Caroline Tory oversees the general operations, finances, events and strategic messaging for Aspen Words, the Aspen Institute’s literary arts program. During her 8 years with the Institute, she has held positions spanning marketing, event planning and fundraising. She worked in Alumni Relations at Bowdoin College and in development at the Wilson Center in Washington, DC. A graduate of Bowdoin College, Caroline spent a year teaching English to French engineers in Nantes, France before relocating to the mountains. Caroline is a competitive mountain biker, ultra-runner and ski mountaineer. She serves on the board of the Aspen Cycling Club, tutors for English in Action and heads communications for the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Council at the Aspen Institute.

Elizabeth Nix is the Program Manager for Aspen Words, working with the team on programs including Winter Words and Summer Words as well as overseeing marketing and communications initiatives. She joined Aspen Words after running her own content development and digital design agency and serving as a longtime contributing writer to History.com, the History Channel’s website. Prior to that, she was the digital content director for A + E Networks, served as corporate communications director for a Silicon Valley tech startup and managed key accounts for a New York City-based digital marketing and tech agency. A graduate of Georgetown University, she began her career on the editorial staff at Cosmopolitan Magazine and has written for a number of other national magazines.

Mallory Kaufman will serve as the Events and Communications Coordinator for Aspen Words, providing event logistics support and helping to tell the AW story through our PR efforts and growing digital channels. She brings to the position nearly 10-years of experience in the communications industry, having worked in both journalism, at ABC News in Los Angeles, as well as in publicity as an account executive at agencies in Los Angeles, CA and Aspen, CO. A Colorado native and resident of the Roaring Fork Valley for the past three years, she loves spending time outdoors – hiking, biking, swimming, and snowboarding – and is always looking for more podcasts to add to her list as well as great cocktails to sip.

Madeline Lipton joined Aspen Words as a Program Coordinator in November 2021. Prior to joining the Aspen Words team, Madeline was the Events and Development Associate for the Society of Fellows (SOF) at the Aspen Institute. On the SOF team, she helped with everything from programming content curation to event logistics and donor support. Madeline graduated from Colby College in 2017 with a major in Global Studies concentrated in Latin America and a minor in Anthropology. During her four years at Colby, she spent a semester living abroad in Salamanca, Spain, and six months living and studying in Valparaiso, Chile. Prior to joining the Institute in April 2018, Madeline held positions at Eigelberger Architecture and Design in Aspen and The National September 11 Memorial & Museum in New York City. Madeline loves to ski, bike, run, read, and hike with her dog Cowboy.

Ivy Chalmers worked in family medicine as a physician assistant for sixteen years before joining the Aspen Words team. When not chasing her sticky toddler or reading a book, she is at work on her first novel.

Athena Pentcholov joined Aspen Words as an Intern in May of 2023 shortly after graduating from the University of Colorado Boulder with a degree in Political Science. She joined Aspen Words full time as a Program Assistant in October of 2023. In her role, she helps support the day to day administration and programming at Aspen Words. Prior to Aspen Words, Athena has worked with Make-A-Wish Colorado and Be The Match (NMDP). Athena is a first generation Bulgarian-American who loves to ski and read as much as she possibly can!

A partner at The Book Group, a boutique literary agency in New York City, where she represents a variety of writers across a literary spectrum, with a special emphasis on fiction. Her clients include Celeste Ng (“Little Fires Everywhere”), Joshua Ferris (“To Rise Again at a Decent Hour”), Madeline Miller (“Song of Achilles”), Nicole Dennis Benn (“Here Comes the Sun”), Cristina Henriquez (“The Book of Unknown Americans”), Paula McLain (“The Paris Wife”), Kevin Wilson (“The Family Fang”), Bret Anthony Johnston (“Remember Me Like This”) and many others. Julie is particularly interested in representing a diversity of voices from around the world.

Writer and professor. Her first book, “Remember Me to Harlem: The Letters of Langston Hughes and Carl Van Vechten,” was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. Her most recent book, “Black is the Body: Stories from My Grandmother’s Time, My Mother’s Time, and Mine,” won the 2019 Los Angeles Times - Christopher Isherwood Prize for autobiographical prose. A native of Nashville, Tennessee, Emily was recently named a 2020 Andrew Carnegie Fellow. A recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the MacDowell Colony, Emily lives in Burlington, Vermont, with her husband and twin daughters.

