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Pamela Kristan is an author, teacher, and consultant, and has helped thousands of individuals and organizations find practical, creative strategies to improve their lives. Since the late 80’s, Pam has run a successful business, authored books, moderated local speak-outs for National Take Back Your Time Day, and given hundreds of talks, workshops, retreats, and consultations around the world.

When not brewing beer, Kristen practices advocacy, grass roots organizing and communications about national forest management and laws as the Director of Conservation Strategies for the [Appalachian Mountain Club](http://www.outdoors.org/conservation/wherewework/southernnewengland/ ""). Follow Kristen on Twitter: [@BeerLady2](https://twitter.com/beerlady2 "") (Photo by [Slumbrew](http://www.slumbrew.com/Blog/2014/08/20/Beer\_Festival\_Survival\_Strategies ""))

Will homebrewed his first beer twenty years ago and has subsequently enjoyed a long career at CBC. In addition to his authentic interpretations of traditional beers, he crafts unique, adventuresome beers – some of which reference ancient brews of the world and others which break new ground in the art of brewing.

Alexandra Kleeman has written for publications including the Paris Review, Zoetrope, Guernica, Tin House, and n+1. She received her MFA in fiction from Columbia University and has received grants and scholarships from the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and the Santa Fe Art Institute. She is currently completing a PhD in Rhetoric at UC Berkeley. She lives in New York City. Book: [You Too Can Have a Body Like Mine](http://www.harpercollins.com/9780062388674/you-too-can-have-a-body-like-mine "")

Rivera Sun was raised on an organic farm on the northern border of Maine in a family boasting two sets of twins, of which she is one. She grew up, learned to dance, discovered California and learned numerous other skills, from storytelling to rock climbing. Now she cultivates an acre of vegetables to share with her community, writes novels and bakes bread. Sun also manages social media for activism groups, and organizes nonviolent actions for change. Follow Rivera Sun on Twitter: [@RiveraSunAuthor](https://twitter.com/RiveraSunAuthor "")

**Jane McGonigal**, Ph.D, is a senior researcher at the Institute for the Future and the author of \_The New York Times\_ bestseller \_Reality Is Broken: Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change the World.\_ Her work has been featured in The Economist, Wired and on MTV, CNN, and NPR. She has been called one of the top ten innovators to watch (BusinessWeek), one of the one hundred most creative people in business (Fast Company), and one of the fifty most important people in the gaming industry (Game Developers Magazine). Her [TED talks on games](https://www.ted.com/talks/jane\_mcgonigal\_gaming\_can\_make\_a\_better\_world?language=en "Ted Talk") have been viewed more than ten million times.

Jim Vrabel is a former newspaper reporter and municipal official, a longtime community activist, and a Boston historian. He was a founder of the Back of the Hill Community Development Corporation on Mission Hill and of the Academy of the Pacific Rim Charter School in Hyde Park, and he served as assistant director of the Mayor's Office of Neighborhood Services, executive assistant to the Boston School Committee, and senior research associate and editor at the Boston Redevelopment Authority.

**Carol Moseley Braun** is an American politician and lawyer who represented Illinois in the United States Senate from 1993 to 1999. She was the first and to date only female African-American Senator, the first African-American U.S. Senator for the Democratic Party, the first woman to defeat an incumbent U.S. Senator in an election, and the first and to date only female Senator from Illinois. She founded [Ambassador Organics](http://www.ambassadororganics.com/company\_ambassador.php "") in Chicago in 2005.

Molly is a professor in the History Department at Christopher Newport University, teaching courses on Early American History, Comparative Slavery, Caribbean History and Culture, and Comparative Revolutions of the Atlantic World. As well, she teaches aspiring secondary social studies teachers in CNU's Master of Arts in Teaching program. When not in the archives or reading colonial newspapers, she can be found on a sailboat or anywhere near the water.

Scot Osterweil is the Creative Director of the Education Arcade and a research director in the MIT Comparative Media Studies/Writing Program. He is the creator of the acclaimed Zoombinis series of math and logic games, and leads a number of projects in the Education Arcade, including the MIT/Smithsonian curated game, Vanished (environmental science), Labyrinth (math), Kids Survey Network (data and statistics), Caduceus (medical science), iCue (history and civics) and the Hewlett Foundation’s Open Language Learning Initiative (ESL). He is a founding member of the Learning Games Network.

Stephen King is the author of more than fifty books, all of them worldwide bestsellers. His novel 11/22/63 was named a top ten book of 2011 by The New York Times Book Review and won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Mystery/Thriller as well as the Best Hardcover Book Award from the International Thriller Writers Association. He is the recipient of the 2003 National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. He lives in Bangor, Maine, with his wife, novelist Tabitha King.

Lee Child was born in 1954 in Coventry, England, but spent his formative years in the nearby city of Birmingham. By coincidence he won a scholarship to the same high school that JRR Tolkien had attended. He went to law school in Sheffield, England, and after part-time work in the theater he joined Granada Television in Manchester for what turned out to be an eighteen-year career as a presentation director during British TV’s “golden age.” During his tenure his company made Brideshead Revisited, The Jewel in the Crown, Prime Suspect, and Cracker. But he was fired in 1995 at the age of 40 as a result of corporate restructuring. Always a voracious reader, he decided to see an opportunity where others might have seen a crisis and bought six dollars’ worth of paper and pencils and sat down to write a book, Killing Floor, the first in the Jack Reacher series. Killing Floor was an immediate success and launched the series which has grown in sales and impact with every new installment.