Ross Raisin is the author of the new novel "Out Backward" (Harper Perennial).
Joshua Ferris called the debut "utterly frightening and electrifying at once," and Stewart O'Nan described it as "equally twisted and brilliant -- a lovely, upsetting book."
He received his MFA from Goldsmiths College in London, where he resides.
Joshua Furst is the author of the novel "The Sabotage Cafe," new in paperback from Vintage, and a story collection, "Short People" (Knopf).
Writing about "The Sabotage Cafe," the New York Times Book Review noted that "Furst is an impressively sharp, compassionate and morally scrupulous anatomist of human relationships." It was a Chicago Tribune Favorite Book of the Year, and a Rocky Mountain News Top-10 Debut Novel.
And the Miami Herald praised "Short People" as "a near-magical collection." The Washington Post called it "sharp, funny and generous-minded."
Furst is also a playwright and the winner of a James Michener Fellowship and the Chicago Tribune's Nelson Algren award for short fiction.
He lives in New York City and teaches at the Pratt Institute.
Visit him online at www.sabotagecafe.com.
Porter Shreve is the author of the new novel "When the White House Was Ours" (Mariner/Houghton Mifflin).
Jim Lehrer calls it "a tale of sheer delight, beautifully told in perfect pitch," and Publishers Weekly writes, "Shreve's third novel skillfully interweaves the story of teenager Daniel Truitt with that of the United States at a crossroads ... The political backdrop is perfectly played, as is the bittersweet nostalgia that makes the book and its freewheeling gang irresistible."
Shreve's other books include the 2005 novel "Drives Like a Dream," a Chicago Tribune Book of the Year, and the 2000 novel "The Obituary Writer," a New York Times Notable Book.
Visit him online at www.portershreve.com.
Simon Rich is the author of the new collection "Free-Range Chickens" and "Ant Farm: And Other Desperate Situations."
The New York Times called "Ant Farm" "savagely funny," and Time Out New York raved that it "is what all humor books should be: full of brief, high-concept musings that you wish you'd thought of yourself."
His essays have also appeared in the New Yorker.
Rich graduated from Harvard University, where he was president of the Harvard Lampoon.
He writes for "Saturday Night Live" and lives in New York.
Allison Amend is the author of the collection "Things That Pass For Love," which will be published in October.
Her stories have appeared in the Atlantic, One Story, Black Warrior Review, StoryQuarterly and many other magazines and journals.
A graduate of the Iowa Writers Workshop, she lives in New York City.
Visit her online at www.allisonamend.com.