Rachel Amberson

Local fan & tarot afficianado

Barry Bard 

Normally ebullient and enthusiastic, Barry Bard is silent about his accomplishments and contribution to fandom in Arizona and around the world. He brings us an overflowing freebee table and movie previews and much more. If (who are we kidding when) you stop by his dealer's table he always seems to have just what you are looking for. We hope he knows just how much he is appreciated by AZ fandom! 

Catherine Book

Catherine Book keeps active in local fan circles through book discussion groups and her excellent work as Charity Auction director for local conventions.

David R. Beaucage website

Writor, Editor & Publisher, David's book credits include 'The Shiloh Project'

Christine Beaucage website

Writer, Editor & Publisher whose works include the 'Taste and See' series.

Pat Broussard

Pat Broussard is an aspiring writer who has attended every single CopperCon with the exception of one year (because her daughter was getting married).

Christine Carmichael

Author (Twilight in the Western Isles, among others) and active member of SFWA.

Dave Duncan

Author of 36 Novels, including: "The Seventh Sword", "A Man of His Word", "A Handful of Men", "The Great Game", "Tales of the King's Blades", "Chronicales of the King's Blades"

Bruce Farr

Bruce Farr collects books, art, convention committee positions, tax knowledge, and whatever else is not nailed down. He has worked on over 100 conventions in the last 20 years, Chaired NASFiC, World Fantasy Con and others. He has edited SF fan magazines

Leslie Fish - Filk Guest of Honor website

I play 12-string guitar, 6-string guitar, some electric guitar, recorder and penny-whistle (not terribly well), autoharp, hand-drum, and I can fake it on electric bass. Keyboards? Hah! Just well enough to pick out a tune for transcribing. Plus my voice, of course. When I got my first guitar at 16 I'd already been into folk music, singing it anyway, for years; I spent about an hour a day playing/practicing with it, and would have done more if my parents hadn't yelled at me to quit making that godawful racket and do my homework. I think Mom was particularly pissed off because she'd tried for years to teach me piano (and Classical lyric-soprano singing -- even though my voice was obviously alto) because she wanted me to befome a proper Classic-music pianist/singer and maybe wind up at the Met -- and none of it took. Instead I was busy "wasting time with that awful cowboy music". Now that I'm successful enough to make my living at That Wretched Stuff, she never asks me anything about music. *Snicker* I use [a verse-long instrumental break] for dramatic purposes: to prepare the audience emotionally for the last (summarizing or punch-line) verse, or to heighten tension before the resolution. Naturally, the "break" can't be allowed to bore the audience, so I play my damndest then.

Joseph Formichella

Joseph Formichella is co-Director/Producer/Editor at Anomalous Entertainment, LLC for "Finding the Future: A Science Fiction Conversation", a feature-length documentary shot mostly at Chicon in 2000. In addition, Joseph Formichella has also written and produced the horror film "Whispers"

Alan Dean Foster - Guest of Honor website

Born in New York City in 1946, Foster was raised in Los Angeles. After receiving a Bachelor's Degree in Political Science and a Master of Fine Arts in Cinema from UCLA (1968, l969) he spent two years as a copywriter for a small Studio City, Calif. advertising and public relations firm. His writing career began when August Derleth bought a long Lovecraftian letter of Foster's in 1968 and much to Foster's surprise, published it as a short story in Derleth's bi-annual magazine The Arkham Collector. Sales of short fiction to other magazines followed. His first attempt at a novel, The Tar-Aiym Krang, was bought by Betty Ballantine and published by Ballantine Books in 1972. It incorporates a number of suggestions from famed SF editor John W. Campbell. Foster's work to date includes excursions into hard science-fiction, fantasy, horror, detective, western, historical, and contemporary fiction. He has also written numerous non-fiction articles on film, science, and scuba diving, as well as having produced the novel versions of many films, including such well-known productions as Star Wars, the first three Alien films, and Alien Nation. Other works include scripts for talking records, radio, computer games, and the story for the first Star Trek movie. In addition to publication in English, his work has appeared and won awards throughout the world. His novel Cyber Way won the Southwest Book Award for Fiction in 1990, the first work of science-fiction ever to do so.

