In this photo Michelle Tea (born Michelle Tomasik in 1971) is an American lesbian-identified author and literary arts organizer whose autobiographical works explore queer culture, feminism, race, class, prostitution, and other themes. She is originally from Chelsea, Massachusetts (a city next to Boston) and currently lives in San Francisco. Tea was the co-founder of the Sister Spit spoken word tour. Her books, mostly memoirs, are known for their views into the queercore community. She has toured with the Sex Workers' Art Show alongside Ducky DooLittle and others. She is also a contributor to The Believer magazine and is the co-writer of the weekly astrology column, Double Team Psychic Dream with astrologer Jessica Lanyadoo, in San Francisco's Bay Guardian newspaper. From February 24 to March 1, 2008, Michelle was the 23rd Zale Writer-in-Residence at the H. Sophie Newcomb Memorial College Institute at Tulane University.
While touring together in the year 2000, Tea and writer Clint Catalyst came up with the idea to solicit first-person narratives for their 2004 anthology Pills, Thrills, Chills and Heartache. Described by literary magazine Publishers Weekly as a "celebrat[ion of] the avant-garde," the book reached #10 on the Los Angeles Times non-fiction paperback bestseller list in its first week of release. Moreover, the book was a 2004 Lambda Literary Awards finalist in the Anthologies/Fiction category.