted Poets & Writers in crafting grant proposals that secured funding to launch pw.org. Melissa holds a BFA from New York University.

TIA WILLIAMS – DIRECTOR OF FINANCE & ADMINISTRATION

Tia joined Poets & Writers in March of 2021. Her extensive experience in nonprofit finance includes roles with The Center for Reproductive Rights, Comprehensive Youth Development, Inc., Harlem United Community AIDS Center and Columbia University. She received her BS in Finance from Hampton University and her MBA from Baruch College. Tia is an avid tennis fan, and in her spare time volunteers with other nonprofits and participates in local races with the New York Road Runners.

Rachel Schuder – Director, Development & Marketing

Rachel joined Poets & Writers’ development and marketing team in 2011; in 2021 she became Director of Development & Marketing. Her previous experience in the nonprofit arts sector includes roles with the Creative Capital Foundation and the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. Rachel has a background in visual art and is inspired by makers and storytellers of all types. She holds a BA from Bowdoin College and an MFA in Combined Media from Hunter College, and has received artist fellowships from the Fine Arts Work Center, the Bronx Museum’s Artist in the Marketplace program, and Skowhegan. 

Bridget Irvine – Development & Marketing MANAGER

After interning with Poets & Writers in 2014, Bridget joined the staff in 2016. She received her BA from Harvard University, spending much of her time there cultivating the undergraduate publication Tuesday Magazine. Her nonfiction has appeared in Electric Literature, and her other work has appeared in Tuesday Magazine and various zines. Bridget is from New Jersey and loves amateur photography and challenging the notion of authenticity/the self.

sara rosado - development & marketing associate

Sara Rosado joined Poets & Writers in September 2022. She received her BA in Sociology and English Literature from Macaulay Honors College and an MLS from Queens College. She has experience working at a variety of non-profit organizations such as the Sugar Hill Children's Museum for Art and Storytelling, the Possibility Project, the Center for Alternative Sentencing and Employment Services, as well as her undergraduate college's literary and arts magazine, Obscura. She has served as a guest lecturer at Lehman College, Hunter College, and Iowa State University, speaking on topics such as intersectionality, cataloging and accessibility, and more. She is passionate about promoting social justice and community empowerment through creative expression, and enjoys spending her free time reading, writing poetry and fiction, and spending time in nature.

Jason Thomas – Staff Accountant

Jason joined the Poets & Writers staff in June 2019. He has more than years of experience in accounting and finance, including with non-profit organizations such as Planned Parenthood of New York City and Saint Patrick’s Cathedral. He has an undergraduate degree in accounting from American International College and a master’s degree in professional accountancy from Southern University and A&M College. In his free time, Jason is a photographer and enjoys capturing the human spirit through his camera lens.

D. Sulaitis – Administrative Coordinator

DS Sulaitis is the recipient of three New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowships, in both fiction and creative nonfiction, and a recipient of a fiction grant from the Elizabeth George Foundation.

Her short stories have appeared several times in the Boston Review, once as the winner of their fiction contest, in addition to other literary magazines. She is completing a memoir and a book of short stories as well as working on a novel. She received a second-place prize in the 2022 American Short(er) Fiction contest. Her creative nonfiction was published in a W.W. Norton Anthology. In her spare time she is involved with bully breed dog rescue and lives with four pit bulls.

 

EDITORIAL

Kevin Larimer – Editor in Chief 

Kevin has been with Poets & Writers since 1999; he became editor in chief in 2013. He is the coauthor of The Poets & Writers Complete Guide to Being a Writer: Everything You Need to Know About Craft, Inspiration, Agents, Editors, Publishing, and the Business of Building a Sustainable Writing Career (Avid Reader Press, 2020). He holds a degree in journalism and received his MFA in poetry from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, where he was the poetry editor of the Iowa Review. He has given presentations and appeared on a number of panels on publishing at events such as the Library of Congress National Book Festival, the Sozopol Fiction Seminars, the Anguilla Lit Fest, the Slice Literary Writer’s Conference, the Iceland Writers Retreat, the Kauai Writers Conference, the Kachemak Bay Writers’ Conference, Poets Forum, the Bronx Book Fair, and the Writer’s Hotel. His poems have appeared in Poetry InternationalFence, Pleiades, Verse, and a dozen other literary magazines. He has written book reviews for American Letters & Commentary, American Book Review, Chelsea, and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

MARVA SHI - PRODUCTION EDITOR

Marva joined Poets & Writers in November 2022. She received her BS in Media, Culture, and Communication from New York University, where she graduated magna cum laude. Before coming to Poets & Writers, Marva worked on several magazines and print publications, including Generasian, Pier To:, Antifragile, and Washington Square News. Beyond the world of print, Marva also has a background in digital video production, graphic design, and marketing. She is passionate about making the world a better place through the arts and spends her free time enjoying animated films, good food, and shared moments with friends.

