About Us
Welcome to Red Room, the online home of the world’s greatest writers. Through original, author-generated content, we offer a trustworthy and creative social network unlike any other. Here, you can connect with your favorite authors, access current industry news, and comment on engaging features. By fostering true community between authors and readers, Red Room showcases esteemed writers and inspires the next generation. We also give back to the community we aim to nurture with our commitment to the Causes We Support.
To be in the Red Room is to be part of the conversation.
Who We Are
Ivory S. Madison
Founder and CEO
Founder and CEO Ivory Madison is a writer, editor, and entrepreneur living in her hometown of San Francisco. A former management consultant to startups and the Fortune 500, Madison has finally combined her love of writing with her business acumen. Before launching redroom.com, she founded the Red Room Writers Society in 2002, where she personally helped hundreds of aspiring and professional writers complete their books. As a result, Madison was named Best Writing Coach by San Francisco magazine. Trained as an attorney, Madison was Editor in Chief of her Law Review, interned at the California Supreme Court, and served as a Law Fellow at Americans United for Separation of Church and State. Her adventures have also included episodes as a New Orleans restaurateur, radical feminist politico, and torch singer at the Plush Room. Her noir graphic novel, Huntress: Year One, will be published by DC Comics in 2008. It tells the origin story of a strong female superhero. Madison is twenty-nine.
Machaela M. Hoctor
Vice President
A former New York Times journalist and San Francisco prosecutor, Vice President Machaela Hoctor comes to Red Room following her successful lawsuit against the most notorious criminal street gang in San Francisco. Hoctor graduated Order of the Coif from Boalt Hall in 1997 and summa cum laude from the University of Wisconsin at Madison in 1993, majoring in Journalism and Political Science. Originally from Nebraska, she now surfs and snowboards in the same weekend. She is also currently finishing her first novel. Hoctor is twenty-nine.
Author Liaison Jane Ganahl is the author of the 2007 autobiographical novel Naked on the Page: The Misadventures of My Unmarried Midlife, which is currently being developed into a sitcom. Ganahl wrote the popular “Single-Minded” column for the San Francisco Chronicle until July 2006. A career journalist, she covered every beat for San Francisco’s two major newspapers for almost two decades, from jazz performances to City Hall politics. Ganahl also edited an anthology of women writers titled Single Woman ... Of a Certain Age, and has written for Parenting and Rolling Stone. She is hard at work on her next book and picking out who will play her in the sitcom. Ganahl is twenty-nine.
Abraham Mertens
General Counsel
General Counsel Abraham Mertens is an attorney who has represented businesses and individuals in all phases of litigation. Mertens graduated from University of California, Hastings College of the Law, and served as an extern at the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Mertens graduated from Rutgers University with honors, majoring in political science and history. While at Rutgers he received numerous academic awards including the Scholar-Athlete Award. Mertens worked at the Harvard Civil Rights Program. In addition, he is a medal-winning rower and is one of the top twenty single scullers in the country. He is working on a book about the year he spent training to qualify for the Olympics. He speaks four languages and is fluent in Dutch. Mertens is twenty-nine.
Tony Gim
Compliance Manager
Compliance Manager Tony Gim brings his experience as a former Chief Compliance Officer and Information Security Officer to Red Room to ensure the company is in good standing with federal, state, and local laws and regulations. Gim received his J.D. from the University of San Diego and double majored at UC Irvine in Criminology and Environmental Analysis. His interests include wishing for a Gary Larsen comeback, raising dust bunnies, and a really great idea for a novel he has yet to start. Gim is twenty-nine.
Jennifer Massoni
Editor and Author Liaison
Editor and Author Liaison Jennifer Massoni has worked at Vanity Fair, where she was the associate editor of Oscar Night: 75 Years of Hollywood Parties. While senior editor of Gentry magazine, she directed the 2006 launch of CAFE magazine. A fifth-generation San Franciscan, Massoni graduated with English Honors from Boston College and completed the Columbia Publishing Course in 2002. She is thrilled to now be working with the redroom.com authors she has admired since her first creative writing class in high school. Massoni is not even twenty-nine yet.
