Dusty Richards
Publisher
Dusty grew up riding horses and watching his western heroes on the big screen. He even wrote book reports for his classmates, making up westerns since English teachers didn’t read that kind of book. But his mother didn’t want him to be a cowboy, so he went to college, then worked for Tyson Foods and auctioned cattle when he wasn’t an anchor on television. But his lifelong dream was to write the novels he loved. He sat on the stoop of Zane Grey’s cabin and promised that he’d get published. And in 1992, his first book, Noble’s Way, hit the shelves. Since then, he’s had 140 more come out. He is a sought-after speaker and master of ceremonies, and has served as President of Ozarks Writers League and Western Writers of America, and Vice President of the Oklahoma Writers’ Federation, Inc. If he can steal some time, he also like to fish for trout on the White River.
Contact Dusty at: dusty@saddlebagdispatches.com
Michael L. Frizell
Editor-in-Chief
Michael Frizell is an educator, writer, public speaker, and performer. He holds a BA in Theatre from College of the Ozarks, an MA in Theatre from Southwest Missouri State University, an MA in Creative Writing from Missouri State University, and an MFA in Creative Writing—Nonfiction from the University of Arkansas – Monticello. He was the writer of Buffy the Vampire Slayer: A Reader’s Theatre Parody (with A Class Act Productions), for two seasons. For Harvest Moon Productions, he is the writer of Star Trek: Live in Springfield and Star Trek: The Next Generation Live in Springfield.
Contact Michael at: michael@oghmacreative.com
Gil Miller
Associate Editor
Gil is an author and member of both the Northwest Arkansas Writers’ Workshop and the Old Wire Pen & Poison Writers’ Group, and makes his home just outside Fayetteville, where he is at work on the first of his Rural Empires novels. He had a normal upbringing, which means his parents aren’t to blame for him going into crime (fiction). Instead, he blames a steady diet of movies, shows, and books, from Miami Vice andScarface in the ’80s to Breaking Bad and Justified (a good example of a modern western) in the ’00s. Some of his greatest influences include authors such as Michael Connelly, Robert Crais, Don Winslow, and the late, great Elmore Leonard. His novels to date in include Spree, A Temporary Thing, Startup, and Franchise.
Contact Gil at: gil@oghmacreative.com
Dennis Doty
Associate Editor
Dennis Doty served as a U.S. Marine for ten years. He spent two years on the Southwest RCA rodeo circuit inventing dozens of creative and entertaining ways to fall off a bucking horse. Dennis has been writing fiction since 2004. He is an Associate Editor for Oghma Creative Media. His work has appeared in Saddlebag Dispatches and Cheapjack Pulp.
Dennis is a native of Southern California, who now lives in Appalachia with his wife and two dogs. He spends his days writing, editing and yelling at kids to get off his lawn.
Contact Dennis at: dennis@oghmacreative.net
Jeremy Menefee
Associate Editor
Jeremy grew up with his father, a journalist and tech writer who often used him as a beta reader, simultaneously teaching him a love of writing and editing.
After Jeremy left the Marine Corps, he returned to writing at a tech PR agency in the Silicon Valley, leveraging his history of writing and understanding technology. After a time trying other careers, he returned to his real love, freelance writing & editing, and in 2015 was asked to ghostwrite a novel. He explained he hadn’t done it before, but was given the contract anyway, and in writing that, he discovered a deep and abiding love of the craft.
He has since ghostwritten 14 novels, as well as self-publishing four short stories and two how-to books on ghostwriting. He plans to release an Urban Fantasy trilogy in early 2018, with a Military Sci-Fi series launched by the end of 2018. He hopes eventually to be able to become a full-time fiction author, focusing on those two series.
Contact Jeremy at: jeremy@oghmacreative.net
Casey Cowan
Creative Director
Casey has worked in and around the journalism, artistic, and literary fields for twenty-one years as a reporter, photographer and graphic designer. In 2013 he helped co-found Oghma Creative Media, a publishing company built around the idea of authors and artists banding together as a team to take control of and market their work effectively. As Creative Director, he’s responsible for the professional appearance and feel of the lion’s share of Oghma’s publications, including Saddlebag Dispatches. In the twelve minutes a day he’s not usually working, Casey is the father of six rowdy teenagers. He enjoys reading, swimming, and target shooting, and he shares his crazy life with his always-supportive fiancee, Amy. He is also in the midst of writing his debut novel, Tarleton’s Quarter, the first of an epic series and novels following the trials and tribulations of three military families in a near-future World War III.
Contact Casey at: casey@oghmacreative.com
Venessa Cerasale
Admin Director
Venessa has had a varied career as an artist, administrator, retail analyst, and police officer. Today, she has turned her considerable talents to her writing and art, and serves as Director of Operations for Oghma Creative Media, the publisher that owns Saddlebag Dispatches. A mother of three and grandmother of two, she enjoys hiking, kayaking, and anything to do with rocks, trees, water, and the outdoors, and is hard at work on her first novel.
Contact Venessa at: venessa@oghmacreative.com
Andrew Butters
Technology Director
Andrew is a 40-something married father of two living in Cambridge, Ontario. He will tell you that his first published work was Losing Vern as part of the Orange Karen: A Tribute to a Warrior anthology but in reality, it was a 500-word anecdote about how he accidentally lit himself on fire that made it into the third installment of the Darwin Awards books.He currently blogs, writes novels, is a huge fan of golf, hockey, science, equality, and the Oxford comma. Andrew sometimes lets his love of attention override common sense. Evidence of this can be found pretty much anywhere you can find him.
Contact Andrew at: andrew@oghmacreative.com