Emma Komlos-Hrobsky – SENIOR editor

Emma joined Poets & Writers in 2019. Previously, she served as senior editor at Tin House magazine and associate editor at Tin House Books. She holds a BA from Wesleyan University and an MFA from The New School, where she later taught English and advised 12th Street, the Riggio Honors Program's literary magazine. Her writing has appeared in Conjunctions, BookForum, Tin House, and Guernica. With the support of the Elizabeth George Foundation, she is at work on a novel about quantum physics, family, and the Alps.

jen degregorio - associate editor

Jen joined Poets & Writers in April of 2022. She holds an MFA in creative writing from Hunter College (CUNY) and a PhD in English from Binghamton University (SUNY). At Binghamton, Jen was a graduate-student fellow in human rights and directed the Binghamton Poetry Project, a literary-service program that offers free community poetry workshops for adults and kids; she was also an editor for Harpur Palate literary magazine and codirected Writing by Degrees creative writing conference and the Literati Reading Series. A former full-time newspaper reporter in Baltimore and New Orleans, Jen has taught writing, literature, and arts-appreciation courses at colleges in New York and New Jersey. Her writing has appeared on Literary Hub, where she worked for the Book Marks editorial team for several years, and in Prairie Schooner, Spoon River Poetry Review, Third Coast, and Women’s Studies Quarterly (WSQ), among other publications. She has won scholarship and fellowship support from Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Kettle Pond Writers’ Conference, Hunter College, and Binghamton University, where she was a Marion Clayton Link fellow in creative writing.

INDIA LeNA GONZáLEZ  –  Associate editor

India served as the 2019-2020 Diana & Simon Raab Editorial Fellow before rejoining Poets & Writers in this new capacity in September 2021. She received her BA from Columbia University, where she graduated magna cum laude, and is a recent MFA graduate from NYU's Creative Writing program, where she taught undergraduate students and received the Writers in the Public Schools Fellowship. Before Poets & Writers, India worked as an Assistant Publicist at HarperCollins and later as an Agent Assistant at the Anne Edelstein Literary Agency. Her work is published in PANK, Pigeon Pages, American Chordata, and Glass: A Journal of Poetry, among others. A 2020 National Poetry Series finalist and 2021 BOA Editions A. Poulin, Jr. Poetry Prize semi-finalist, India is also a professionally trained dancer, choreographer, and actor. She currently lives in Harlem.

 

Jessica Kashiwabara – digital director

Jessica joined Poets & Writers in May 2014. She received her BA from the University of California in San Diego, studying Human Development and Literature Writing, and has lived in New York City since 2000. She has worked in online media for Spin, CNET, and the Child Mind Institute, a nonprofit for children's mental health. She was selected to participate in the JET Programme in 2007, teaching English in Japan. Jessica has trained in the martial art of Shorinji Kempo for many years and enjoys performing and writing music, photography, and comedy. Her writing has appeared in Black Renaissance Noire, Midwestern Gothic, PANK, and Tribes.

Francisco Márquez – Assistant Web Editor

Francisco Márquez joined Poets & Writers in August 2020. He earned a BA in English from Florida State University and an MFA in Poetry from New York University, where he was a Goldwater fellow. He has received additional support from the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, the Tin House Workshop, The Poetry Project, and the Fine Arts Work Center in Provinceton, Massachusetts, where he was a 2019-2020 poetry fellow.  His work can be found in The Brooklyn Rail, Narrative, The Yale Review, The Slowdown podcast, and The Best American Poetry series, among other publications. Born in Miami, and raised in Maracaibo, Venezuela, he lives in Brooklyn. 

