New Comm Ave

Editorial Board


Nick Courage was born in New Orleans in 1982. When not guest editing New Comm Ave, he helms A Mutual Respect Books and Music, an underground arts collective based in Brooklyn, New York, and is an associate editor of English composition books for Bedford/St. Martin's. He's published three books (My Life as an Aerophyte, Mr. Feathers Flies Again, and Triangulating Happiness) and has been described as "more comet than poet" (E. Merrick V, Milk and Automaton), offering "a fresh sort of daring in the overstrained broth of contemp. am. po." (A. Codrescu, Exquisite Corpse).
Erin Tyson is currently an adjunct faculty member at three schools in Southern California: Fullerton College, Cal State Fullerton, and Chaffey College. Though preparing for classes and staying up on her students’ work takes most of her time, she actually does enjoy a few of life’s pleasures. Not an expert by any means, Erin has been know to play a bit of guitar here and there. When not serenading her friends and family, one of her favorite pastimes is finding small treasures at local thrift stores and garage sales. Most of all, Erin enjoys spending time with friends and family members.
David Peterson received a couple BA's from UC Berkeley, and then an MA in Linguistics from UCSD, before returning home to Orange County to teach English. Of the first ten interstate/state highways in California, he's traveled the 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9 and 10 (the 6 remains elusive), and heard at least three of them mentioned in songs. In 2006, he "successfully" defeated the morpheme at the first Language Creation Conference, only to "employ" its bloated corpse a few months later in an essay for The Speculative Grammarian. Since then, he's devoted his time to things he enjoys: basketball, 19th century Russian literature, music (both heavy metal and non), Patrick McGoohan, video games, lexicalist morphology, and ice cream. If not properly supervised, he's liable to create a language or two, as well.
Bridget Kominek is an English instructor at Fullerton College. She has her degrees in English from CSUF, where she is currently working on a second Master''s degree in American Studies. She spends a lot of time focusing on her teaching duties and spending time with her husband, which does not leave her enough time to think up clever things to say about herself in editor bios. When she''s not writing about herself in third person, she likes to cook, nap, and read.
When she isn’t teaching at Fullerton College, Danielle Fouquette likes watching other people take long walks on the beach at sunset while she drinks expensive Shiraz from the Barossa Valley. The best advice about writing Danielle ever got was from a curmudgeonly night news editor who told her moments after she filed a breaking news story about a car vs. pedestrian “Dammit Fouquette! People don’t die at the end of the news story!” Since then, Danielle has passed that advice along to every crop of writing students she has taught.
Laura Bennett is a graduate student at Boston College and an admirer of the giant squid''s sinister and mysterious ways. If she could be an animal, however, she would definitely not be a squid; in fact, she wouldn''t be a sea creature of any kind. Sea creatures are slimy, for the most part, and sharks, which feel like sand paper, have disgusting appetites. Speaking of appetites, she doesn''t understand why some vegetarians are willing to eat fish, or why people differentiate between "fish" and "flesh," as if fish were vegetables or something. She warmly welcomes submissions to the New Comm Ave on any of these topics.*
Steve Flaherty may look like a wee freshman Geophysics major at Boston College, but it’s what’s inside him that counts. You may recognize Steve in such literary classics as Wuthering Heights, Gone with the Wind, and the Communist Manifesto. Steve Flaherty enjoys succeeding and averting disaster. If presented with the choice between an ice-cold root beer and the secret to life, Steve would choose root beer. Steve does not condone and never has condoned evil. He is the eleventh task of Hercules, which Hercules is yet to complete. His favorite extinct reptile is the velociraptor, for obvious reasons. His life goals include: Josh Hartnett.
Jackie Otto is a sophomore at the University of California, Davis. Currently studying Environmental Science and Management (double majoring in I-am-not-a-hippie-that's-environmental-studies-majors) Jackie later plans to get her Master's in a marine science. What. I don't know which one yet. A true Washington kid, raised in the Seattle area, she lives for hard rock anywhere from Guns n' Roses to Alice in Chains, paying for it dearly for it when driving with passengers who like rap or chick music. She attributes her current happiness to the Matrix, Kira Roden, the British, Camp River Ranch, and the Shift Button.
Laura Holzwasser has lived her entire life, before attending Boston College, in a suburb of Boston called Sudbury, MA. Sudbury is about as exciting as what she likes to call its claim to fame, the "Mary had a Little Lamb Schoolhouse," which many people are shocked to find out actually exists. Despite her clumsiness and difficulty mastering walking up and down stairs, Laura has spent 15 years of her life practicing gymnastics, surprisingly with relatively no injuries. Being only 5'3.5", she blames gymnastics for stunting her growth making her four inches shorter than her sister who is four years younger than her. She also has dabbled in pole vaulting despite her incredible fear of heights. Laura enjoys saying "wicked" and pronouncing "room" as "rum," which annoys everyone from outside of the Boston area. She would like to thank Ms. Notaro and Professor Sousa for helping her improve her personal narrative writing.
Mark Fullmer studied trumpet at the University of Southern California, expatriated to England after graduation, repatriated when his work visa expired, then studied English literature at Boston College, but spent way too much time making independent films with Olive Barrel Productions (credits on a recent short will include gaffer, grip, fan operator, extra, casting director, set designer, legal consultant, and screenwriter). Now teaches writing in sunny Southern California. Likes swimming, walks on the beach, doing laundry (particularly ironing), Russia, metal detectors, and movies that make you cry. Dislikes plain yogurt, pronouns, and saying goodbye. Is currently writing an interactive serial novel about the great American subculture of videogaming, to be published on Facebook beginning January 2010.