About Lori L. Lake - www.LoriLLake.com

I was born in Portland, Oregon, and spent my early years with my parents and four sisters until my parents divorced when I was 13. As a teenager, I lived with an aunt and uncle, and over time, both my parents remarried other people, with my dad 's marriage adding two brothers. After graduating from Tigard High School, I went off to Lewis & Clark College in Portland where I double-majored in literature and political science.

In the middle of my tenure at college, I met Diane at a bank processing center where I worked part-time. We became partners in 1981. In 1983, I graduated college, and we moved from Oregon to Minnesota because the job prospects were much better. Diane and I were partners for 27 years until we parted in November 2008.

Until the end of summer 2009, I lived in Minneapolis, writing, editing, teaching at The Loft, and doing various other writing-related jobs. I moved back to Oregon at summer's end, coincidentally arriving on August 28th, 2009, exactly 26 years to the day from when I left for Minnesota.

For a few years, my apartment was in NE Portland, very close to where Beverly Cleary's characters lived. (I still feel an amusing attachment to Ramona Quimby, Ribsy, and Henry Huggins.) When I moved in 2012, it was only because I found a house, my first solo home purchase!

In 2014, I opened my own independent company, Launch Point Press, both to reissue my own backlist and to focus on authors wanting to get books back in print or other writers new to the business (hence the "launch" in the title). I sold the press at the end of 2022, and it's still a going concern!

I sold my first house and in early 2018 bought a different home in SE Portland/Gresham, which I named The Fortress of Solitude. (Lee Lynch insisted it should have been called The Sanctuary of Solace. <g>). I enjoyed the roominess, the big yard, and time alone, and I loved my friends and family being nearby.

But then I met Tairi Blair at a writer's retreat in 2024. We quickly realized we were immensely compatible. She moved from her place in California to Oregon, I rented out my house, and we officially moved in together during fall of 2025. She, too, is a writer, and we are doing a great job supporting and inspiring one another. It's partly due to her that I've just finished my first book in about eight years!

I started writing seriously in 1986 and spent a good deal of time trying to get published. You can read more about my Writing Quest HERE. All of the realizations from way back when STILL stand.