Meet the Staff
|
Alexciana Castaneda - Managing Editor & Prose Editor: Alexciana is a senior at Lewis University, majoring in Public Policy with a minor in Sociology. She is also a Mentor and Multilingual Specialist in the university's Writing Center. At Lewis, Alexciana has experience as a Community Engaged Learning Facilitator and as the Secretary for Pi Sigma Alpha. She is excited to be returning to Jet Fuel Review and continuing to help others find their voices in publishing. Alexciana has presented three times at Celebration of Scholarship, with her most recent work, “A Holistic Approach to Harm Reduction: The Move Towards Syringe Service Programs in South Carolina" presented in Spring 2022. Some of her favorite writers include bell hooks, Carla Shedd, and Susan Wendell. After graduation, Alexciana plans to pursue her Master of Public Health degree with a focus in Community Health Promotion. Her co-authored work has appeared in the Journal on Policy and Complex Systems.
|
|
Selena Tomas - Asst. Managing Editor & Poetry Editor: Selena is a Senior at Lewis University majoring in English. She has a concentration in Literature and Language, as well as General Writing. Selena is a writing tutor at the Lewis University Writing Center, as well as the President of Sigma Tau Delta. She plans to pursue a Ph.D. in hopes of becoming an English professor. Outside Lewis, Selena enjoys reading, writing, and spending time with her baby brother. Some authors that she recommends are Kate Chopin and Rupi Kaur.
|
|
Haley Leon - Art/Design Editor, Social Media Editor and Prose Editor: Haley is a Senior at Lewis University majoring in Aviation Administration, with a minor in Dispatch and a Technical Writing Non-degree Certificate. While her main goal is to become a future pilot, she wants to pursue a writing career when she is not soaring in the clouds. Haley enjoys writing short stories, listening to music from other cultures, exploring new cultures, and learning new languages. She hopes to use her newfound knowledge in her future works and in her career as she plans to travel the world. Some of her favorite writers include Mindy McGinnis, Langston Hughes, and Victoria Aveyard.
|
Lauren Lotarski – Poetry Editor, Layout Editor and Blogger: Lauren is a Junior at Lewis University majoring in Psychology and English with a concentration in Literature and Language. She is also employed at the university library. In her free time, she likes to read, draw, knit, and consuming general popular media like movies, TV shows, and video games. Some of her favorite authors are Leigh Bardugo, Charles Dickens, and Neil Gaiman. She hopes to improve upon her writing and knowledge of literature during her time at Lewis and applying it to her future endeavors.
|
|
|
Samuel McFerron - Blog Editor, Prose Editor & Poetry Editor: Samuel is a Junior at Lewis University. They are double majoring in English and Philosophy with a concentration in Literature. They aspire to become a professor of Ethics and spend most of their free time reading and writing. They hope to improve upon their writing skills as well as their literary analysis skills during their time here at Lewis and are seeking publication within this time frame. Some authors they recommend are David Foster Wallace, Milan Kundera, Fyodor Dostoevsky, and Emma Goldman.
|
|
Jovaughn Williams- Prose Editor: Jovaughn Williams is a Junior transfer student from College of Dupage. He’s majoring in English within the Writing concentration with a minor in Psychology. If he’s not getting his hands dirty in a sport, he likes to spend his free time writing stories, making videos, and hanging out with his friends. His major goal is to bring his writing skills to the next level, eventually becoming a novelist so he can spread his creative novel ideas to everyone around him. His favorite authors included the likes of Pierce Brown, James Dasher, and Cherie Dimaline.
|
|
Mary Egan - Founder: Mary founded the Jet Fuel Review during her senior year at Lewis University. Since graduating, she has ventured into the publishing world. Mary currently works at Goodheart-Willcox Publisher, where she is an Associate Editor in the Health and Health Sciences department. On a typical day, Mary spends at least six hours fiddling with and correcting other people's words, and that's the way she likes it. She still helps to maintain and edit the Jet Fuel Review's blog. This is Mary's sixth year with the Jet Fuel Review and she is proud of the team managing the journal now. When she's not at work, Mary enjoys whittling down the numbers of unread books on her shelves, participating in National Novel Writing Month, watching Gilmore Girls over and over, and enjoying the time-suck that is the internet.
