Internationally published and acclaimed author Barbara Esstman, MFA, is the co-editor, with Virginia Hartman, of A More Perfect Union: Stories and Poems About the Modern Wedding (St. Martin's Press). Esstman is also the author of The Other Anna and Night Ride Home, both published in the United States by Harcourt Brace and Harper Perennial, as well as in numerous translations by Bertelsmann and twelve other foreign presses. Both novels were adapted for film by Hallmark Productions.

Esstman's short stories and essays have appeared in both mainstream and literary publications, from Lear's Magazine to Confrontation, and have earned the Redbook Fiction Award and two honorable mentions from the Pushcart Prize. Her articles have appeared in the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and she writes travel copy for Biotrek Adventure Travels. Esstman has been a fellow of the National Endowment for the Arts, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and the Maryland Commission for the Arts. She does private editing for clients writing fiction and memoir, and teaches creative writing at universities in the Washington, DC area, as well as at The Writer's Center in Bethesda, Maryland.

Born in Carroll, Iowa, and raised in St. Charles, Missouri, Esstman attended The Academy of the Sacred Heart in St. Charles for thirteen years. She received a Bachelor of the Arts in English from St. Louis University in 1969, and a Master of Fine Arts from George Mason University in 1987. She lives in Fairfax, Virginia.

For information about workshops, visit The Writer's Center. For mentoring, editing, and book doctoring services, see the Editing section of this website.