Self-taught (no MFA), Andrea Hollander began a solo writing apprenticeship when she was 23 and waited to submit work to journals for 10 years. Her first published poems appeared when she was 33, and her first book when she was 46. Born just after World War II in Berlin, Germany, Hollander was raised in Texas, Colorado, New York, and New Jersey. She was educated at Boston University and the University of Colorado, where she spent a few years as a teaching fellow before moving to the Arkansas Ozarks. There she and her now ex-husband built their own house and raised their son. They owned and ran a B&B for 15 years, and Hollander was also the Writer-in-Residence at Lyon College, a position she held for 22 years before she divorced and moved to Portland, Oregon, where she has lived since 2011.