Faculty Advisor
|
Simone Muench - Chief Faculty Editor & Advisor: Simone Muench is the author of six full-length books including Lampblack & Ash (Winner of the Kathryn A. Morton Prize; Sarabande, 2005), Orange Crush (Sarabande, 2010), Wolf Centos (Sarabande, 2014), and Suture, a collaborative book of sonnets written with Dean Rader, (Black Lawrence Press, 2017). Her chapbook Trace received the Black River Award (Black Lawrence Press, 2014). Some of her honors include a 2013 NEA fellowship, two Illinois Arts Council fellowships, the Marianne Moore Prize for Poetry, and residency fellowships to Yaddo, Artsmith, and Vermont Studio Center, where she also served as a Visiting Writer in 2016. In 2014, she was awarded the Meier Foundation for the Arts Achievement Award, which recognizes artists for innovation, achievements and community contributions. She received her Ph.D from the University of Illinois and is Professor of English at Lewis University where she teaches creative writing and film studies. Currently, she serves as chief faculty advisor for Jet Fuel Review, as a poetry editor for Tupelo Quarterly, as the poetry editor for JackLeg Press, and as the founder and host of the HB Sunday Reading Series. A vegetarian and life-long horror film fan, you can find her at www.simonemuench.com
|
|
Carrie McGath - Former Faculty Editor & Advisor: Carrie McGath is the author of a full-length poetry collection, Small Murders, as well as several handmade, limited-edition poetry chapbooks including Dollface, So Sorry to See You Go, Ward Eighty-One, Ohio Lonely, and The Chase. She is currently at work on her second full-length poetry collection, The Luck of Anhedonia. Her poems have appeared in The Tahoma Literary Review, The Chariton Review, The Hiram Poetry Review, Barrow Street, and others and she has worked as an art critic in the city of Chicago since 2009. Her art criticism has appeared in Brut Force, Chicagoist, Newcity, and Third Coast Review and she is the Art Editor for Lovers Eye Press. Carrie is listed on VIDA’ s ‘anti-list’ of Under-Acknowledged Women Writers. Carrie received her PhD from the University of Illinois at Chicago where she teaches composition and creative writing. Before working toward her doctorate, Carrie received her Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing (poetry) from Western Michigan University before moving to Chicago to earn a Masters in New Arts Journalism and Art History from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Carrie lives in the Logan Square neighborhood of Chicago with her sassy tuxedo cat, Sophie.
|
|
Consultants
|
Jackie K. White - Reader & Consultant: Jackie K. White is an Associate Professor at Lewis where she regularly teaches Introduction to Poetry; Early U.S. Literature; Latino, Latin American, Native American Literature; and Teaching Young Adult Lit. She has a Ph.D. in English from the University of Illinois at Chicago where she specialized in Creative Writing (Poetry) with concentrations in Hemispheric-American Studies and Women’s Studies. A former editor of the literary journal RHINO for nine years, Dr. White also has published numerous poems and translations in such journals as ACM, Bayou, Fifth Wednesday, Spoon River Poetry Review, Third Coast, and online at seven bridges, shadowbox, and prosepoem. com. Her first chapbook, Bestiary Charming won the 2007 Anabiosis Award and her second chapbook, Petal-Tearing & Variations, was published by Finishing Line Press in 2008. A third chapbook of poems, Come Clearing, was published by Dancing Girl Press in March, 2012. Dr. White is also the co-translator of Cesar Miguel Rondon’s History of Salsa and is currently working on a translation of Sherezada Vicioso’s Algo que decir: Essays on Feminist Caribbean Literature.
