Our Current Staff
Many thanks to our graduates, alumni and volunteer staff, without whom much of our work would not be possible!
SCOTT W. BERG – PUBLISHER
Born and raised in the Twin Cities, Scott W. Berg holds a BA in Architecture from the University of Minnesota, an MA from Miami University of Ohio, and an MFA in Creative Writing from George Mason University, where he now teaches publishing, writing, and literature. He is the author of The Burning of the World, Grand Avenues: The Story of Pierre Charles L’Enfant, the French Visionary Who Designed Washington, D.C. and 38 Nooses: Lincoln, Little Crow, and the Beginning of the Frontier’s End.
TAYLOR SCHAEFER – EDITORIAL DIRECTOR
Taylor Schaefer (MFA ‘25) is the recipient of Stillhouse Press’s inaugural post-graduate fellowship, and will serve as the press’s Editorial Director until Spring 2026.
In her three years as a student at Stillhouse, Taylor previously worked as Director of Marketing, and was the publicist for The Rolodex Happenings, Liddle Deaths, The Atlas of Remedies, Sad Grownups, Leafskin, and Tell Me Yours, I’ll Tell You Mine.
Taylor writes lyric and journalistic essays focused on myth, nostalgia, recent sociocultural history, and human exploration. She loves to read essay collections with a magnified voice that blur the boundaries of genre and narrative. Essays that read like fiction, essays that read like poetry– she is especially interested in narrative nonfiction that blends the personal with research and niche topics. She is currently at work on her first full-length project, an essay collection about gun culture and myths in American Identity.
JACOB SHARP – EDITOR-IN-CHIEF, PUBLICIST
Jacob Sharp (he/him) is a third-year MFA candidate in Creative Writing at George Mason University. Jacob received his BA in English and recently relocated from Asheville, North Carolina. He has a fascination for birds, reptiles, and invertebrates. His tuxedo cat Beelzebub is his partner-in-crime.
Currently, Jacob is focusing on his literary fiction short stories and has begun dabbling in historical fiction. Jacob finds inspiration from reading literature that focuses on dissecting the human psyche.
After graduation, Jacob hopes to continue to pursue a career in publishing while also focusing on publishing his own works.
CHRIS MANN – ACQUISITIONS EDITOR
Chris Mann (he/him) is a third-year MFA candidate in Fiction at George Mason University. Chris received his B.A. in Creative Writing from the University of Texas at El Paso (1994) and earned an MFA in Theatre Arts from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (2002). In addition to his literary studies at Mason, Chris will graduate with a certificate in publishing.
Chris is heavily influenced by writers of Southern Gothic such as Eudora Welty, Flannery O'Conner, and Tennessee Williams. He often writes on the trials and tribulations of those characters who live in the south. He also enjoys venturing from that and into the realm of what it means to function within the growing pressures of these challenging times in the United States.
After graduation, Chris intends to pursue a career in publishing as well as continuing his own writing.
OLIVIA BISSELL – DESIGNER
Olivia Bissell (she/her) is a 2024 graduate of George Mason University’s Master of Arts in English Literature. She received her Bachelor of Arts in English and Psychology from the College of William & Mary in 2022. At Stillhouse, Olivia is an Assistant Editor on Sad Grownups (2024), Leafskin (2025), Tell Me Yours, I’ll Tell You Mine, I'll Tell You Yours (2025) and some upcoming projects. She also has been a part of the Media and Marketing team through her creation of social media graphics promoting Stillhouse and its books. She designed the temporary book cover for Leafskin and the preliminary design for the cover for I'll Tell You Mine, I'll Tell You Yours. For her day job, Olivia is in an editorial position at the American Association for the Advancements of Science (AAAS). She hopes to eventually become a lead editor at a major publishing company and possibly publish a novel too. Olivia also enjoys reading and writing fantasy, science fiction, and short stories in her free time. Outside the publishing world, she likes to paint, knit and play video games.
REBECCA BURKE – CONSULTING EDITOR
Rebecca Burke (she/her) is a 2021 graduate of George Mason University’s MFA in Creative Writing with a concentration in Fiction, and a 2017 graduate from Mason with a BA in Government and International Relations. At Stillhouse, Rebecca has previously worked as the Submissions Editor and Manager, an assistant editor for You Will Never be Normal and Shapeshifting, and the lead editor for Stillhouse’s first anthology, In Between Spaces: An Anthology of Disabled Writers, and for Sad Grownups, winner of the 2025 PEN/Bingham Award for Debut Short Story Collection. For her day job, she manages the production of over 2,000 articles a year for Science Advances, an interdisciplinary open-access online journal, and she hopes to eventually teach an undergraduate class on publishing.
