2021

Since starting her career in the book business in 2012, Kristīne Pīkenena has been actively promoting Latvian and international literature. Currently she works as manager of the Jānis Roze Bookstore in Riga, at Kr.Barona street. She has taken part in three ICYB (International Congress of Young Booksellers), that used to gather young at heart booksellers from all around the globe. For more than six years she has been bringing together likeminded readers in the book club “Total Cover” (Totāls vāks), with monthly literary meetings on diverse subjects. 

Petrit Ymeri is the executive director of the Dituria publishing house, founded in May 1991. For several years, he was a literature teacher in high school and later a lecturer in foreign literature at the University of Tirana. Until 1991, he was a cultural journalist for the Albanian Radiotelevision and later the head of the editorial sector of the 8 November publishing house. From 2003 to 2014, Petrit Ymeri was a member of the Board of Directors of the Albanian Radiotelevision.

Jasmin B. Frelih (1986) is an author and translator from Slovenia. His first novel In/Half won the EUPL in 2016 and was since translated into ten languages. His short story collection Tiny Ideologies was published in 2015 and his essay collection Pale Freedom (2018) won the Marjan Rožanc award for best book of essays. His next novel is forthcoming this year from Beletrina publishing house. He lives in Škofja Loka with his partner and their dog.

Svetlozar Zhelev is a well known contemporary expert in the Bulgarian literary field. Former publisher, TV and radio host, he was a board member of the Bulgarian Book Association from 2006 to 2010, and president of the jury for the "Translations" program of the National Culture Fund from 2018 to 2020. He is a member of the programing committee of the "TRADUKI" network, board member of ENLIT, co-founder and board member of the "Elizabeth Kostova Foundation on Creative Writing", and a lecturer in Sofia University "St. Kliment Ohridski" since 2013.

In 2001, Shakeh established Artbridge, the first bookstore café and restaurant in Yerevan, Armenia. During the past 20 years, she managed to change the culture of bookselling in the country, by promoting Armenian books, exporting them to libraries and customers around the world, and participating in international book fairs with the same vision of promoting Armenian issues and literature. She has initiated the project “Exhibition and Sales” for rural area in Armenia with collaboration with publishers to promote new publications.

Isabel Lucas is a journalist and literary critic. She started to do journalism on television and has since passed through the editorial staff of some of the main Portuguese newspapers and magazines. Freelance since 2012, she writes regularly for Público newspaper, collaborates with Ler and has collaborated with several national and international publications. Among many of his work in various journalistic areas, he has featured in articles and interviews with some of the most celebrated American authors.

Renate Punka wears three hats in her daily professional life. She is managing director of Janis Roze Publishers – one of the oldest and most respectable publishing houses, the home of many established and aspiring writers from Latvia and, mostly, from abroad.

Ben Andoni was born in Tirana. He studied Geography and History. Since 1996, his main profession has been as a journalist. For 12 years, he was the manager of a National Cultural Supplement. He works regularly for columns concerned with national politics and Kosovar issues. He has translated more than 20 prominent authors from Slavic and English literature. He also published 5 books of his own, concerned with history, publicity and geographic issues, and is the co-authors of some reports of the Civil Society. 

Lucia Butnariuc was born in 1995. She studied History at  the Faculty of History and Philosophy of Moldova State University,. Since September 2019, she is a bookseller at Cărturești Chișinău.

Darin Tenev is an associate professor in the Literary Theory Department of the University of Sofia “St. Kliment Ohridski” and director of the Institute for Critical Social Studies at the University of Plovdiv. He gave lectures in Tokyo, Kyoto, New York, Berlin, Münster. He has published two books – Fiction and Image. Models (2012) and Digressions. Essays on Jacques Derrida (2013).