The Luminaries

Dr. Kelly Anderson is a family physician with fellowships in HIV and emergency medicine. She has worked extensively in rural and remote emergency departments, spent fifteen years at the Inner City Family Health Team at St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto, and built the clinical team at Felix Health. After completing the Bookends Novel Fellowship, she trained in the Gateless Writing Academy and is a certified Gateless writing teacher. Kelly spent much of her childhood in British Columbia, and now lives in Guelph, Ontario with her family. The Wild Beneath, coming from Park Row/HarperCollins Canada in August 2026, is her first novel.

kellychristineanderson.com
@doctorkellyanderson on instagram

Kevin Melville Jennings: Tarot Master, Metaphysical Counselor & Astrological Guide

Kevin Melville Jennings is a New York–based metaphysical counselor, astrologer, and scholar of the sacred Tarot. Blending traditional and esoteric wisdom, he weaves together astrology, alchemy, and ancient philosophy to guide others on their spiritual journeys. His work unites mystical insight with practical application, helping clients explore the deeper realms of consciousness, creativity, and personal transformation.

A Gateless-trained teacher under the guidance of Suzanne Kingsbury, Kevin has, at Gateless retreats, opened and closed each day with the Tarot—using its images as portals into writing, intuition, and the unconscious.

A lifelong student of the Western Mystery Tradition since the age of eleven, Kevin has devoted his life to the study and practice of the esoteric arts. Beginning in 1995, he has guided a meditation circle devoted to inner stillness and revelation. His astrological insights reached a global audience through Vogue.com’s Daily Scope, and he was recognized among twenty-five visionary leaders in Apples Are Square: Thinking Differently About Leadership by Susan and Thomas Kuczmarski.

Through his teaching, writing, and divinatory practice, Kevin’s work continues to inspire others to awaken to the sacred wisdom that resides both within and around them, and illuminates the inner cosmos of the human heart.

Shanta Lee is an award-winning visual artist, writer across genres, author, and public intellectual who often says she is a “…practitioner of entanglement” for all of the ways she brings things together in her work. Winner of the New England Poetry Club’s Grant for Poetic Achievement, Abel Meeropol Social Justice Writing Award, and a 2024 National Arts Strategies Creative Community Fellow (New England), her work has been widely featured in Harper’s Magazine, The Massachusetts Review, ITERANT Literary Magazine, Palette Poetry, Prism, Ms. Magazine, and DAME Magazine, alongside of her former radio segment she created, produced, and reported for Vermont Public.

Shanta Lee’s previous books include: Co-Editor with Philip Brady of the anthology, Sign & Breath: Voice and the Literary Tradition (Etruscan Press, 2025); A double volume of two chapbooks, Close Is… and Hopscotch Between the Living and the Dead (Diode Editions, 2024); This Is How They Teach You How to Want It…The Slaughter: A Field Guide for the Hunted & the Hunter, The Dead-Alive, The Live-Dead Ones, The… (Harbor Editions, 2024); Black Metamorphoses—named a finalist in the 2021 Hudson Prize, shortlisted for the 2021 Cowles Poetry Book Prize and longlisted for the 2021 Idaho Poetry Prize—illustrated by Alan Blackwell (Etruscan Press, 2023); and GHETTOCLAUSTROPHOBIA: Dreamin of Mama While Trying to Speak Woman in Woke Tongues (Diode Editions, 2021), winner of the Vermont Book Award.

Shanta Lee also has a broad professional wingspan which includes a few programs academic mentor programs and a statewide internship program that have run for 20+ years long after her tenure. Lee has an MFA in Creative Non-Fiction and Poetry at the Vermont College of Fine Arts, an MBA from the University of Hartford, and an undergraduate degree in Women, Gender and Sexuality from Trinity College.  Explore her work by visiting, Shantalee.com and stay tuned for her forthcoming hybrid work, Do Words Dream Themselves Into Silence Told in Riddles? (Harbor Editions, 2026).

