Zinta Aistars is the creative director of Z Word, LLC, a writing and editing service. She is the host of the weekly radio show, Art Beat, on WMUK, the Southwest Michigan NPR affiliate station in Kalamazoo, Michigan, and the author of three published books in her native language of Latvian — a poetry collection, a story collection and a children’s book. Zinta lives on a small farm in Hopkins, Michigan, where she raises chickens and organic vegetables, and wanders the woods between writing assignments.