Author Profiles
Ohio has a rich literary heritage as well as some wonderful contemporary authors. Learn more about them here! You can sort by various categories and see who has participated in our annual book festival by using the category search on the left, or search by keyword (including partial author names) by using the search field on the right.
Tara Tyler
Tara Tyler has had a hand in everything from waitressing to rocket engineering. After moving all over the US, she now writes and teaches math in Ohio with her husband and one boy left in the nest. She has two novel series, Pop Travel (sci-fi detective thrillers) and Beast World (fantasy adventures), plus her UnPrincess novella series where the damsels save themselves. She’s a commended blogger, contributed to several anthologies, and to fit all these projects in, she economizes her time, aka the Lazy Housewife—someday she might write a book on that… Make every day an adventure!
Doreen Uhas Sauer
Doreen Uhas Sauer serves as Board President for Columbus Landmarks Foundation and on a number of boards in the University District, where she is active in historic preservation, urban issues and local history. A longtime Columbus educator with Columbus City Schools, she currently directs a Teaching American History grant and has worked extensively in international civic education.…
Read MoreDoreen Uhas Sauer serves as Board President for Columbus Landmarks Foundation and on a number of boards in the University District, where she is active in historic preservation, urban issues and local history. A longtime Columbus educator with Columbus City Schools, she currently directs a Teaching American History grant and has worked extensively in international civic education. She has received statewide recognition for her work in preservation education, developed more than thirty local history/architecture programs and was named Ohio Teacher of the Year in 2003.
Thrity Umrigar
Thrity Umrigar is the bestselling author of nine previous novels, including Honor, which was a Reese’s Book Club Pick, as well as three picture books and a memoir. Her books have been published in over fifteen countries and in several languages. A former journalist, she has contributed to The Washington Post, the Boston Globe, The New York Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer and other newspapers. She is a recipient of the Nieman Fellowship to Harvard, and winner of the Cleveland Arts Prize, the Seth Rosenberg prize and a Lambda Literary award. She is currently a Distinguished University Professor of English at Case Western Reserve University.
Richard Underwood
Richard H. Underwood, American legal scholar and legal nonfiction and true crime writer, is the Edward T. Breathitt Professor of Law at the University of Kentucky College of Law. His most recent book is Gaslight Lawyers: Criminal Trials & Exploits in Gilded Age New York. He is also the author of CrimeSong: True Crime Stories from Southern Murder Ballads (2016), the recipient of two IPPY Book of the Year Awards and winner of a Foreword Reviews Book of the Year Award (Bronze, True Crime).
Underwood was born in Columbus, Ohio, where he grew up and attended college and law school. He graduated summa cum laude from The Ohio State University in 1969 and then entered the army. He served four years, with tours of duty in Germany and Vietnam, and later served as the security officer at the Presidio of San Francisco. Underwood left the army with the rank of captain, and he received a number of decorations, including the Bronze Star, the Army Commendation Medal with Oak Leaf Cluster, and the Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry with Bronze Star. He then attended the Moritz College of Law at The Ohio State University. After law school, Richard Underwood served as a law clerk for the Honorable David S. Porter, a federal judge on the United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio, in Cincinnati. He practiced several years with the law firm of Vorys, Sater, Seymour, and Pease in Columbus, Ohio, before taking a teaching position at the College of Law, University of Kentucky.
Professor Underwood has made many presentations, including a Musicology lecture, “Murdered Girls,” dealing with legal cases memorialized in Southern murder ballads, at the John Jacob Niles Center for American Music (2011), in addition to lectures at the Second World Conference on New Trends in Criminal Investigation and Evidence (1999) in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, and the Worldwide Advocacy Conference (1998) at the Inns of Court School of Law, in London, England. In 2011, Underwood presented at the Bob Dylan and the Law Symposium, co-sponsored by the Louis Stein Center for Law and Ethics, Touro Law Center, and the Fordham Urban Law Journal, in New York City.
He has taught a variety of courses, including Evidence, Scientific and Forensic Evidence, Litigation Skills (Trial Advocacy), Civil Procedure, Federal Courts, Insurance Law, Remedies, Law and Medicine, Bioethics, and Professional Responsibility (Legal Ethics). His legal publications include many law review articles, and he is the co-author of three legal practice books. Professor Richard Underwood has received special awards from the Kentucky Supreme Court for his work on the Kentucky Rules of Professional Conduct (1989) and for his service as the chairman of the Kentucky Bar Association Ethics and Unauthorized Practice Committees (1998).
