Laurie McAndish King is travel writer whose essays have been published in anthologies such as 30 Days in Italy, The Thong Also Rises, and the award-winning The Kindness of Strangers. Her work has also been published in the San Francisco Chronicle Magazine and aired on KUSF radio. Laurie has studied medicinal plants in Argentina and Brazil, tracked lemurs through the mountains of Madagascar, fought off leeches in tropical Queensland, tracked lions on foot — without a gun — in Botswana, studied with an urban shaman, and trapped and banded raptors in the Marin Headlands.

Laurie earned her master’s degree in Internet-based education and publishes an online newsletter, Travel Writers News. She is an officer and board member of Bay Area Travel Writers, co-edited the erotica anthology Hot Flashes: sexy little stories and poems, evangelizes for children’s financial literacy, and indulges her passions for travel and natural history as often as she possibly can.