Mark Greenawalt website

Mark Greenawalt is an award-winning artist who has evolved to painting on living canvases. From liquid latex swimsuits to airbrushed murals, Greenawalt blurs the boundaries between art and photography as an accomplished body painter. His final images are

Hugh Gregory

Noted lecturer on non-US space programs.

Bennie Grezlik

Currently seeking a publisher for his completed Search For Earth trilogy, Bennie Grezlik's credits include The Anthropic Cosmologist (short story-GateWay SF Magazine, 2002), The Wigglers ("More Stories That Won't Make Your Parents Hurl" anthology, Yard Dog Press).

Maryelizabeth Hart website

Bookstore owner, and co-author of the "Watchers Guides" for Buffy the Vampire Slayer.. As well as an avid collector of action figures.

K. Mark Hoover

"Joke Hell" sold to fantastic Stories, "James Van Pelt Interview" sold to Strange Horizons; "Richard Parks Interview" sold to Strange Horizons, "Les Johnson Interview" sold to Strange Horizons", "Slugball", fiction, sold to Strange Horizons, "Stargasso", poem, sold to Fantasitc Stories, "The Hour of the Tiger" and "Flight Wind" sold to Cyberkwoon, "Strange Charms" sold to New Mystery Magazine. Won Honorable Mention at L. Ron Hubbard's Writers of the future contest.

Paula Lary

Along with belly dance dancing and costuming, Paula Lary does stained glass, photography, and general costuming.

Jacqueline Lichtenberg website

With eighteen SF novels, fourteen SF short stories, and Star Trek Lives! plus over six years of the SF/F review column in The Monthly Aspectarian, Jacqueline Lichtenberg, the founder of Star Trek Welcommittee, is still Trekking on.

Todd Lockwood - Guest of Honor website

Our artist Guest of Honor, and well known fantasy artist, his contributions include those to Dungeons & Dragons and Magic: The Gathering; cover art for novelists such as R.A. Salvatore, and numerous awards & recognitions.

Jeff Mariotte website

Jeff Mariotte was born in Park Forest, Illinois. He moved away from there at the age of six, when his father, a civilian working for the Department of Defense, was transferred to Paris, France. Since then he's lived in Arlington and Reston, Virginia, Worms and Schriesheim, Germany, and San Jose and San Diego, California. He graduated from San Jose State University with a degree in Radio/TV/Film. He has worked delivering the Washington Post, in a comic book store, fast food, selling encyclopedias door-to-door, and as maintenance supervisor for a large regional shopping center. He was the manager of Hunter's Books, La Jolla when his first fiction was published. He has been VP of Marketing and Senior Editor for comic book publisher WildStorm Productions, Editor-in-Chief for IDW Publishing, and a freelance writer. He and his wife Maryelizabeth Hart and partner Terry Gilman are the owners of Mysterious Galaxy, an independent bookstore specializing in mystery, science fiction, fantasy, and horror. Jeff's current works include the newly released "Witch Season - Summer" , as well as stories for fan favorites as "Buffy", "Angel" and "Andromeda".

Don Markstein website

Donald D. Markstein has been absorbing knowledge about comics and animation for just about half a century now. Don makes his living as a writer and editor. In 1981, Don and his wife, GiGi Dane, founded Apatoons, a cooperative publication.

Ben Massoglia website

Part of the Massoglia book-selling clan, Ben has been part of Phoenix fandom from an early age. His current interests include collectible card games, computer games, RPG's, LARP's, and speculative fiction literature.

Alice Massoglia website

A 17 year veteran on the speculative fiction book selling front, Alice has also worked at staff or committee level for approximately a dozen regional or larger speculative fiction conventions, and about the same number of local speculative fiction conventions.

Marty Massoglia website

A fan and purveyor of fine speculative fiction books for the last 17 years, Marty can usually be found at the dealer's table. He is also well known for teaching regency, country, and ballroom dancing at local conventions.

Allison Mitchell

Allison Mitchell is a textile artist, and has experience in quilting, general sewing and doll making. You may have seen her dolls in the art shows-she makes the dragons. While she has no experience with the costumer's guild, she has made her own costumes for various events.

