2025 Moderators

Ben Alter is an active member of the Society for American Baseball Research, better known as SABR. Several of his articles on baseball history and statistics have been published in SABR’s Baseball Research Journal. Before retiring in 2021, he was a principal with an environmental consulting firm. His textbook, Environmental Consulting Fundamentals, is currently in its second edition. Ben also wrote numerous articles on environmental assessments and remediation and teaches a continuing education class on technical writing. He is a long-suffering Mets fan.

Neil Baldwin is the critically-acclaimed author of biographies of William Carlos Williams, Man Ray, Thomas Edison, and Henry Ford, and his most recent book is Martha Graham: When Dance Became Modern. Baldwin served as manager of The Annual Fund at The New York Public Library; and was founding executive director of The National Book Foundation, sponsor of the National Book Awards. As professor emeritus in the College of the Arts at Montclair State University, Baldwin created and taught BA undergraduate and MFA and MA graduate writing seminars in Great Books & Ideas, Cultural History, Dramaturgy and Danceaturgy.

Mary Lynn Becza is the assistant director of the Morristown & Morris Township Library. She is a graduate of Douglass College and received her Master’s Degree from Rutgers University School of Information and Library Science. Mary Lynn can often be found at the Library recommending her favorite new titles to patrons.

Tara Bernie is the founder and owner of TB Yoga House in Morristown, NJ, where she teaches yoga and strength classes in-studio, privately, and through her innovative video series. A 200-hour certified RYT and advocate for health and healing, Tara brings the same passion she once poured into her long career in news and entertainment, as a senior correspondent and producer with outlets including People, DailyMailTV, NBC’s Access Hollywood, KNBC Los Angeles, and WNBC New York. She has interviewed Hollywood icons, covered major events from the Oscars to the Super Bowl, and even reported on the political stage with former Presidents and Secretaries of State. A cancer survivor, young widow, and proud mom of two daughters, Tara inspires others through her resilience and her belief in the power of storytelling and community.

Mary Brosnahan led the Coalition for the Homeless for three decades from 1989 to 2018, as executive director, then president and CEO. Her op-eds have appeared in the New York Times,the New York Daily News, and been featured on 60 Minutes, NBC, ABC, MSNBC, and CNBC. She has contributed to dozens of news reports on both WNYC and NPR. Ms. Brosnahan has been awarded several honorary doctorate degrees and her alma mater, the University of Notre Dame, presented her with the Thomas A. Dooley Award, its highest recognition for outstanding work on behalf of humanity.

Mary Calvi is a 14-time New York Emmy award-winning journalist, anchoring for CBS New York and Inside Edition Weekend. Her second novel, If a Poem Could Live and Breathe: A Novel of Teddy Roosevelt’s First Love, is based on love letters from the Gilded Age to and from Roosevelt and his first love, Alice Lee. Many of these letters have never been published and were long believed destroyed. Her in-depth research for her debut book, Dear George, Dear Mary: A Novel of George Washington’s First Love, is the basis of a Smithsonian Channel documentary.

Carol Fitzgerald is the president of The Book Report Network. The company’s websites — Bookreporter.com and ReadingGroupGuides.com — have become the gathering places for a large and devoted community of booklovers since 1996. Carol is known for her in-depth author interviews. She hosts the “Bookreporter Talks To” video/podcast series which now has more than 240 author interviews, as well as “Bookaccino Live: A Lively Talk About Books,” a monthly book preview program, and the “Bookaccino Live” Book Group series, a book group discussion program with a featured author.

Matthew Futterman is a senior writer at The Athletic, the sports division of the New York Times. He specializes in tennis and Olympic sports. He previously worked at the Wall Street Journal, the Star-Ledger, and the Philadelphia Inquirer. He is the author of the forthcoming book, The Cruelest Game: Searching for Greatness in Tennis…and What it Takes. He has previously written Running to the Edge and Players: How Sports Became a Business. He lives in New York City.

Darcey Gohring has twenty-five years of professional writing and editing experience. She is the host of The Writer’s Corner, an online writing community with hundreds of members from all over the country, and curates Wisdom & Words. In her role as a writing community host, Darcey has interviewed more than one hundred writers from all different genres on craft. For six years, Darcey was the managing editor of a lifestyle magazine and has held almost every position in the editorial field. As a writing instructor, she has helped hundreds of writers craft their stories. Darcey leads writing workshops for both fiction and non-fiction writers and has served as the keynote speaker for conferences all over the United States. Her work has appeared in dozens of publications including Memoir Magazine, Newsweek, HuffPost, Business Insider, Scary Mommy, Writers Read, among others. She was a contributing author for the anthology, Corona City: Voices From an Epicenter. She is currently working on a novel inspired by her experience of being diagnosed with breast cancer in the first few weeks of the pandemic.

Maggie Lindsy Haberman is an American journalist, a White House correspondent for the New York Times, and a political analyst for CNN. She previously worked as a political reporter for the New York Post, the New York Daily News, and Politico. She wrote about Donald Trump for those publications and rose to prominence covering his campaign, first presidency, and inter-presidency. In 2022, she published the best-selling book Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America.