Iyabo Onipede is a facilitator, speaker, and consultant who leads challenging yet compassionate learning experiences which create belonging, and thriving racial and cultural inclusion in organizations. A graduate of Goucher College and Georgetown University Law School, Iyabo self identifies now as a “recovering attorney” after practicing law for 20 years. She also has a Master of Divinity from Candler School of Theology at Emory University. She also serves as the Co-Director of Compassionate Atlanta, where she delights in loving on her diverse and eclectic community and most comfortable in her own skin. Iyabo’s home on the web is www.iamiyabo.com.

Jennifer Barrett is the Chief Education Officer at Acorns, a financial wellness app with more than 5.5 million users, and founding editor of its money site, Grow. Before Acorns, she held various management roles in media, including Personal Finance Editor at CNBC and Senior Vice President and Editor in Chief at DailyWorth, a financial media company targeting women. She also served previously as a General Manager at Hearst Digital, overseeing four magazine sites, including Cosmopolitan and Seventeen.

A longtime financial literacy advocate and award-winning journalist, Jennifer began her financial journalism career covering foreign exchange for The Wall Street Journal and spent seven years at Newsweek, where she was a staff writer and editor. The co-author of two personal finance books, she’s also written for several national publications including The New York Times, The Washington Post, Worth and Money. She’s currently working on a book about women and breadwinning. Follow her on Twitter @JBarrettNYC.  As well as her time in the Academy where she “fell in love” with the writers in her pod, who became cheerleaders during the launch and the sale, Jen has also been to Gateless Retreats in Joshua Tree and Paris and is at work with Gateless on her second book.

Dr. Heather Bartos writes about midlife the way women actually live it: with grit, humor, mascara smudges, and the occasional burst of magic. An OB/GYN and US Navy veteran, she has spent two decades helping women feel at home in their own bodies. Her newest book, Quickies: 100 Little Lessons for Living Sexily Ever After in Midlife, is a playful, poignant collection of wisdom for the next great era of our lives. Named one of the top menopause experts in the U.S. by Oprah and Maria Shriver, she blends science with real talk and just enough irreverence to be dangerous. Her forthcoming novel, Are You There, God? It’s Me, Menopause, arrives May 2026.

My website is heatherbartosmd.com

Natalie Schriefer, MFA is a freelance writer and academic editor. She focuses on pop culture, health, and identity (particularly bisexuality). Her short-form CNF and journalism have appeared in Poets & Writers, CNN, Wired, HuffPost, The Rumpus, and more. Natalie’s long-form work includes a 2026 media tie-in book based on the manga series Komi Can’t Communicate. When she isn’t at her desk, she’s often out walking or learning a new sport. You can find her online at www.natalieschriefer.com.

I. Murphy Lewis is the author of Across the Divide to the Divine: An African Initiation (2024) and Why Ostriches Don’t Fly and Other Tales from the African Bush (1997). After her initiation with the Maasai Warriors in Kenya, Lewis left her executive position with the Fashion House, Badgley Mischka, to complete a Masters and PhD in Mythology with an Emphasis of Depth Psychology and Culture at Pacifica Graduate Institute. She lives and writes in Paris, working psychoanalytically and shamanically with private clients in the Akashic Records and facilitates a writing group on Fridays at 12 pm EST on Terri Trespicio’s New Rules. As founder, she oversees IML Publications, LLC and the Global Voice® Foundation.

Sara O’Keeffe is one of the most successful literary agents for commercial and literary fiction.

Based at the London office of globally renowned literary agency, Andrew Nurnberg Associates, Sara represents best-selling and award-winning authors from all over the world and gets the best possible publishing, TV and film deals for her clients.

Melanie Maure is a Gateless Life and Writing coach, Somatic Therapist, and psychotherapist with a Master’s in Counselling Psychology. She’s also a novelist and has shared numerous reflective essays and psychoeducational articles in places like HuffPost, Elephant Journal, Medium, and Vocal. Melanie truly loves helping other writers discover and express the voice that lives in the soul and craft their words to express the beautiful stories that reside within us all. Living in the breathtaking province of British Columbia, Canada, she feels deeply grateful to call such an inspiring and spectacular part of the world her home.