Daybreak
All content © Daybreak Upper Valley LLC
© 2026 Daybreak Upper Valley LLC.
I've been a journalist for most of my working life, first writing for publications about state and national politics and about how communities grapple with change, then working for an Upper Valley news startup, and finally, launching Daybreak in early 2019. I really like telling people stuff they didn't know.
Carin Pratt is one of the remarkably knowledgeable crew at the Norwich Bookstore—and an ardent recommender of books. Before she landed in these parts, she spent 27 years at CBS News, including two decades as the executive producer of Face the Nation.
Corin Hirsch has covered the food and drinks world for Seven Days and Newsday, and contributes to The Guardian, Wine Enthusiast and other publications. She can also be found tending bar at the Woodstock Inn.
Emma Kaas co-owns the Norwich Bookstore with her husband, Sam Kaas. When she’s not at the bookstore, you’ll most likely find her reading books, baking bread, tinkering with spreadsheets, or pulling tarot cards.
Erica Houskeeper is a freelance writer and photographer who lives in Burlington, Vermont. She publishes Happy Vermont, a website, newsletter, and podcast about exploring the Green Mountain State.
H Rooker is the Assistant Store Manager at Still North Books and Bar, and a lifelong New Englander.
Jared is an adult services librarian at the Howe Library in Hanover. He purchases a range of nonfiction for the library and conspires with a colleague to devise the library’s programming. When otherwise free, he’s usually in the mountains, swimming in local ponds and rivers, trying his hand at new cuisines, reading, or dreaming of walking the Scottish Highlands.
Kari Meutsch and Kristian Preylowski co-own and run the Yankee Bookshop in Woodstock.
Kate Oden is a freelance writer, editor, and translator living in Hanover. She publishes more brief book reviews on Substack.
Liza Bernard is a voracious reader who enjoys both printed volumes and audiobooks. Formerly co-owner of the Norwich Bookstore, she maintains her connections with readers and writers as the Programming and Marketing Librarian at the Norman Williams Public Library in Woodstock, Vermont.
Michaela Lavelle loves people, books, and spaces where those things can come together. She is the Director of the Quechee/Wilder Libraries in Hartford and can be found playing volleyball, taking long walks, or attempting to bake without a recipe when she is not in the stacks.
Chicago-born Peter Orner is the author of eight books, most recently the novel, The Gossip Columnist’s Daughter, named a best book of 2025 by the New Yorker and the Chicago Tribune, and the story collection, Maggie Brown & Others. He's been called “a master of the short story” by the New York Times. His collection of essays, Am I Alone Here? was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism, and his second non-fiction book, Still No Word from You, was a finalist for the Pen Award for the Art of the Essay. Peter’s work has appeared in the New Yorker, the Paris Review, the Atlantic, Harper’s, Granta, and received four Pushcart Prizes. He teaches at Dartmouth College, and lives with his family in Norwich, where he’s a volunteer firefighter.
Sam and Emma Kaas own and run the Norwich Bookstore.
Eric Francis is a veteran Upper Valley freelancer, covering crime, fires, natural disasters, and the occasional rabid bobcat.
Jeff Sharlet is a professor of creative nonfiction at Dartmouth College and the bestselling author and editor of eight books including The Undertow, The Family, and This Brilliant Darkness, which begins in the clock tower of the Hotel Coolidge in White River Junction and ends in Norwich, where he lives with his family and creatures.
Lexi Krupp is an independent journalist based in Burlington. She previously reported on health care for Vermont Public.
Matt Golec is a former Upper Valley writer, teacher, and board game designer. You can learn more at mattgolec.com.
Rena J. Mosteirin is the author of Disaster Tourism (BOA Editions) and Experiment 116 (Counterpath Press). Mosteirin is co-author, with James E. Dobson, of Moonbit (punctum books) and Perceptron (punctum books). Mosteirin teaches at Dartmouth College and owns Left Bank Books.
Duncan Green is a rising senior at Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, where he is studying journalism and history. Next fall, he will be taking on a lead producing role for the Newshouse, a campus publication covering SU and the city of Syracuse. Duncan graduated from Lebanon High School in 2023 and is based out of Plainfield this summer.
Peter Money is a poet, playwright, and author of the novel Oh When the Saints (Dublin) whose mentor was the Beat Poet Allen Ginsberg. His writing has appeared in The Irish Times, The Sun, American Poetry Review, on The Writer’s Almanac and RTE Radio 1 Ireland (“Loves: Silence and the Music of JS Bach”). Peter plays in the band Los Lorcas (their latest album Wild Island tracks are online) and his memoir about “leavings” is forthcoming in 2026.
Sarah Copps lives in Enfield with her husband, cat, and dog. Her writing includes newspaper reporting, freelance writing, and literary fiction.
All content © Daybreak Upper Valley LLC