 

ADVERTISING

Tim O'Sullivan – Associate Publisher

Tim joined Poets & Writers in 2008. He has published novel excerpts in A Public Space, one of which was re-published in the 2012 Pushcart Prize Anthology; another excerpt received special mention in the 2008 Pushcart Prize Anthology. He has been a Teaching-Writing Fellow at the Iowa Writers' Workshop, an Emerging Writer Fellow at the Center for Fiction, and a Residential Fellow at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts and the MacDowell Colony. He is at work on a novel.

Amy Feltman – assistant director of Advertising

Amy Feltman joined Poets & Writers’ staff in June 2014. She earned her BA from Vassar College and holds an MFA in Fiction from Columbia University. Her work has been published in The Believer logger, The Millions, The Rumpus, The Toast, Cosmonauts Avenue, and Slice Magazine, among others. Her short story, “Speculoos,” was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2016. Her debut novel, Willa & Hesper, was released by Grand Central Publishing in 2019 and was longlisted for a Jewish National Book Award. Her second novel, All the Things We Don’t Talk About, was published by Grand Central Publishing in 2022.

Jessica lipton – advertising ASSOCIATE

Jessica joined Poets & Writers in November 2021. She received her BA in Art History from Boston College. When not working, she is often tending to her plants, writing prose, or playing with her dog, Maeve.

 

PROGRAMS & PARTNERSHIPS

Thierry Kehou – Director of Programs & Partnerships

Thierry Kehou is a Cameroonian American and Brooklyn-based writer and literary translator from French, and a founder of Lampblack, a magazine and literary organization. He earned his BA from New York University’s Gallatin School and his MFA in Creative Writing from Rutgers University Newark. His writing has appeared in Departures Magazine, The Huron River Review, and elsewhere. His completed translation of Francis Bebey’s Three Little Shoeshiners has received support from the Breadloaf Translators’ Conference and was longlisted for the 2020 John Dryden Translation Competition. Currently, he is translating Jean d’Amérique’s debut novel Soleil à coudre for Other Press and is at work on a novel.

ricardo hernandez – assistant director of Programs & partnerships

Ricardo was the 2016-17 McCrindle Foundation Readings & Workshops Fellow, before becoming the Program Assistant in June 2017. He earned his BA from Baruch College and holds an MFA in Poetry from Rutgers-Newark. A recipient of fellowships from Lambda Literary, Poets House, and the Vermont Studio Center, and a semifinalist for the 2019 Vinyl 45 Chapbook Contest, Ricardo’s work has appeared in Muzzle Magazine, Witness Magazine, Hyperallergic, and The Offing, among others. Born in Mexico City and raised in Queens, he now lives in Brooklyn.

Jamie Asaye FitzGerald – Director, California Office and Readings & Workshops (West)

Jamie Asaye FitzGerald joined Poets & Writers in 2005. She is a Los Angeles-based hapa poet from Hawaii, who believes in the transformative power of writing and words in action. Prior to joining Poets & Writers, she worked in advertising and as an educator. She has an MFA in poetry fom San Diego State University and a BA in English/Creative Writing from the University of Southern California where she received an Academy of American Poets College Prize and the Edward Moses Poetry Prize.  Her poetry is published in The American Poetry Review, Works & Days, Mom Egg Review, and elsewhere, and has been included in anthologies such as Coiled Serpent: Poets Arising from the Cultural Quakes & Shifts in Los Angeles (Tia Chucha Press, 2016) and Wide Awake: Poets of Los Angeles & Beyond (Beyond Baroque/Pacific Coast Poetry Series, 2015).

jalen lisbon – Programs & Partnerships Assistant

Jalen joined Poets & Writers in October after completing his BA in English from Ithaca College. A lifelong reader and writer, he has served as a writing tutor and planned literary events such as author and book festivals. Devoted to literacy education, his work has been published in STEM to Story: Enthralling and Effective Lesson Plans for Grades 5-8. Some of Jalen's favorite moments are spent listening to music, taking walks, or doing anything that involves a lot of laughter.

 


INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND WEB DEVELOPMENT

Jason Chapman – Director, Information Technology and Web Development

Jason has worked in the IT industry for over twenty years, and joined Poets & Writers in 1997. His diverse experiences include mainframe operations for the Georgia Institute of Technology, application development for a military contractor, and Web development for a variety of businesses. He is also the author of the novel, The Heretic, an early success in the still-developing arena of electronic publishing.