THE SNALLYGASTER
BY BARRY WALLACE

A young writer goes in search of stories about his Appalachian heritage, and in the process discovers an enigmatic relative who exposes a horrifying truth about his family’s past. Mountain folklore meets contemporary suspense as Tim must rediscover his forgotten childhood and confront the power of storytelling.

Barry Wallace is a playwright, theatrical director, and music director from Knoxville, TN. He has written five full-length plays and numerous 10-minute plays. His short play, BLACK BALLOONS, won Best Screenplay and Best Production in the 2022 The Ten Show Film Festival in Provo, UT, and his short plays GROCERY LIST, BAGGAGE, and THE 86th SOUL have been performed at new play festivals in 2025 and 2026. He has a BA in Theatre from the University of Tennessee and is married with two very talented grown children. You can find out more about his works at https://newplayexchange.org/users/69726/barry-wallace.

BLOOM
BY ANYA MARTIN

In BLOOM, aspiring chef and cookbook author, Megan Horst, pitches her farm then to table cookbook to NYC publishers who are more fascinated with exploiting her naivety as a young runaway Mennonite than hearing her insights into growing, harvesting, and cooking. As shocking memories of her childhood inside the harsh confines of her mother’s garden threaten to uproot her dreams, BLOOM unearths the complicated power structures of women and daughters within societies that limit them to bloom where planted. Part cookbook, and part farm know-how, BLOOM, explores a young Mennonite girl’s experience with puberty and adolescence within the constraints of her mother’s garden.

Anya Martin is a playwright and theatre-maker whose work has been praised as “smart, sharp and witty” (City Paper) with “scenes of imagination and poetic insight.” (Pittsburgh Post Gazette) Recently, in 2025, Martin’s play Run Wild, inspired by ancient Greek trilogies, was presented in a sold-out staged reading with Pittsburgh International and Classical Theatre. In 2024, her play The President’s Pants (and Buchanan’s Peace) about a Mennonite woman haunted by the ghost of President Buchanan was a Semi-Finalist for the 2024 O’Neill National Playwrights Conference, and a winner in the Madison New Works Lab. Her play, In Our Time: Pandemic Stories from the Frontlines, based on interviews with ICU women physicians during COVID, and the writings of Hemingway, was presented in staged readings with City of Asylum, The Pittsburgh Cultural Trust, and Hiawatha Project.

Buoyant Sea, Anya’s immersive tactile play exploring states of water and states of being premiered in 2023 in a sold-out run with The Pittsburgh International Children’s Theatre Festival and won the 2024 Artistic Innovation Award with Theatre for Young Audiences USA. Her play, “Demeter’s Fracked Heart,” was a winner with Sienna College’s 2024 Climate Justice Plays, and her play Helen at the Gym (Again) was selected for the ATHE New Play Development Workshop in 2023. An earlier version of this play, Helen at the Gym, was a 2018 RedBull Annual Short Play Festival winner, and was read at the Lucille Lortel Theatre in NYC, and is published with Stage Rights.

Her monologue Like a Dog was published with “Fresh Words: An International Literary Magazine in 2024”. Anya’s play Camino is slated to be published with Pandora Press and Glassenheit Publications this spring of 2026. Currently, Anya teaches playwriting at Duquesne University and taught directing at Carnegie Mellon School of Drama for 7 years. For 15 years, she was the Founding Artistic Director of Hiawatha Project, an award-winning theatre-making company in Pittsburgh, PA. She currently serves on the board of City Theatre in Pittsburgh, PA. Anya earned her BFA from Carnegie Mellon School of Drama and her MFA from Sarah Lawrence College. She is a member of The New Play Exchange, The Playwrights Center, The Dramatists Guild, and Pittsburgh Public Playwrights Collective. Find out more about Anya at www.AnyaMartinPlays.com.

WHAT THE HILLS REMEMBER
BY SAMANTHA OTY

In a remote Appalachian town in the 1950s, residents are struck by a mysterious wave of sudden memory loss. A determined young woman obsessively documents the town’s fading history. When a government scientist, Jasper, arrives to investigate the phenomenon, he finds not only a potential cause buried in the poisoned land, but an unexpected connection with Dortha.

