Sara M Saleh is an award-winning writer/poet, human rights lawyer, and the daughter of migrants from Palestine, Egypt, and Lebanon. Her poems, short stories, and essays have been widely published nationally in English and Arabic. She is co-editor of the groundbreaking 2019 anthology Arab, Australian, Other. Sara made history as the first poet to win both the Australian Book Review’s 2021 Peter Porter Poetry Prize and the Overland Judith Wright Poetry Prize 2020. Sara lives on Bidjigal land with her partner and their cats, Cappy & Lola. Songs for the Dead and the Living is her first novel.

Yassmin Abdel-Magied is a Sudanese–Australian media presenter and writer, who had an early career as a mechanical engineer. She was named Young Queenslander of the Year in 2010 and Queensland Australian of the Year in 2015 for her engagement in community work.