AMY WALLEN (Circus Ringmaster) is to blame for the idea of 3-minute prose readings known as DimeStories. As the original founder and host, she earned the moniker “Time Dominatrix” for the long running, and very popular open mic. Over the years with showcases and iTunes and CDs produced by Amy, DimeStories became the inspiration for NPR’s Three-Minute Fictions. Besides bossing everyone around at the DimeStories offices, she’s also the author of the Los Angeles Times bestselling novel, MoonPies and Movie Stars. Every summer, Amy can be found as writer-in-residence at the New York State Writers Institute. She writes book reviews for the LA Times and other national magazines. She is a judge for the 2010 PEN/USA Literary Fiction Awards. Discovering she prefers to judge rather than watch the clock, she has hung up her Ringmaster cat-o-nine-tails and is now a DimeStories curator. Selfishly, she focuses most of her time on finishing her second novel, but she still keeps her flash fiction toes wet by being a loyal attendee at the open mics. She still keeps her timer handy.