Samantha is a graduate of Radford University (B.S. English; Technical Editing and Writing) and The George Washington University (M.P.S. Publishing; Editorial/Marketing and Promotion). Her first play, Demolition Lovers, was written during her sophomore year of high school and won the 2010 New Voices playwriting contest. She has been writing ever since. Her plays have been produced at MadLab Theatre, Northern Kentucky University, and The Pharmacy Theatre. Her play New Year’s Eve at the Stop-n-Go was adapted into the indie film Turbo Cola by Covert Productions and went on to win several awards in the 2022 film festival cycle, including Best Film at the 2023 Film Threat Awards. When not working on new plays, Sam is half the team behind the Real Horrorshow Podcast and one of the founding members of Postcard Press. She lives in Virginia with her husband and cats, and she may or may not actually be two ten-year-olds in a trenchcoat.

CARSWELL HOLLER
BY TRAVIS LOWE

When a traveling EPA agent stops in for a bite at a greasy spoon café in southern West Virginia’s coal country, it sets off a series of dangerous events and menacing stories, both real and imagined, natural and supernatural. A comedically elegant and broodingly dark celebration of Appalachia and its ghosts.

Travis Lowe is a nationally recognized playwright, whose works include Oxalis, Sixteen Years Tried, Mixed Fandango, Six Knots, Some Notes On Dating During Outbreak, and Recycled Nuts. His plays have been developed and produced by The Magnetic Theatre, Different Strokes! Performing Arts Collective, Multiverse Theatre Collective, Haywood Arts Regional Theatre, Sublime Theatre and Press, and the Montford Park Players. Travis’s picaresque prequel to Twelfth Night, The Humourous Adventures of Sir Andrew Aguecheek, was shortlisted for the Shakespeare’s New Contemporaries Project, and his darkly comedic dive into immigration history, Glister Doves and Gopher Wood, was a finalist for the Princess Grace Foundation’s Playwriting Fellowship. He is a member of The Dramatists Guild of America and currently resides in Asheville, NC with his wife, two parrots, and an enviable collection of kitchen spices.

THE SNALLYGASTER
BY BARRY WALLACE

A young writer goes in search of stories about his Appalachian heritage, and in the process discovers an enigmatic relative who exposes a horrifying truth about his family’s past. Mountain folklore meets contemporary suspense as Tim must rediscover his forgotten childhood and confront the power of storytelling.

Barry Wallace is a playwright, theatrical director, and music director from Knoxville, TN. He has written five full-length plays and numerous 10-minute plays. His short play, BLACK BALLOONS, won Best Screenplay and Best Production in the 2022 The Ten Show Film Festival in Provo, UT, and his short plays GROCERY LIST, BAGGAGE, and THE 86th SOUL have been performed at new play festivals in 2025 and 2026. He has a BA in Theatre from the University of Tennessee and is married with two very talented grown children. You can find out more about his works at https://newplayexchange.org/users/69726/barry-wallace.

BLOOM
BY ANYA MARTIN

In BLOOM, aspiring chef and cookbook author, Megan Horst, pitches her farm then to table cookbook to NYC publishers who are more fascinated with exploiting her naivety as a young runaway Mennonite than hearing her insights into growing, harvesting, and cooking. As shocking memories of her childhood inside the harsh confines of her mother’s garden threaten to uproot her dreams, BLOOM unearths the complicated power structures of women and daughters within societies that limit them to bloom where planted. Part cookbook, and part farm know-how, BLOOM, explores a young Mennonite girl’s experience with puberty and adolescence within the constraints of her mother’s garden.

Anya Martin is a playwright and theatre-maker whose work has been praised as “smart, sharp and witty” (City Paper) with “scenes of imagination and poetic insight.” (Pittsburgh Post Gazette) Recently, in 2025, Martin’s play Run Wild, inspired by ancient Greek trilogies, was presented in a sold-out staged reading with Pittsburgh International and Classical Theatre. In 2024, her play The President’s Pants (and Buchanan’s Peace) about a Mennonite woman haunted by the ghost of President Buchanan was a Semi-Finalist for the 2024 O’Neill National Playwrights Conference, and a winner in the Madison New Works Lab. Her play, In Our Time: Pandemic Stories from the Frontlines, based on interviews with ICU women physicians during COVID, and the writings of Hemingway, was presented in staged readings with City of Asylum, The Pittsburgh Cultural Trust, and Hiawatha Project.