Author of “Half-Lit Houses,” “Of Gods & Strangers,” and “Hybrida” (W.W. Norton, 2019). She is also co-editor of the Norton anthology “Language for a New Century: Contemporary Poetry from the Middle East, Asia, and Beyond.” Her poems have been published in journals such as American Poet, McSweeney’s, The New York Times, and Ploughshares. Of “Hybrida,” NPR stated, “Chang’s third collection is one of the most important books of poetry to come along in years.” Chang is a professor and Director of Creative Writing at Binghamton University.

Executive Director of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) and the co-founder of 100 Word Story. He has published two books on writing, “Pep Talks for Writers: 52 Insights and Actions to Boost Your Creative Mojo,” and “Brave the Page,” a teen writing guide, in addition to a collection of 100-word stories, “Fissures,” and “Nothing Short of 100: Selected Tales from 100 Word Story.” His short story collection, “All the Comfort Sin Can Provide” is forthcoming from Black Lawrence Press in 2021. His stories have appeared in dozens of literary magazines, including Tin House, The Southwest Review, and The Gettysburg Review, and his essays on creativity have been published in The New York Times, Poets & Writers, Writer’s Digest, and The Writer. He serves on the National Writing Project’s Writer’s Council and Lit Camp’s Advisory Council. He’s also the co-host of the podcast Write-minded.

Essayist and reviewer, reviewing books for Lambda Literary since 2010. Her writing has appeared in BuzzFeed, Tin House, Electric Literature and elsewhere. After working behind the scenes on the National Book Awards for the National Book Foundation, she was Assistant Director at the NYU Center for Publishing and taught creative writing in Columbia University’s Narrative Medicine program. She currently serves as the director of the Writing Institute at Sarah Lawrence University and lives in Brooklyn with one bookseller and three cats.

Agent at the Gernert Company. She represents narrative nonfiction, memoir and fiction and has a particular interest in books on pressing social and political issues. She graduated from Barnard College and has a graduate degree in the nineteenth-century novel. Prior to becoming an agent, she was a publicist at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

A poet and author of “Sonoran Strange” (West End Press / University of New Mexico Press, 2015) which was selected as a Southwest Book of the Year by the region’s librarians. A serial collaborator, Phillips has worked on a wide range of performance, music and community education projects in the US, Mexico and beyond. He holds a MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Arizona in Tucson, where he lives with his family.

Editor at Grove Atlantic, where she edits literary fiction and nonfiction. She is also editor and publisher of Stonecutter, a print magazine of art and literature which focuses on publishing international writers and artists alongside US-based ones. Stonecutter has featured work by John Ashbery, Cathy Linh Che, Mark O’Connell, Renee Gladman, Ricardo Piglia, Nicole Sealey, Newsha Tavakolian, Sara Baume, Karl Ove Knausgaard, Lydia Kiesling, and Sally Rooney, to name but a few. Now residing in Queens, Katie is originally from Cork, Ireland.

A Shareholder in Garfield & Hecht, P.C.’s Aspen office, practicing civil and commercial litigation with an emphasis on real estate litigation. He has first- and second-chaired hundreds of cases in state and federal courts throughout Colorado, including frequent appearances before trial courts throughout the state and in the Colorado Court of Appeals and Supreme Court, and in the United States District Court and the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit. He also handles commercial arbitrations. His practice also includes creditor-side bankruptcy litigation; he regularly represents creditors, lenders, banks, and other financial institutions in Chapter 7, 11, and 13 bankruptcy cases, including adversary proceedings. His local, regional, national, and global clients include individuals, companies, corporations, and other organizations. In 2013, 2014, and 2015, he was named one of the Top Young Attorneys in Colorado and recognized as a SuperLawyer Rising Star.

After recently stepping down from her role as Director of Admission and Financial Aid at Aspen Country Day School, she now works as a placement counselor for students seeking an independent high school. Previously, she was an Associate Director of Philanthropy for the Colorado chapter of The Nature Conservancy and the Director of Mountaineering Operations for Mountain Travel*Sobek, a California-based global adventure travel company. Gretchen graduated from Berkeley with a BA in Psychology. An Aspen native, she and her husband Craig Corona have three children who have been raised in the Roaring Fork Valley.

Beth devotes much of her volunteer time to education and youth in the Roaring Fork Valley. She has sat on the Board of Trustees at Cranbrook Schools Brookside and Aspen Country Day School, and on the board of the Aspen Education Foundation. She co-chaired the Aspen High School Accountability Committee and the Colorado Western Slope College Fair Activities Committee. A graduate of the University of Manitoba (BA) and the Kellogg Graduate School Of Management at Northwestern University (MBA), Beth lives year-round in Aspen with her husband Josh. They have three children.

