posts that contain mini-bios of our writers
Kelli Samson works as a high school English teacher, a blogger and a freelance writer based in Thurston County. She is a mother, friend, teacher, baker, writer, reader, film-watcher, and photographer. Contact any member of the OLY ARTS writing staff at editorial@olyarts.com.
Yvonne Joyce is a quilter, artist and writer recently retired to the Olympia area after many years in southern California, where she covered arts and culture for SB, Arts & Arts Southern CA, Arts Scene, the Orange County Register and other publications. Her work can be seen at the Olympia Arts Walk in 2018. Contact …
Karen Lunde has been writing professionally since the age of 15 and has spent more than two decades shaping stories as a writer and editor for companies like Macmillan Publishers and Grammarly. When she’s not writing, she’s often behind a piano or singing with local Olympia groups. She writes a weekly Substack newsletter, Chanterelle Story …
Kristopher Stewart is a freelance writer and college student in Washington state. After graduating from Timberline High School with three years of journalism experience on the staff of The Blazer, Timberline’s award-winning news magazine, he earned his associate’s degree from South Puget Sound Community College and is attending Western Washington University, where he’s studying computer …
Tom Simpson is a long-time writer for The West-Seattle Herald and a recent transplant to the Olympia region. He hails originally from Bellingham, Washington, where he also worked on the staff of The Bellingham Herald. Contact any member of the OLY ARTS writing staff at editorial@olyarts.com.
Jonah Barrett is a recent graduate of The Evergreen State College. He was senior coordinator and editor of TESC literary journal Vanishing Point. Jonah lives in Olympia: he is from Tenino Washington.
Adam McKinney has been writing professionally since 2009, doing his part to document the ever-changing music and arts scene in the South Sound. He has co-produced the Squeak and Squawk Music Festival, written a terrible dating column, and contributed a chapter for the book Showtime in Tacoma. When he’s not writing about pop culture, he …
Noah Shachar is working on his B.S. in Physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara, currently taking a leave of absence and working as a local barista. He writes poetry and fiction with whatever free-time he has and has finagled his work into OLY ARTS magazine, The Catalyst magazine and the Santa Barbara Independent newspaper. Noah …
Christian Carvajal is an author, director, actor, writer and columnist in northwestern Washington state and a communications consultant for Washington DSHS. He was OLY ARTS‘ founding, managing editor for two years and editor emeritus for two years after that. He has been a regular, freelance contributor to the publication. Carvajal is also a novelist, whose …
Ned Hayes is the author of three novels and a freelance journalist. His work appeared in The Seattle Weekly, The Bellingham Herald, The Olympian, The Pasadena Weekly, Oregon ArtsWatch and many other publications. In recent years, he has been a core product leader at Adobe Systems, Xerox PARC, Microsoft, and Intel. Ned helped to launch OLY …