The Chest is that old piece of furniture that sits quietly in the corner, hoping to not be noticed even though it is as tall as the desk and as long as the bed. The Chest is made of dark wood and black iron nails, with shiny gold decorations on the corners and lid. Inside, it’s made up of wooden compartments that fit together like puzzle pieces. It never runs out of space.

Jamie uses the Chest to store all of his stories. He has been placing them there for more than half of his life. This site is built to represent the Chest and its endless compartments. To keep everything working and looking good, Jamie has a team of cool people on hand. Some of them were hired straight from his stories, but some exist beyond computer screens too.

Here is the team behind the Chest of Stories:

	Jamie: the brains behind the whole thing. James Hiwatari is a Brazilian bisexual trans guy who lives in Glasgow. He wants to write for a living, and in his free time likes to play/compose music and draw manga style characters. Jamie plays cello, clarinet, recorder, viola, and oboe. He speaks Portuguese, English, Italian, Japanese, and a little bit of Icelandic (and is learning Hungarian and Czech in his precious free time). He’s easily bribable with chocolate.
	Nathan: designer-extraordinaire and the other real pair of hands over the keyboard. Serial Optimiser.
	Mari: Jamie’s Creativity needed a name, so he called her Mariana Reinert. She gets the credit for coming up with ideas for the site. To know more about her, read her story.
	Karl: the resident Musician. Like Mari, he currently lives in a room inside Jamie’s head. Karl gets the credit for all the original compositions on the site.
	Tsubame: the Artist. They share with Nathan the task of illustrating the site, though Tsubame is the only one who gets credit for the Comics. They live with Mari and Karl in the cosy house of Jamie’s thoughts.
	Vilém: his role is listed as the Writer, even though that’s technically Jamie’s job too. They probably share the workload (which is weird because Vilém needs Jamie’s physical hands to write anything). Vilém is another one with a room in a house that only Jamie can see.

Mari, Karl, Tsubame, and Vilém are known as the Artistic Quartet. The group was created so that Jamie could manage all aspects of creating his stories. Mari comes up with the plots. Vilém puts them to paper. Tsubame designs the characters. And Karl creates tunes to enhance everyone’s reading experience.

The Chest contains stories about diverse characters. Nobody here is straight and cisgender by default, or assumed to be of white European descent. Not everyone is able-bodied. If stories with lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, and asexual (LGBTIA) characters aren’t your cup of tea, you might be better off drinking your hot beverage somewhere else. LGBTIA characters exist in all of the stories in the Chest, even when sexuality and gender identity aren’t central to the plot. The Chest also tries to be home to as many disabled and/or minority ethnic characters (who may or may not be LGBTIA too) as possible. We operate on the belief that a diverse cast of characters enriches every story.

Constructive criticism of all stories is welcomed and appreciated, particularly coming from those with different background to Jamie’s. Trolls will be laughed at, then ignored. All stories in the Chest belong to Jamie, but are free for everyone to enjoy.