Sue O’Bryan has owned a home in Aspen since 2000, and has lived in Aspen full-time since 2004. She has a BSEE and practiced as an electrical engineer for 12 years. Sue has an MBA with a focus in non-profit management, and a JD, and is a patent attorney licensed to practice in both Florida and Colorado. Since 2004 Sue has practiced as a Staff Attorney at Alpine Legal Services where she focuses on individuals in crisis; specifically victims of violence, children, seniors, and the mentally and physically disabled. Sue is an avid reader and has been a long time supporter of AW. She has two college-aged children.

Michelle Goldberg was born in Zimbabwe and raised in Angola and Switzerland, Michelle attended St. Lawrence University, New York, where she studied sociology and skied competitively. She has worked as a writer, editor, TV presenter and corporate communications consultant in Hong Kong, Italy, Switzerland and the US. She now lives in Aspen with her husband and four children. Michelle has served on the boards of The Greater Miami Jewish Federation (Women’s Philanthropy, Miami Beach Board) and The Buddy Program. She is an avid athlete, loves to volunteer, travel, read and spend time with family and friends.

She moved to Aspen with her three grown children and husband over 11 years ago from Westport, CT. She has a background in nursing and healthcare having received her Masters in Public Policy from Georgetown University before working as a health policy analyst and lobbyist in Washington, D.C. She is currently a managing member of Revelis, a private investment firm focused on healthcare investments, and volunteers for the Aspen Valley Ski Club, Aspen Education Foundation and College Fair, as well as the community vaccine clinics. She is a frequent Aspen Ideas Festival participant, avid reader (particularly of non-fiction) and regular at the Winter Words author series. Sue is a USTA tennis player and enjoys skiing, biking and recently, pickle ball.

Lauren Johnson is a writer and strategic communications consultant who has worked with companies such as Cisco Systems, Fortive, Inc., Goldman Sachs and Verifone. She holds an MFA in Playwriting from the University of California, Los Angeles, where she was the recipient of the Audrey Skirball-Kenis Fellowship. Lauren is currently pursuing her graduate degree in Natural Resource Conservation at Paul Smith’s College in upstate New York, and divides her time between Cape Cod and the Adirondacks along with her wife, three dogs and two cats.

Laurie Michaels, Ph.D. is an individual philanthropist based in Aspen, CO. Until 2012, she maintained a private practice in clinical psychology. In 2012, she founded Open Road Alliance to address the lack of fast, flexible, emergency funds available to non-profits and social entrepreneurs. In 2020, she started The 2030 Fund to address climate issues and promote renewables in Louisiana. Dr. Michaels was a board member of the Aspen Community Foundation for 12 years, serving as board chair for four years ending in 2013. She is currently vice-chair of the international peace-building organization, Search for Common Ground, and board chair of Access AfterSchool, which provides afterschool and summer programs for students from Aspen to Parachute, as well member of the board of Aspen Journalism.

A multi-award-winning poet, author, screenwriter, academic, translator, and journalist. His writing appears in The New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker, The Paris Review, and other national and international publications. The author of three books of poetry, two books of nonfiction, and a book-length translation of fiction, Phillips has been awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Nicolás Guillén Outstanding Book Award, the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, the PEN/ESPN Award for Literary Sports Writing, the PEN/Joyce Osterweil Award for Poetry, a Whiting Award, and the GLCA New Writers Award. He has also been a finalist for the Griffin Poetry Prize, the National Book Award, and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. Also an acclaimed sportswriter, Rowan’s writing on basketball has been collected by The Library of America, his soccer writing has been acclaimed by BBC commentary and English soccer legend Gary Lineker, and his award-winning writing on tennis has achieved widespread international recognition. He is a graduate of Swarthmore College and has a doctorate in English Literature from Brown University. Currently, he is the Margaret Bundy Scott Professor of English at Williams College and on the faculty of the Creative Writing Program at Princeton University. He is a poetry editor for Public Books, a fellow of the New York Institute of the Humanities at NYU and a scholar at NYU’s Institute for Public Knowledge. He divides his time between New York City, Barcelona, and Williamstown, Massachusetts with his wife and two daughters.

Lisanne grew up in London, Ontario. She has an English literature degree from the University of Western Ontario, a JD from the University of Victoria, B.C., and a Masters of Law from Fordham University. She is a member of the New York Bar and is a certified mediator. Lisanne and her family moved to Old Snowmass, CO five years ago. She is currently a trustee of Colorado Rocky Mountain School and serves on the advisory board of Aspen Words. She enjoys the Aspen Summer Words workshops and the Winter Words lineup every year and feels Aspen Words has helped her become a better reader. In her spare time, she enjoys running, hiking, and biking in the mountains.