Buoyant Sea, Anya’s immersive tactile play exploring states of water and states of being premiered in 2023 in a sold-out run with The Pittsburgh International Children’s Theatre Festival and won the 2024 Artistic Innovation Award with Theatre for Young Audiences USA. Her play, “Demeter’s Fracked Heart,” was a winner with Sienna College’s 2024 Climate Justice Plays, and her play Helen at the Gym (Again) was selected for the ATHE New Play Development Workshop in 2023. An earlier version of this play, Helen at the Gym, was a 2018 RedBull Annual Short Play Festival winner, and was read at the Lucille Lortel Theatre in NYC, and is published with Stage Rights.

Her monologue Like a Dog was published with “Fresh Words: An International Literary Magazine in 2024”. Anya’s play Camino is slated to be published with Pandora Press and Glassenheit Publications this spring of 2026. Currently, Anya teaches playwriting at Duquesne University and taught directing at Carnegie Mellon School of Drama for 7 years. For 15 years, she was the Founding Artistic Director of Hiawatha Project, an award-winning theatre-making company in Pittsburgh, PA. She currently serves on the board of City Theatre in Pittsburgh, PA. Anya earned her BFA from Carnegie Mellon School of Drama and her MFA from Sarah Lawrence College. She is a member of The New Play Exchange, The Playwrights Center, The Dramatists Guild, and Pittsburgh Public Playwrights Collective. Find out more about Anya at www.AnyaMartinPlays.com.

WHAT THE HILLS REMEMBER
BY SAMANTHA OTY

In a remote Appalachian town in the 1950s, residents are struck by a mysterious wave of sudden memory loss. A determined young woman obsessively documents the town’s fading history. When a government scientist, Jasper, arrives to investigate the phenomenon, he finds not only a potential cause buried in the poisoned land, but an unexpected connection with Dortha.

Samantha is a graduate of Radford University (B.S. English; Technical Editing and Writing) and The George Washington University (M.P.S. Publishing; Editorial/Marketing and Promotion). Her first play, Demolition Lovers, was written during her sophomore year of high school and won the 2010 New Voices playwriting contest. She has been writing ever since. Her plays have been produced at MadLab Theatre, Northern Kentucky University, and The Pharmacy Theatre. Her play New Year’s Eve at the Stop-n-Go was adapted into the indie film Turbo Cola by Covert Productions and went on to win several awards in the 2022 film festival cycle, including Best Film at the 2023 Film Threat Awards. When not working on new plays, Sam is half the team behind the Real Horrorshow Podcast and one of the founding members of Postcard Press. She lives in Virginia with her husband and cats, and she may or may not actually be two ten-year-olds in a trenchcoat.

CARSWELL HOLLER
BY TRAVIS LOWE

When a traveling EPA agent stops in for a bite at a greasy spoon café in southern West Virginia’s coal country, it sets off a series of dangerous events and menacing stories, both real and imagined, natural and supernatural. A comedically elegant and broodingly dark celebration of Appalachia and its ghosts.

Travis Lowe is a nationally recognized playwright, whose works include Oxalis, Sixteen Years Tried, Mixed Fandango, Six Knots, Some Notes On Dating During Outbreak, and Recycled Nuts. His plays have been developed and produced by The Magnetic Theatre, Different Strokes! Performing Arts Collective, Multiverse Theatre Collective, Haywood Arts Regional Theatre, Sublime Theatre and Press, and the Montford Park Players. Travis’s picaresque prequel to Twelfth Night, The Humourous Adventures of Sir Andrew Aguecheek, was shortlisted for the Shakespeare’s New Contemporaries Project, and his darkly comedic dive into immigration history, Glister Doves and Gopher Wood, was a finalist for the Princess Grace Foundation’s Playwriting Fellowship. He is a member of The Dramatists Guild of America and currently resides in Asheville, NC with his wife, two parrots, and an enviable collection of kitchen spices.