Jordan Hernandez founded Completely Booked in 2020, a celebrated literary movement championing diverse voices. Her multi-platform community has earned national recognition, with features on Oprah’s Book Club and The Today Show. Completely Booked includes a book club with live author discussions, engaging events, and social media platforms. Beyond this work, Jordan serves as director of content marketing, contributes to The Local Girl Media, and actively advocates for fitness and community service initiatives.

Adriana Landouceur is a book influencer, educator, and community advocate from Newark, New Jersey. Through her platform BringMe_Books and her book club Truth Club, Adriana curates conversations that highlight marginalized authors, social justice, and the power of storytelling. Adriana is committed to creating spaces where literature inspires action and communities imagine new possibilities together.

Chad E. Leinaweaver is the director of the Morristown & Morris Township Library, a position he has held since 2016.  He currently serves on the board for the Morristown Festival of Books and has previously served as the President of MAIN, a consortium of libraries in northern New Jersey.  Previously, Chad served as the head of the special collections division of the Newark Public Library, and the director for the library and museum collections for The New Jersey Historical Society.  In 2023 Chad wrote That Our Daughters May Be as Cornerstones: A History of Irving College, has authored portions of the Dictionary of New Jersey History, previously served as the chair of the New Jersey Studies Academic Alliance Author Awards and has been an archival consultant and on the advisory board for the Caucus Archival Projects Evaluation Service (CAPES).

Julie Maloney is a writer and poet. She is the founder/director of Women Reading Aloud, an international writing organization dedicated to the support of women writers. She led her 31st writer’s retreat in May, 2025, in Madeira, Portugal. Her debut novel, A Matter of Chance, won the Eric Hoffer Book Award for General Fiction in 2019 and was selected by Us Weekly as a trending book. Her new novel is in the works.

Maryann McFadden “won the literary lottery” in 2007 according to writing blogs when her previously self-published novel, The Richest Season, sold at auction to Hyperion Books. She has also written Cape Cod Light, The Book Lover, The Cemetery Keeper’s Wife (historical fiction set in her hometown), and The Christmas Star. Her novels have been chosen as ABA Indie Next Picks and translated into multiple languages. Her unusual publishing journey has inspired many aspiring authors.

Mary Ann Naples is the chief operating officer & publisher of Publishers Marketplace, the essential news and information service for publishing industry professionals, and has been a publisher at the Hachette Book Group, The Walt Disney Company, and Rodale. Naples has also had extensive experience in other areas of publishing including agenting and startups, and she began her career in editorial.

Kathleen Sanderson has over four decades in the culinary field and has combined teaching, consulting, editorial leadership, and industry involvement to make a lasting impact. She has taught at leading culinary centers including Kings Cooking Studio, Nantucket Culinary Center, and The Farm School, and co-founded Foodservice Solutions, a marketing consultancy with clients such as the Idaho Potato Commission, Campbell’s, Kraft, and DANONE. Previously, she was food editor and test kitchen director for Restaurant Business magazine. A graduate of the California Culinary Academy with continuing education at the Culinary Institute of America, she has developed signature cooking programs, achieved CCP accreditation from the IACP, and held leadership roles in organizations such as Les Dames Escoffier and the NY Women’s Culinary Alliance.

Tony Santillo, Head PGA Professional, has spent more than thirty years at Spring Brook Country Club, beginning in 1994 and working his way up from Bag Room Attendant to Assistant Golf Professional before being named Head PGA Professional in 2008. Elected to PGA membership in 2007, Tony has competed at a high level and won numerous events across New Jersey. He has represented Spring Brook as President of the NJAPGA, served on the NJPGA Board of Directors from 2010–2015, and was honored as the 2011 NJPGA Merchandiser of the Year for private facilities and the 2012 Player Development Award Winner for growing the game. In 2010, he broke the course record with a seven-under-par 63, which included nine birdies.

Chirag V. Shah, MD, MSCE, is the chairman of the department of medicine at Morristown Medical Center. Board-certified in critical care medicine, pulmonary disease, and internal medicine by the American Board of Internal Medicine, he has been a practicing pulmonologist and medical intensivist since 2007. He attended the University of Missouri at Kansas City’s accelerated six-year combined BA/MD program. He completed his residency in internal medicine at Washington University School of Medicine and Barnes-Jewish Hospital, St. Louis, Missouri. He completed fellowships in both pulmonary and critical care medicine at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and earned a Master of Science in clinical epidemiology at the University of Pennsylvania.

Laura Spence-Ash’s debut novel, Beyond That, the Sea, was published in 2023. Her short fiction has appeared in One Story, New England Review, Crazyhorse and elsewhere. Her work has been supported by MacDowell, Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Sewanee Writers’ Conference, and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. She earned her MFA in Fiction from Rutgers-Newark where she received the Presidential Fellowship.

Grant Stanton is an assistant professor of history and africana studies at Drew University studying Black contributions to the formation of the United States. He received his PhD from the University of Pennsylvania, his MA from the University of Chicago, and his BA from the University of California – Santa Barbara. Grant’s work has appeared in the Washington Post, the Boston Globe, and Early American Studies, among other outlets.

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