2019 Guggenheim Fellow, a Pulitzer Prize finalist for nonfiction and the best-selling author of 18 books of fiction, nonfiction and poetry. His most recent book is “The House of Broken Angels,” a New York Times Notable Book of the year, finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and recently acquired by the Hulu network for a series. His novel “Into the Beautiful North” is a selection of the NEA Big Reads program. He is a distinguished professor of creative writing at the University of Illinois-Chicago.

William Weathers grew up in Houston Texas. He and his family moved to the Roaring Fork Valley in 2018 and are raising two children here. Will attended the university of Texas at Austin for undergraduate before heading to medical school at UT Southwestern in Dallas, and then onto residency and fellowship at the University of Texas Houston/MD Anderson Cancer Center. Will was a prolific writer in his training and has been the author of over 40 published academic papers. After working for a year in private practice in Houston, Texas, he and his wife decided to move to the Roaring Fork Valley to raise their children. Will currently runs a radiology practice in Roaring Fork valley and serves as head of radiology at Valley View Hospital, Grand River Hospital, and Pioneer Hospital. Will serves on numerous boards at his national practice, Radiology Partners. When not working, he dedicates his time to his family and reading.  

Jean Chen Ho is the author of Fiona and Jane, one of TIME’s 100 Must-Read Books of 2022, longlisted for the Story Prize, and named a Best Book of the Year by NPR, Vulture, Vogue, Oprah Daily, Glamour, Harper’s Bazaar, Elle, and Electric Literature. Her fiction, essays, and criticism appear in New York Times Magazine, The Cut, Los Angeles Times, Guernica, and other publications.

Ho is the 2023-24 Visiting Assistant Professor in fiction at Skidmore College. She teaches prose in the Randolph College low-residency MFA in Creative Writing. She held the 2022-23 Mary Routt Endowed Chair of Writing at Scripps College. She has a PhD in Literature and Creative Writing from the University of Southern California, and an MFA from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. She has been awarded fellowships and residencies at Hedgebrook, MacDowell, Aspen Words, Tin House, I-Park Foundation, Willapa Bay AiR, Kundiman, and Vermont Studio Center. She was born in Taipei, Taiwan and grew up in Southern California.

Gina Balibrera earned an MFA in Prose from the University of Michigan’s Helen Zell Writers’ Program, where she was also a postgraduate fellow. She’s been awarded grants from the Gould Center, the Rackham Institute, a Tyson Award, the Aura Estrada Prize, the Under the Volcano Sandra Cisneros Fellowship, and is currently a member of the inaugural Periplus Fellowship cohort. Her novel The Volcano Daughters is forthcoming from Pantheon.

Brittany is a Métis storyteller, family physician, writer, and lecturer, with Anishinaabe, Cree, and Eastern European lineage.

Nadia Davids is a South African writer, theatre-maker and scholar. Her plays have garnered various theatre awards and nominations and been staged locally and internationally. Her debut novel “An Imperfect Blessing” was long-listed for the South African Sunday Times Fiction Award and shortlisted for the University of Johannesburg Prize and the Pan-African Etisalat Prize for Literature. “An Imperfect Blessing” was named one of This is Africa’s best African novels and was on 2020’s Lonely Planet reading list. Her personal essays have appeared in the Mail and the Guardian, the Johannesburg Review of Books and The Los Angeles Review of Books. She has presented programs for the BBC and her work has been featured on CNN. In June 2017 Nadia was elected President of PEN South Africa where, along with the PEN SA board, she has worked to protect writers at risk, defend freedom of expression and support the literary landscape of South Africa.

Miles W. Griffis is an award-winning independent journalist based in Los Angeles, California. He covers with the Southwest, health, and queer issues.

His work has appeared in High Country News, The New York Times, National Geographic, Outside, Popular Science, Them, Vogue, Wildsam, and many others. He was selected as a finalist in the Sewanee Review’s 2020, 2022, and 2023 non-fiction contests. He is the co-founder of The Sick Times, a new website covering the Long Covid crisis.

Outside of his writing, Miles has worked as a backcountry guide in Colorado, Canada, and Australia. He’s also volunteered as a wild land firefighter.

He is currently accepting freelance and full-time writing opportunities and is at work on a memoir about Long Covid. He is represented by Katelyn Dougherty at Paradigm Talent Agency.