Born in Ireland, Laura O’Gorman Schwartz grew up in Japan, Singapore and New Jersey before attending Bard College in upstate New York. While majoring in Japanese Studies, she gulped down as many literature and creative writing classes as possible. Later, she was personally selected for The Writers’ Institute at CUNY by André Aciman, who called her “a superb writer.”

Her science-fantasy novel The Warmth of Ashes recently won first place in the 13th Annual Writer’s Digest Self-Published E-book Awards. Her short fiction has been published or is forthcoming in a wide range of publications, most notably The Shanghai Literary Review, Wraparound South, Ohio State University’s The Journal, The Birmingham Arts Journal, Whisk(e)y Tit, and the American Literary Review. 

From 2013 to 2019, her articles were featured almost every month in the Singapore American Newspaper (now the Living in Singapore magazine). Laura was also a regular contributor to The Wall Street Journal: Expat for two years. In addition to writing the Lifestyles chapter (renamed to Life as an Adult) for the past five editions of the Living in Singapore reference guide, she also acted as Editor-in-Chief for the 15th and 16th editions, providing extra copy along with final revisions.

Laura currently resides in Singapore with her trans nonbinary spouse, two cats and too many cactuses. Her queer identity sounds like algebra: bi-demi-poly, divided by being apagender. She is obsessed with: teashops, mornings, BTS, Nihonga, mountain hikes, bookstores, cocktail bars, Frederic Church paintings, pole dancing, the moon and words words words.