Meet the 2027 Fault Zone Team
Carol Ann Lapeyrouse
With a vision for editing Fault Zone: Shake, Rattle, and Roll, our Editor-in-Chief brings a blend of big-picture thinking and hands-on experience. She sets the tone for everything we do.
Editor-in-Chief
Sam Kauffman
Sam Kauffman has spent over twenty years writing in various literary genres, teaching junior high, leading workshops across the US, and presenting at the Literary Stage, CWC, and the San Mateo Library. Sam’s poems have appeared in assorted award-winning anthologies.
Fiction Editor
Ashley Rajendragon
Ashley is a writer who has been masquerading as a mechanical engineer for the past decade. She is excited to shake, rattle, and roll with you for the next two years.
Creative Nonfiction Editor
Kate Adams
Kate Adams received her first story at the age of twelve, filling the pages of a very surprised notebook. She has maintained a daily writing practice for many years and sings the praises of sonnets, ballads, and other metrical forms.
Poetry Editor
Connie Chang
Tech Manager and Contracts Manager
Connie used to work in tech, but now she writes memoir, personal essays, and recipes. She collects cookbooks, so you’ll find her in the kitchen when she isn’t working on her next startup idea.
Savitha Rao
A marketing communications professional and entrepreneur, Savitha is a published author on sustainable living. She is currently researching diaspora and migration from the Indian sub continent from 1830 to 1930.
Publicity Manager
Doug Baird
Cover Designer
Doug Baird is an event producer, stage manager, and graphic designer in San Francisco, where his company, Doug Baird Productions, has managed events for nonprofit, corporate, and theatrical projects for over 30 years. Doug has designed print materials for book covers, show programs, and promotion while being published in three of the past Fault Zone editions.
Assistant Poetry Editor
Marianne Brems
Marianne Brems is the author of five poetry collections, the most recent Within the Trifles (2025). She is also the winner of the California Writers Club statewide Big Contest for Small Poems and Prose, The Smalls Too 2026.
Diane Jacobsen
Mentoring Editor
Diane weathers life with an arsenal of fish stories to tell, a multi-tool in her car, a barbed wire scar on her knee, and a row of boots in her closet. Currently, she lives in the Bay Area with her husband and dog, where she writes, rows, gardens, and texts her recent-college-grad son too much.
Mentoring Editor
Karen Sundback
Award-winning author of short stories. Karen’s author website.
It is an honor and a pleasure to work on this volume.
Lisa Meltzer-Penn
Mentoring Editor
Lisa Meltzer Penn's short fiction and essays have been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, published in multiple Fault Zone anthologies, Traveler’s Tales: Spain, The Sand Hill Review, Fabula Argentea, TMI Project’s Alone Together pandemic series, Migozine, San Mateo County Library’s Story Café, and others, and won Best of Show at the 2021 San Mateo County Fair. Lisa is a recipient of the California Writers Club’s prestigious Jack London award and is a Past Branch President and Founding Editor of the Fault Zone Anthology series as well as a New York-trained editor and freelancer known for digging into the bones of a story to bring out its best qualities; find out more at lisameltzerpenn.com.
Tom Adams
Tom Adams is a Northern California writer whose work explores connection, place, and the stories that shape our lives. He was a contributing author to Fault Zone: Faultless? and Fault Zone: Detachment, and served as a mentoring editor for Fault Zone: Faultless, guiding three fellow writers from draft to production.
Mentoring Editor
Vanessa MacLaren-Wray
Mentoring Editor
Vanessa MacLaren-Wray creates worlds where people—human or otherwise—matter. Her publications include novels, short stories, and poetry, and she led the Fault Zone: Faultless? team.
Laurel Anne Hill, author and former underground storage tank operator, has been creating stories since before she could read. Her publications include three award-winning novels, over thirty short stories, and a whole bunch of short nonfiction (including one scientific paper).