Thomas Dotson
Member Services Manager
Member Services Manager Thomas Dotson has been working with customers and communities online for more than a decade, most notably, for seven years as customer and community manager for PlanetOut, Inc. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Theater from the University of Michigan-Flint. An avid comic book fan, he often can be found at home with his vicious Chihuahua, Max, and working on his great unfinished graphic novel. Dotson is twenty-nine.
Huntington W. Sharp
Editor, Homepage & Special Projects
The common factor in Homepage and Special Projects Editor Huntington Sharp’s work in the varied fields of managed health care, commercial real estate, government law, cabaret, and contemporary lighting is a dogged commitment to le mot juste. He studied linguistics and English at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and law at New College of California, and he edited for and published a commentary in the latter’s Law Review. It's hard to believe that this Eagle Scout and founding member of the Red Room Writers Society is twenty-nine.
Rebecca Goldman
Community Liaison
Community Liaison Rebecca Goldman has worked as a writer, producer, and editor for TV, film, books, and new media start-up companies. Goldman wrote and produced daily comedy news segments for Current TV and co-wrote the award-winning documentary Sputnik Mania. As the Executive Producer of Sagas, she brought the tradition of family oral history into the Web 2.0 paradigm, facilitating a national network of video interviewers. She is currently editing a Voice of Witness oral history book on China for McSweeney’s. She studied Rhetoric and Art at the University of California, Berkeley, and is pursuing a Masters. in Media and Communications at EGS. Goldman is twenty-nine.
Heather Goyette
Associate Communications Manager
Associate Communications Manager Heather Goyette returned to her childhood hometown of San Francisco after graduating from UCLA magna cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts in American Literature and Culture and a specialization in communications. She has several years of experience in corporate communications, project management, and software customization; most notably, she managed, wrote and edited Genentech, Inc’s “Best Place to Work” submissions for FORTUNE and Working Mother magazines for two years. Goyette wrote an autobiographical novella at the Red Room Writers Society and has since moved to the Peninsula and shifted her creative energy to creating stained glass windows. Goyette is not yet twenty-nine.
Marianne Jensen
Web Coordinator
Web Coordinator Marianne Jensen joined Red Room after more than a decade in the nonprofit world working to make the world a better place. Now, she spends her days immersed in web analytics and email communications in order to make the web a better place. Jensen helped promote the groundbreaking series The L Word for Showtime and launch the cable channel LOGO for MTV Networks. She spends her free time working on independent films, making music on her guitars, and being an aunt to the kids of her nine brothers and sisters. A fifth-generation San Franciscan, Jensen is twenty-nine.
Lead Developer Ambi Sidhu has been creating leading edge web applications for the past 10 years. After graduating from Berkeley Engineering with an ME degree specializing in Robotics, he was soon caught up in evolution of the internet. Sidhu has a proven track record developing sophisticated and scalable web applications for many companies, including Google. He has also worked as a consultant to leading internet engineering firms, designing and developing everything from ecommerce to content management systems. Sidhu blends engineering acumen with a knack for user interface and interactions design. Though he is not working on a novel, Sidhu did write an entire software manual once. Sidhu is twenty-nine.
Ben Feldman
Web Content Coordinator
A graduate of Kenyon College with a degree in American Studies, Web Content Coordinator Ben Feldman moved to San Francisco in the summer of 2006. He has worked for sports radio in Washington, D.C. and has worked with students of all ages, teaching classes in Reading, English, and History. He also taught Comedy, which was funny, but not ha-ha funny. In addition, he has written travel and restaurant reviews for a variety of publications, and analyzes baseball for BleacherReport.com. Feldman's parents are twenty-nine.
Julie Boddorff
Quality Assurance Tester
Quality Assurance Tester Julie Boddorff graduated from Kenyon College with a degree in Sociology and Studio Art. Drawing on experience living in South Africa, Boddorff wrote her undergraduate thesis on that country’s perceptions of masculinity in the HIV/AIDS era. She has spent time in various career fields, from art galleries to summer camps to multimedia labs. Boddorff dreads the day she turns twenty-nine.
