Alexandra Burghardt (shown here with her little cousin) is a military brat currently enrolled in Southeastern Louisiana State University, preparing for a career as an English teacher...maybe even as a philosophy professor. She spent nine years in the order of the Franciscan Sisters of the Penance of the Sorrowful Mother before deciding that her call was outside the monastery. She works at a health club, and she drinks “community coffee” every day, but she admits that she just LOVES the frappucinos at Starbucks!

Meredith Gould is an award-winning writer, editor and independent publisher based in Princeton, NJ. After earning her doctorate in Sociology from New York University, she spent a decade teaching college. Her career includes stints as the marketing guru for a yoga center as well as the Roman Catholic church, editing national and regional health and wellness magazines, and writing for the pharmaceutical industry. She is the author of numerous books, including The Catholic home: Celebrations and Traditions and Deliberate Acts of Kindness: Service as a Spiritual Practice(Doubleday). Fueled by tea and dark chocolate, she blogs at www.meredithgould.blogspot.com

Genevieve Kineke has written and lectured extensively on authentic femininity and religious faith. The founder of Canticle Magazine, she lives with her husband Charley and five children in East Greenwich, Rhode Island. She is the author of The Authentic Catholic Woman (Servant), and is a liaison for the International Congress commemorating the 20th anniversary of John Paul II’s encyclical On the Dignity and Vocation of Women, www.dignityofwomen.com and blogs at Feminine Genius: www.feminine-genius.com. An avid indoorsman, she is devoted to both Earl Grey and Juan Valdez, and longs for order to spontaneously descend on her household.  

Sandra Miesel is the prolific author of both science fiction and Catholic historical and literary articles and books. She has edited anthologies of Andre Norton's fiction, and is an expert on Gordon Dickson. Most recently, she co-wrote THE DA VINCI CODE HOAX with Carl Olson, and THE PIED PIPER OF ATHEISM with Peter Vere (Ignatius). A recent widow, she has three grown children. She holds a bachelor of science in chemistry from the University of Colorado, and masters degrees in biochemistry and medieval history from the University of Illinois. Her coffee habits are none of your beeswax.

Margaret McGuire is a junior at Great Falls High School and the daughter of Kristen McGuire. She loves reading, creative writing, reading, playing the violin, reading and sewing. Did we mention she loves to read? She also loves tea, with sugar, please, just one lump.