|
Patricia Damocles - Reader & Consultant: Patricia Damocles is a Filipinx American writer based in the Chicago suburbs. She graduated from Lewis University with a B.A. in English Language & Literature/Creative Writing and is currently an Associate SEO Specialist at Dealer Inspire. She is a 2019 Wolny Writing Residency fellow, a member of Sigma Tau Delta, a consultant for Jet Fuel Review, and a poetry reader for Memorious. Her work has been published in Poet Lore, Lewis Voices, Jet Fuel Review, and elsewhere. In her free time, she enjoys reading poetry and memoirs, watching documentaries, weightlifting, spending time with family, and lounging around with her two cats, Misty and Maxxie.
|
Miguel Soto - Reader & Consultant: Miguel graduated with a Bachelor’s of Arts in English Literature and Language from Lewis University. He is a Wolny Writing Residency fellow. He is also the Founder of Not Another Lit Mag and Poetry Reader for Split Lip Magazine. His writings can be found in [PANK} Magazine, Kissing Dynamite Poetry, 30 N, The Ekphrastic Review, Rogue Agent, and elsewhere. Check out his book reviews published under Jet Fuel Review for a sense of what he loves to read. You can find him at www.miguelasoto.com
|
|
Kasia Wolny - Consultant: Kasia graduated from Lewis University with a B.A. in English, Literature and Language Concentration, and a creative writing minor. Kasia loves to read literature from around the world and across genres; some of her favorites are Toni Morrison, Khaled Hosseini, Wojciech Kuczok, Jhumpa Lahiri, and Diana Gabaldon. In her writing, she likes to focus on short story and essay composition, and on Polish-English translation. Kasia is a mom of two teenagers who, being bilingual, regularly poke fun at her for mispronouncing English words. In her free time, she likes to hike, cook, tend to her garden, visit art museums, and drink tea with friends. Kasia is the recipient of a 2019 Abraham Lincoln Civic Engagement Award, thus becoming a Student Laureate of The Lincoln Academy of Illinois. She's currently getting her graduate degree in English at UIC-Chicago and is the founder of the Wolny Writing Residency.
|
|
|
Zakiya Cowan - Consultant: Zakiya Cowan graduated from Lewis University with her B.A. in English & Spanish Language and Culture. She is a former editor for Jet Fuel Review, a 2019 Wolny Writing Residency fellow, and a 2020 Brooklyn Poets Fellowship recipient. Her work is published or forthcoming in Hobart, Split Lip Magazine, Windows Fine Arts Magazine, Spoon River Poetry Review, and You Flower/You Feast: A Harry Styles Anthology. Some of her favorite writers include Toni Morrison, Roxane Gay, Eve Ewing, and Safia Elhillo. In her free time, she enjoys listening to crime podcasts, writing, and discovering new bookstores and restaurants to visit in her hometown of Chicago. She is a reader for Memorious, an intern for Sundress Publications, and the interview editor for the new BIWOC run Honey Lit.
|
Mateusz Czubiński - Reader & Consultant: Mateusz is a senior at Lewis University, majoring in English with a concentration in Writing with a minor in History. He is an aspiring technical writer, with experience working as a blog writer and Writing Center tutor. In his free time, he enjoys spending time with friends and family, as well as traveling at any given opportunity. If he isn’t with friends and family, he is most likely binging any of his favorite shows - Psych, Scrubs, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, and New Girl.
|
Cassidy Fontaine-Warunek - Reader & Consultant: Cassidy graduated from Lewis University in the Spring of 2022, majoring in English with a concentration in Writing, as well as minoring in Computer Science. Outside of Lewis, Cassidy participates in writing groups with the Community Writing Project. In her free time, she enjoys cooking, working out, reading, and writing. Some of her favorite authors are: Gillian Flynn, Terry Tempest Williams, and Michelle Alexander. Her work has appeared in Windows Magazine.
|
In Memoriam: JFR Editor Steven T. Seum (July 19, 1978 - December 29, 2017)
Visit here for the Tribute Page
Graduate
Dedicated to Steven Seum
If i could make time stop
I'd freeze the moment before you graduated.
Crystal figures in a curio-cabinet metronome
close to the edge, so i fear they may topple.
I can't catch them, because i run in slow
motion and these soles have no friction.