Dawn Mullan website

Though art is a focus, Dawn has many other unique skills and abilities from facilitating panel discussions to presenting lectures, web designing to desktop publishing, from acting in film to stage managing plays, writing articles to creating program books. The breadth of her abilities keeps broadening with every new endeavor she undertakes. Even with her busy schedule, Dawn finds time to give back to the community. Being a member of several non-profit organizations as well as supporting her local United Way with contributions of art work for the Silent Auction, Dawn still believes that volunteering her time is an important civic responsibility.

Vera Nazarian website

Vera Nazarian is arguably the only Armenian-Russian professional speculative fiction writer working in English today. Her life story is an unusual journey. She left the former Soviet Union at the height of the Cold War as a refugee at the age of eight, with her parents and nothing but a couple of suitcases, and arrived in the United States in 1976, a month before her 10th birthday, by way of Lebanon, Greece, and Italy. Writing came soon in Vera Nazarian's life - as soon as she figured out the English language, she started to write in it, wrote and dreamed all through elementary, junior high and high school, and sold her first short story at the age of 17 to the second volume of Marion Zimmer Bradley's popular DAW anthology series SWORD AND SORCERESS. Since then she has published numerous works of short fiction in anthologies and magazines such as the SWORD AND SORCERESS and DARKOVER anthology series edited by the late Marion Zimmer Bradley, bestselling author of the classic Arthurian novel THE MISTS OF AVALON (recently made into a TNT original mini-series starring Julianna Margulies and Anjelica Huston) who became her editor-mentor over the years, THE AGE OF REASON edited by Kurt Roth, OUTSIDE THE BOX edited by Lou Anders, BEYOND THE LAST STAR edited by Sherwood Smith, STRANGE PLEASURES #2 edited by Paul Barnett, MZBFM, Talebones, On-Spec, Visionair SF, Maelstrom SF, Colonies SF, and has seen her work translated into French, German, Spanish, Italian, Dutch, Czech, and Hungarian. She is an active member of Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) .

Bill Nichols

Bill Nicholls is a writer, programmer and consultant, sometimes all three at once. Bill started programming in 1961 with the original Fortran on an IBM 1620. After getting a BS degree in Physics, he was seduced by the computer side of the force and began work at Univac in 1964. After a long and twisted career in IT, he wants to share what he has learned and written. During his IT career, science in general and physics in particular remains a major interest. He is currently a contributing writer for Byte.com (Byte Magazine) on advanced software and technologies.

Adam Niswander website

Adam is the author of the Shaman Cycle novels originally published by Integra Press. The Charm appeared in 1993, The Serpent Slayers appeared in 1994, and The Hound Hunters.

Janeen O'Kerry website

Growing up in the military, I lived in many places -- California, Germany, Washington D.C., Texas, and Ohio. And like many writers, I've held a number of different jobs -- everything from computer programmer to horseback riding instructor.My writing career began in 1984 when I sold the first of over 100 non-fiction articles written for the national and regional horse magazines. A few years later, a friend and I decided to try our hand at novels. We wrote three and sold the third one, APRIL'S CHRISTMAS , to Avalon Books in 1994. My own first novel was LADY OF FIRE , a time-travel romance published by Leisure Books in 1996. I've always had a great interest in Ireland, history, horses and fantasy, and truly enjoy combining all these things in my novels. Janeen's Celtic Journey's series has been well received, and translated into other languages for European readers.

David Perrine

David Perrine is an entrepreneur who is planning to build a live-action role-playing theme park northeast of the Valley. He is also promoting a ballot initiative to establish a space program in Arizona.

Ray Poulsen

Life long fan of sci-fi including reading books and watching movies and tv shows. My current writing project is a scipt for A Princess of Mars to submit to Paramount Studios.

D.F. Sanders

Poetry, both genre and mainstream, published in a number of books and periodicals, plus SF/F music (filk) with a number of collaborators, some of which has been recorded by Firebird Arts & Music and other producers (includes such songs as "Call the Navigator," "The Border Patrol," "The Good Ship Manatee", "Hawk Brother","Web of Light", and others)

Ken St. Andre website

Ken St. Andre - is a well-known Phoenix fan and writer of games and game-related short stories who helped organize the first LepreCon 29 years ago and has made at least a token appearance every year since. He may be most well-known for his love of Tunnels & Trolls, as well as Wasteland and other adventure games.

