Artistic Director for LitFest Pasadena

Jervey Tervalon, MFA, is the award-winning, Los Angeles Times bestselling author of five books including Understanding This, a novel based on his experiences teaching at Locke High School in Los Angeles, for which he won the Quality Paper Book Club’s New Voices Award. Jervey was born in New Orleans and raised in the Jefferson Park neighborhood of Los Angeles where he attended Foshay Junior High. He received his MFA in Creative Writing from UC Irvine and was a Disney Screenwriting fellow and a Shanghai Writers Association Fellow.

He is the Founder of Literature for Life. He is also the Co-founder of LitFest in the Dena (originally named LitFest Pasadena). Currently he teaches fiction writing and Literature at the College of Creative Studies at U.C. Santa Barbara. His latest novel is Monster’s Chef was published by Amistad/HarperCollins.

President of Light Bringer Project

Tom Coston has been actively involved in the greater Los Angeles nonprofit community for the past 18 years. As president of Light Bringer Project he leads the organization and its board to fulfillment of its mission “to build communities through the power of the arts,” and to achieve long-term success for its innovative learning, prevention and career pathways programs.

Tom has held leadership positions on the boards of many high-profile nonprofit organizations, including Villa Esperanza Services, Leadership Pasadena, Mothers Club Family Learning Center, Arroyo Seco Foundation, and Institute for Urban Research and Development and has served as board president of several of these. Tom is the producer of Pasadena’s famed Doo Dah Parade. He is a graduate of UCLA.

Managing Director of Light Bringer Project

Patricia has daily oversight responsibility of Light Bringer Project, its programs and operational needs. A graduate with a Fine Arts degree from Art Center College of Design, she has professional experience in public relations and marketing. She is a past board member of Leadership Pasadena and is on the communication task force for Villa Esperanza Services which serves developmentally disabled individuals and their families.

Project Developer of Light Bringer Project

Natalie oversees the production of Light Bringer Project’s free and public events, which include LitFest in the Dena, the Pasadena Chalk Festival, and the Pasadena Doo Dah Parade. She also manages other special projects under development. Natalie is a graduate student in English at Cal Poly Pomona with a focus in Rhetoric & Composition and a former slush reader for Uncharted Magazine. She is a writer of speculative short fiction and poetry, saxophone player, and zine maker.

Her writing has made in appearances in Eye To The Telescope, Third Estate Art, and Worlds of Possibility. She is the 2024 recipient for the Ted Pugh Poetry Award.

Literary Arts Coordinator of Light Bringer Project & Omega Sci-Fi Project

Valentina Gomez’s work with us is focused in the literary arts, with Omega Sci Fi Project and Locavore Lit LA. She has been a contributing teacher on our in-school literary programs with visiting authors, a reader of student stories for competitions, as well as an advisor to LitFest in the Dena programming. She firmly believes reading and writing are critically important to childrens’ development toward their future success in the world. She is a recent graduate of USC with a dual B.A. in Creative Writing and Psychology, and an M.A. in Publishing.