Jan Johnson Drantell is a writer and editor. From 2000 until 2017 she was the founding publisher of Red Wheel/Weiser Books and Conari Press. She held similar positions in other publishing houses and has worked with individual authors to reorganize and rewrite their manuscripts. She earned a BA from the College of St. Benedict in St. Joseph, MN, and an MFA from San Francisco State University, where she studied with poets and fiction writers Norma Cole, Robert Gluck, Maxine Chernoff, Fenton Johnson, Molly Giles, and others.

She wrote (with co-author Leslie Simon) “A Music I No Longer Heard,” “Healing Hearts: Meditations for Divorce,” plus the poetry chapbook, “This Might End Well After All.” She has also published individual poems and short fiction in anthologies and magazines. She is currently at work on two poetry manuscripts, plus a book on time travel for young adults.

She has taught writing and editing in various settings, among them Book Passage Bookstore & Cafe in Corte Madera, CA and UC Berkeley Extension courses. She loves hanging around with other writers and sharing knowledge and is extraordinarily pleased to be offering writing classes at the White Bear Center for the Arts.