Susan Orlean has been a staff writer for the New Yorker since 1992 and has written for Vogue, Rolling Stone, Esquire, and many other magazines. She is the author of eight books including The Orchid Thief, which was a NYTimes bestseller and was made into a movie called Adaptationin which Meryl Streep played Susan Orlean. Streep won a Golden Globe for this role and was nominated for an Academy Award!

Susan Orlean’s other books include The Life and Legend of Rin Tin Tin, My Kind of Place (travel), The Bullfighter Checks her Makeup (a collection of profile pieces written for Rolling Stone and other magazines), and her most recent book, published October 2018, The Library Book about the disastrous 1986 Los Angeles Library fire, and about the value of libraries in general.

Orlean was a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University, and received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2014.

People who have worked with Susan at other conferences say that she is “fabulous and incredibly funny;” “one of the nicest, most fun people on earth;” and “fantastic in so many ways.” She has a reputation as an extraordinary, lively and entertaining speaker.