IT Manager Renjie Wang has a Bachelor of Science in Technical Management and years of experience specializing in business information system needs consultation, project planning, infrastructure setup, operational support, risk analysis, and disaster recovery. His strong emphasis on crisis planning and management has greatly reduced risk and loss for many business users. Wang’s mother’s only child is not even twenty-nine.
Andrea Calabrese
IT Intern
IT Intern Andrea Calabrese has more than six years’ experience in the IT sector. Calabrese has done help desk troubleshooting, networks planning and installation, machine customization, and server administration. With his recently completed B.A. in Business Administration, he combines his business training and technical expertise to deliver strategic solutions. An Italian from the city of Cosenza, Calabrese charms his coworkers with his accent. He is not yet twenty-nine.
Administrative Support Team
Margarita Duggan
Assistant to the CEO
In addition to being the assistant to the CEO, Margarita Duggan is the executive director of the Red Room Writers Society, where she enjoys supporting writers pursuing their dreams. Duggan graduated from the University of California, Santa Barbara with a Bachelor of Arts in Chicano/Chicana Studies. While at UCSB, she fell in love with Chicano/Chicana writing and received the W.E.B. DuBois Award for poetry. She is twenty-nine.
Lauren Sapala
Office Manager
A graduate of the University of Michigan with a Bachelor of Arts in English Literature, Office Manager Lauren Sapala found Red Room through the Red Room Writers Society, where she drafted her first novel. Sapala is dedicated to new ideas, great books, and all kinds of writing. She really is twenty-nine.
Tanya Madoff
Bookkeeper/Controller
After earning a Bachelor of Arts in Literature from the College of Creative Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, Bookkeeper/Controller Tanya Madoff discovered she had a talent for finance as well. Her career has included leading several companies to financial success while also writing for newspapers, magazines, and marketing contracts. Also an entrepreneur in her own right, she owns her own knitwear business where she keeps labor costs low by making her dog model scarves. Madoff is currently working on her first novel, featuring a heroine who is twenty-nine.
Key Consultants
Teola Young
Consulting Advertising Director
Consulting Advertising Director Teola Young is a former vice president and co-founder of Biocompare.com and Medcompare.com, successful internet startups that Young led to become the most widely used shopping and educational portals for scientists in the world.
Jake McKee
Consulting Community Director
Consulting Community Director Jake McKee is the former global community relations specialist for LEGO. As principal of Ant’s Eye View, a social media and consumer engagement consultancy, McKee has worked with online communities since the early days of the internet. His work had made the covers of Wired and Forbes.
Where We Came From: The Red Room Writers Society
Founded in June 2002 by Ivory Madison, the Red Room Writers Society began providing its innovative, signature Writers Studios to procrastinating professional and aspiring writers in the San Francisco Bay Area. It was an immediate success. Founded on just $150, it now has the revenue to support numerous scholarship writers who could not otherwise afford the program, as well as numerous donations to silent auctions and community programs.
The Red Room Writers Society was recognized by San Francisco magazine in its Best of the Bay 2005. The company has been profiled in the media as a major feature story in statewide publications such as California Lawyer magazine, and in national book industry magazines such as Pages.
After five years, the company and its founder are deeply entrenched in the San Francisco literary scene. Madison has served on the board of and been a featured writer at Litquake, the city’s premiere annual literary festival. The Red Room Writers Society is featured in the citywide Literary Map of San Francisco.
While the Red Room Writers Society began with just four members, it now has more than four hundred talented writers in San Francisco. It has appeared in the acknowledgments of published books by authors who note that they never would have finished their manuscripts without the Red Room Writers Society.
The “brick and mortar” Red Room Writers Society will continue to work with as many writers as possible through its Writers Studios, workshops, and coaching and editing services. For more information, please visit www.red-room.com.
Our Social Mission
We at Red Room believe writing has the power to transform individuals as well as society as a whole. Through their original contributions to Red Room, our writers are spreading that message to readers around the world.
In 2008, Red Room will form its own nonprofit organization to connect with at-risk youth, work with them to find their voice, and establish a vital sense of community.
