Jury Gregorio, formerly of Manila but now based in Singapore working for one of the large advertising multinationals there, is a writer and creative director who used to work with the editor when the latter was still in the industry. Jury has won awards in local creative races, for his campaigns as well as his photography and has since gone on to make a name for himself in advertising outside the country, while pursuing his passion for photography. He has exhibited in Singapore, Japan, and Berlin, among other places. His photographic portfolio may be viewed at Jury Gregorio Photography at http://jurygregorio.com/, and he keeps a blog, Blackbook, at http://jurygregorio.blogspot.com/.
Aberjhani, poet, historian, journalist, blogger, and novelist, appears for the second time in our online magazine. He is co-author of the award-winning Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance (Facts On File); and author of The Wisdom of W.E.B. Du Bois. The recently published Bridge of Silver Wings is his third book of poetry; and Christmas When Music Almost Killed the World his first novel. He is currently at work on the completion of a 17-year book project, titled Elemental: the Power of Illuminated Love, featuring the work of the critically acclaimed award-winning artist Luther E. Vann with poetry and prose by Aberjhani. In addition, he is founder of the popular Creative Thinkers International website.
Jose Marte A. Abueg’s collection "Bird Lands, River Nights and Other Melancholies" won for him the Grand Prize in Gawad Likhaan: The University of the Philippines Centennial Award, for poetry in English. His other literary awards include the Palancas for fiction and the Philippines Free Press award for poetry. He has been published in the Ani literary annual of the Cultural Center of the Philippines, Philippines Free Press, and Sunday Times Magazine. Mart is a longtime journalist and editor, currently the managing editor of INQUIRER.net and overall editor in charge of the INQUIRER.net Money website.
Edgar B. Maranan is a poet, essayist, fictionist, playwright, writer of children’s stories, and translator. He has won a total of thirty prizes—a record number—for his works in English and Filipino, in the Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Literature, and was inducted into the Palanca Hall of Fame in 2000. He has also won awards in the Cultural Center of the Philippines Annual Literary Contest, Palihang Aurelio Tolentino Playwriting Competition, Institute of National Language poetry competition, Philippines Free Press Literary Awards, Philippine Graphic Magazine Nick Joaquin Literary Prize, Filamore Tabios Sr. Memorial Poetry Prize (Meritage Press, USA), and the Philippine Board on Books for Young People (PBBY)-Salanga Writers Prize, which he won three years in a row, from 1989 to 1991. Maranan’s third poetry book, Passage / poems 1983-2006, came out in October 2007, under the Bookmark imprint. Most of the poems in this book are part of poetry collections which won in the Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Literature (Voyage, 1984; Hinterland, 1987; Star Maps, 1988; and Tabon, 2000). He is an active member of the newly formed Baguio Writers Group.
Victor Peñaranda, after long assignments in Bhutan and Macedonia while doing development work, is back in the Philippines and once again extensively traveling his beloved home archipelago. From his various stops he invariably sends us poems like postcards—deep, inward-looking mementoes and shots-in-the-arm—which help keep our little online magazine going. He has won the Palancas, the Philippines Free Press Awards, and has been in journalism, most notably the now defunct broadsheet-format New Age and literary magazine called Ermita, which he edited together with Alfred A. Yuson. In its inimitable manner, Ermita brought together some of the best Filipino literary and artistic talents during its existence of a little more than a year. Bimboy, as he is known to friends, is a man of many interests, from the hard realities of underdevelopment to the evolution of consciousness. His first book, Voyage in Dry Season, won the Manila Critics Circle’s National Book Award in 1996.
Fidel Rillo is a poet and much sought-after book designer who still resists publishing his own book of poems (enough to make a book by all standards). Active in the local poetry workshop circuit, he lectures at the Linangan sa Imahen, Retorika, at Arte, the poetry clinic of National Artist for Literature Rio Alma. Fidel's poetry is well anthologized and is part of the post-First Quarter Storm movement in Tagalog/Filipino writing that employs the lyric, historical consciousness, and contemporary sensibility even when engaged in nationalist causes.