I slow down time.
I can't stop the confetti
before it ashes in your eye.
But i can watch it, in slower
and slower
and slower motion.
by Rae Powell
Dedicated to Steven Seum
If i could make time stop
I'd freeze the moment before you graduated.
Crystal figures in a curio-cabinet metronome
close to the edge, so i fear they may topple.
I can't catch them, because i run in slow
motion and these soles have no friction.
I slow down time.
I can't stop the confetti
before it ashes in your eye.
But i can watch it, in slower
and slower
and slower motion.
by Rae Powell
In Memoriam: JFR Editor Lucas Boelter (Sept 23, 1990-Sept 24, 2015)
Visit here for the Tribute Page
|
back of my van
the back of my van and the smoke is ghosts of white, ephemeral flowers that puff and sink and we're all here singing Sunday Morning Coming Down and Lenny with the nose that holds a white earring shaped into the word BANG!, exclamation mark and all, he says he’s joining the navy after the trip only if they sing In The Navy when on the boat and his pops used to beat the shit out of him and his sister and collie too and he once told me I could look into my daddy's eyes and see two ghosts fightin' each other and the ghost wit' the red back always winnin' but it’s all right now because he’s with Margaret now and with his friends and we're in the back of our van smoking and singing Sunday Morning Coming Down by Lucas Boelter |
Previous Editors
Bianca Apato, Ryan Arciero, Lauren Barnes, Liz Baudler, Jordan Benes, Brittany Bishop, Katelyn Bittke, Joseph Block, Lucas Boelter, Madeline Brzeczek, Gianna Capperino, Alecea Cardillo, Jillian Carlberg, Melissa Carrington, Mary Carroll, Ashley Castillo, Kayla Chambers, Angela Ciarlette, Caitlin Connelly, Melissa Cortez, Michael Cotter, Zakiya Cowan, Brittany Crosse, Amber Curl, Mateusz Czubinski, Sean Darke, Patricia Damocles, Dominique Dusek, Mike Egan, Henrietta Eghan, Payton Emond, Katie Esposito, Daniel Fiorio, Tim Fitzpatrick, Cassidy Fontaine-Warunek, Sarah Ford, Emilio Franchini, Sam Gennett, Mandy Gieseler, Miguel Gonzalez, Audrey Heiberger, Andrea Holm, Kammeran Hughes, Mark Jacobs Sanders, Jake Johnson, Jess Jordan, Jeff Jurinek, Jakob Kagay, Stephanie Karas, Zachary Klozik, Joshua Kostecka, Kari Krajniak, Monika Kois, Kyle Kotas, Lydia Kozlowski, Michael Lane, Emily Lif, Stephanie Lipinski, Jason Ludtke, Kelly Lyons, Mike Malan, Theresa Marten, Nicole Martinez Harn, Salvador Martinez, Grant Mazan, Ashley McCann, Deirdre McCormick, Symone McCoy, China McDonald, Tina McKee, Zachary Meredith, Samantha Moffett, Gabby Muir, Dina Nashed, Jacqueline Nelson, Julie Nettles, Caeley O'Connor, Doug Overbeck, Stephen Papesh, Sabrina Parr, Chris J. Patiño, Kyle Paup, Brandon Peck, Madelyn Pedersen, Chris Pelech, Tonya Peterson, Lauren Pirc, Carrera ‘Rae’ Powell, Caitlyn Quinlan, Olivia Radakovich, Stephanie Raga, Nicole Reidy, Haley Renison, , Andrea Yvette Rodriguez, Donatas Ruzys, Samantha Rydberg, Bree Scott, Christine Sellin, Steven Seum, Lucas Sifuentes, Noah Slowik, Miguel Soto, Michelle Staje, Ashley Stajura, Rachel Steele, Linda K. Strahl, Reno Stramaglia, Quinn Stratton, Eryn Stochelski, Roslyn Summerville, Sylvia Szewczyk, Keanu Taylor, Armon Thurmond, Kasia Wolny, Victoria Vega, Ashley Zizich