Carmella Van Vleet
Carmella Van Vleet is a former teacher who has been a full-time author for over 20 years. She’s the author of over a dozen books, both fiction and non-fiction, for kids of all ages. Her debut middle grade novel, Eliza Bing Is (Not) A Big Fat Quitter, received the Christopher Award and was featured on multiple state award lists, including Choose to Read Ohio. And her most recent middle grade, Nothing Is Little, was a 2023 Ohioana Book Award finalist. She lives in Ohio and can be found online at: https://carmellavanvleet.com/.
Jeannie Vanasco
Jeannie Vanasco is the author of the memoirs Things We Didn’t Talk About When I Was a Girl (2019) and The Glass Eye (2017). Her writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Believer, Lit Hub, The New York Times, the Times Literary Supplement, and elsewhere. Born and raised in Sandusky, Ohio, she now lives in Baltimore and is an assistant professor of English at Towson University.
J. D. Vance
J. D. Vance is an author and venture capitalist known for his memoir Hillbilly Elegy. The book is about the Appalachian values of his upbringing and their relation to the social problems of his hometown. Hillbilly Elegy is the winner of the 2017 Ohioana Book Award About Ohio/An Ohioan.
John A. Vanek
John Vanek is a physician, novelist, and poet with works published in numerous literary journals in four countries and showcased on public radio. He has garnered awards in both fiction and poetry, and has been invited to read his work at colleges, the Akron Art Museum, the Cleveland Clinic, and the George Bush Presidential Library. The Father Jake Austin Mystery Series features a Roman Catholic priest protagonist (a 21st century Father Brown). DEROS (book one), Miracles (book two), Absolution (book three), and his poetry book, Heart Murmurs: Poems, are available at Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com and fine bookstores.
Denise Verrico
Denise Verrico is a New Jersey native who grew up in Pennsylvania. She attended Point Park College in Pittsburgh, where she majored in theatre arts. For seven seasons she was a member of The Oberon Theatre Ensemble in NYC where she acted, directed, and wrote plays. Denise has enjoyed vampire stories from the time she was a little girl and was a fan of the Dark Shadows television series. She enjoys reading non-fiction and fiction of all kinds, particularly historical fiction, thrillers, science fiction, fantasy, manga, and graphic novels. Every April through October you can find Denise climbing to heights of four hundred plus feet at speeds exceeding one hundred and twenty miles per hour on her favorite roller coasters. She currently lives in Ohio with her husband, teenaged son, and flock of six spoiled parrots.
Paula Vertikoff
Marie Weller and Paula Vertikoff are a dynamic duo committed to promoting social-emotional wellness for
children and the adults who support them. With a combined experience of fifty years in the field of education,
they have witnessed firsthand what research has confirmed – social emotional wellness plays an integral role in
academic achievement and overall success in life.
Their beloved “Cranium Critters” picture book series introduces two endearing characters who explore the
fascinating world of the brain and its crucial role in managing emotions, fostering focus, and accomplishing
goals. Scout, the brain’s safety pup, imparts valuable lessons to children on calming their minds and effectively
managing their emotions through mindfulness and other evidence-based techniques. Einstein, the brain’s head
thinker and problem solver, equips children with skills to overcome distractions and stay focused on what truly
matters.
Driven by their passion for empowering young minds, Marie and Paula founded Cranium Kids Media, to share
video lessons, stories, blog articles, and activities to help young people learn little life lessons and develop big
life skills needed to lead happier, healthier lives.
For more information and to explore their enriching content, please visit their website at
https://craniumkidsmedia.com/, and subscribe to their YouTube channel, which features additional video
lessons: https://www.youtube.com/@CraniumKidsMedia/videos.
They also offer valuable resources for educators on their Teachers Pay Teachers page:
https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Cranium-Kids-Media.
Connect with them on Facebook or Instagram for updates and insights: @craniumkidsmedia and
@cranium.critters.
Marie resides in Columbus, Ohio, with her loving husband and takes pride in being a mother to three grown
children. Paula calls Hilliard, Ohio, her home, where she lives with her husband, two sons, and a feisty beagle
named Mila, who served as the inspiration for Scout, the brain’s safety pup.