2026 Main Stage Poets, Performers, and Presenters

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Shelly Covert is a descendant of the Nisenan people who have made their homes in and around Nevada County since time immemorial. She is the elected Spokesperson for the Nevada City Rancheria Nisenan Tribe and sits on the Tribal Council. She is also the Executive Director of California Heritage Indigenous Research Project (CHIRP), the Tribally guided 501c3 that supports the Nevada City Rancheria Nisenan Tribe, through its mission to Preserve, Protect and Perpetuate Nisenan Culture.

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Sands Hall is the author of the award-winning memoir, Reclaiming My Decade Lost in Scientology (Counterpoint). She teaches annually for the Community of Writers and the Iowa Summer Writing Festival. Her prize-winning essays and stories have appeared in such journals as Alta Journal, New England Review, Iowa Review, and the Los Angeles Review of Books.

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Maxima Kahn’s first full-length book of poems, Fierce Aria, was published by Finishing Line Press in 2020 and was a finalist for an Eric Hoffer Book Award. Her poetry and essays have appeared in The Louisville Review, Euphony Journal, Entropy, Citron Review, Sweet, Wisconsin Review and Spillway, among many others. A recipient of fellowships and scholarships to the Vermont Studio Center and the Community of Writers, she has twice been nominated for Best of the Net. Having taught creative writing at the University of California Davis extension, she now teaches at Brilliant Playground.

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Karen Terrey is a writer, editor, and writing coach, offering marketing and business writing, copy editing, publishing guidance, and creative writing workshops in Truckee through her business Tangled Roots Writing.  She has taught at Lake Tahoe Community College, Sierra Nevada College, and Sierra College, and has served as a poetry editor for the literary journals Pitkin Review and Quay. She is a recipient of a Sierra Arts Endowment Grant, the John Woods Scholarship to Prague Summer Program, the Steve Turner Scholarship to Surprise Valley Writer's Conference, and a scholarship to the Vermont Studio Center. Her poems have appeared in Rhino, Edge, Meadow, WordRiot, Puerto Del Sol, Wicked Alice, Canary, and Gray Sparrow Journal, among others. Her poetry chapbook Bite and Blood is now available from Finishing Line Press and local bookstores, including Sundance Books in Reno, NV, and Word After Word in Truckee, CA. 

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