Michael A. Stackpole website

Michael Stackpole has brought the fans of Star Wars such adventures as :Rogue Squadron; I, Jedi; The Dark Glory War, Ghost War, Fortress Draconis, When Dragons Rage, The Grand Crusade, Once a Hero, Talion: Revenant.

David Lee Summers website

David Lee Summers has brought us such items as:"The Slayers" a dragon story in the 2001 issue of "Realms of Fantasy"; "The Pirates of Sufiro" and "Children of the Old Stars" small press science fiction novels. I am also the editor of "Hadrosaur Tales" a semi-pro science fiction and fantasy magazine. He is currently finishing a retelling of Grimm's fairytales.

Paul Tanton website

Paul Donald Peter Tanton keeps active in local fan circles by assisting in various capacities for local conventions, participating in local gaming, and attending local movie premieres. He is a member of Tricuspa Figment Live Action Systems, Phoenix Fan Force, Phoenix Chuy's Fan Club, and the Arizona Shadowfist Proving Ground League.

Evo Terra website

Along with co-host Michael R. Mennenga , Evo hosts "The Dragon Page - Literary Concepts in Fantasy and Science Fiction", a weekly syndicated radio talk show which broadcasts worldwide on Book Crazy Radio (www.bookcrazy.net) and in syndication. In Phoenix, it is heard weekly on KFYI radio Sundays at 6pm.

Kit Townsend

Kit Townsend is a 1987 graduate of Clarion West Writer's Workshop. She was co-founder of a writer's group for semi-professional writers and a founding member of eWorld's Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror Forum.

Christopher Turco

Christopher Turco was born on a cold day when bellbottom pants were still in fashion, and he's never forgiven himself for it. He has pursued a variety of artistic interests but has always been drawn most powerfully to writing.

Michelle M. Welch website

Michelle M. Welch offers CopperCon attendees a useful viewpoint on the experience of a new writer. Her first novel is to be published in October 2003. The project grew out of almost fifteen years of work, and it is the fifth novel manuscript she wrote.

Catherine Wells - Guest of Honor website

Catherine is the author of several novels, including her 1997 Mother Grimm which was a finalist for the Philip K. Dick Award. She enjoys filking and is also a playwright with numerous production credits. She has also done extensive research on the real Macbeth, and the Celtic culture of 11th century Scotland.

John Wheeler website

John is a newly practicing face and body painter whose credits include Tempe Snow Day 2001, The Phoenix Children's Hospital Grand Opening Celebration (April 2002), Creation Con, Gallifrey One, the Harris Elementary School Carnival, and LepreCon and CopperCon.

Lee Whiteside website

Lee Whiteside is our local SFTV guru with the long running SF Tube Talk column in ConNotations, The Magrathea/SFTV Web Page (www.sftv.org), and associated mailing lists. Besides being Chairperson of CopperCon 23, Lee is a software Engineer/Lan Administrat

Randall Whitlock website

Randall Whitlock is a registered geologist with a background in meteorites, Arizona geology, and environmental assessments. He also operates "MoiRandall's," a custom costume and desktop clothing pattern publishing business (including the "Randwulf's" line).

David Williams website

David A. Williams, Ph.D., is currently serving as a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the Department of Geological Sciences at Arizona State University, Tempe. He has served as a Visiting Assistant Professor at ASU, teaching Geology 101.

Mike Willmoth

Mike is an integral part of the staff for most valley conventions. He enjoys helping organize and run conventions. He will be chairing the World Horror 2004 and World Fantasy 2004 Conventions. His hobbies include amateur astronomy and ham radio operations.

C.F. Yankovich website

Catherine Yankovich has had her art published in Analog, MZB Magazine, and Ad Astra. She has assorted short stories published in Connotations and The Martian Wave and multiple articles to be published in America's Flyways.

Veronica Ann Zabala website

Veronica Ann Zabala, a student at ASU's Planetary Geology Department, is a recipient of the NASA Space Grant. She is involved with all aspects of investigation of aeolian dynamics of the planet Mars and how these affect the surface structure.