Bio: Vera Nazarian left the former Soviet Union at the height of the Cold War as a refugee at the age of eight and arrived in the United States a month before her 10th birthday by way of Lebanon, Greece, and Italy. As soon as she figured out the English language, she started to write in it and sold her first short story at the age of 17. Since then she has published numerous works of short fiction in anthologies and magazines such as the Sword and Sorceress and Darkover series edited by the late Marion Zimmer Bradley, and has seen her work translated into French, German, Spanish, Italian, Dutch, and Czech. She is an active member of Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. Her short fiction has been on the Preliminary Nebula ballot and has been Honorably Mentioned by Gardner Dozois' Year's Best SF. Her debut novel, mythic fantasy Dreams of the Compass Rose is forthcoming in May 2002 from Wildside Press, and has already received critical acclaim. Ancient myth, moral fables, and her Armenian and Russian ethnic heritage play a strong part in all her work, combining the essences of things and places long gone into a rich evocation of wonder.