Rebecca predominantly writes contemporary fiction and short-form nonfiction, and is currently working on a novel about queerness, trauma, and recovery. She loves voice-driven narratives that take bold risks and ask pressing questions in new or previously unexplored ways. Some of her favorites include Little Fires Everywhere, Make Your Home Among Strangers, Station Eleven, and Things We Didn’t Talk About When I Was a Girl.
PAUL LOGAN – INTERIOR DESIGN
Paul Logan IV (they/he) is a George Mason alum who received their MA in English Literature in 2024. Paul received their BA in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies with a minor in Spanish from American University in 2022. They do all the interior designs for the books we publish at Stillhouse Press.
Paul loves to read anything with a queer lens. Mainly fantasy, romance, horror, and graphic novels. They also run all the social media accounts for Safe Space NoVa, a queer youth non-profit in northern Virginia. After graduation, they hope to continue working in the publishing field doing interior design work for a queer publishing house.
CAROL MITCHELL – CONSULTING EDITOR
Carol Mitchell (she/her) is a book editor at Stillhouse Press and an alum of the George Mason University MFA program (2020). Her first novel for adults: What Start Bad a Mornin' was published by Central Avenue Publishing in September 2023. In the past she has written realistic fiction, however, her love of fantasy has been nudging its way into her writing and appearing as magical realism in the most unexpected places. In addition to being an author, Carol is a trained and experienced editor who enjoys working with Stillhouse authors to bring out the best in their work.
SYDNEY FLOYD – SUBMISSIONS MANAGER
Sydney Floyd (she/her) is a second-year candidate in Nonfiction at George Mason University. Syd received her BA in English, also from George Mason University, and is originally from Fauquier County, Virginia. She is obsessed with her three cats, loves a good anime, and thinks tattoos are an underrated form of therapy.
Syd’s writing focuses primarily on her complicated family dynamics, as well as the effects of growing up on a farm in rural Virginia. She has begun to dabble in more experimental forms of nonfiction and has a growing fascination with writing on the intersection of media—TV, movies, music, literature--and her personal life.
Syd hopes to continue her career in publishing following her graduation and plans to get her own works out into the world.
KAYLA BROWN – SOCIAL MEDIA AND MARKETING DIRECTOR
Kayla Brown (she/her) is a third-year MFA candidate in Creative Writing at George Mason University. Kayla received her BA in English with a concentration in Creative Writing. She’s from Fort Washington, Maryland and enjoys traveling (Switzerland is her happy place), listening to foreign music, and being enthralled in epic love stories whether on tv or in a book.
Currently, Kayla is focusing on her personal essays but also enjoys dabbling in all three genres (poetry, nonfiction, and fiction). Kayla has studied abroad in Greece to focus on poetry and finds inspiration from her travels to use for her current writing.
After Graduation, Kayla hopes to continue to pursue a career in publishing while also focusing on publishing her own work.
EZRA RODRIGUEZ – ASSISTANT EDITOR
Ezra Rodriguez (they/he) is a first year MFA candidate in fiction at George Mason University. Ezra recieved their B.A. in Writing Seminars from Johns Hopkins University in 2018. Previously to coming to Stillhouse Press, Ezra spent two years working at the Jennifer Lyons Agency and seven years at Johns Hopkins University Press, assisting the history and life science lists in addition to acquiring books in K-12 Education Policy. They currently live in Baltimore with their husband and three cats.
Ezra writes weird, transgressive, and multifaceted queer narratives within a speculative framework. They aspire to follow the model of writers such as Channa Porter, Harlan Ellison, Ryka Aoki, and Italo Calvino, who excel at combining lyricism and tight narrative control to capture the humanity within the fantastic.
After graduation, Ezra plans to continue working in publishing and (hopefully) publish their first novel.
VICTORIA REYNOLDS – POETRY EDITOR
Born in Philadelphia, Victoria Reynolds (she/her) has spent the majority of her life in Pennsylvania. Victoria is a 2025 graduate of George Mason University’s MFA in Creative Writing with a concentration in Poetry and received a BA in English Literature with a Creative Writing Concentration from Gettysburg College in 2015. She also has a graduate certificate in publishing from George Mason University.
Her work contends with the fallibility of memory and her poems appear in Salt Hill, Muzzle, South Carolina Review, Raleigh Review, and elsewhere. In 2025, she was selected as an artist-in-residence through the National Park Service for Isle Royale National Park. Victoria is a former professional ski instructor and a hobby cook. Post-MFA, Victoria plans to pursue a career in teaching and hopes to publish her debut poetry collection in the coming years.
