Lisa K. Richter

When I was young, the kitchen was a fantastical place alive with aromas, steam, crackling oil, and screaming pressure cookers. A place of transformation. It still is. Today, it is where I go to calm my mind and fire up new ideas. If you’re looking for me, you’ll find me here.

Fly, my darling, a poetic love story about letting go—a book I’ve been working on for some time—is forthcoming April 2026 from She Writes Press.

My poetry, essays, and short fiction have appeared in literary journals and anthologies, both in print and online. In 2014 I was selected as a finalist in Glimmer Train's national fiction contest. I've studied classical piano and hold degrees in mathematics (BA, University of Virginia '83) and creative writing (MFA, Antioch University 2010). I'm a a poetry alumna of The Community of Writers.

A portfolio of published writing can be found here. 

In early technical careers as a computer programmer and a marketing support rep, I worked in Washington, D.C. and Germany at IBM. After my kids were born and after several years in Italy, we eventually settled in California where I founded (in 2002) Cosmic Thinkers, a coding workshop series for young people. Using a simple computer language as a foundation, my students created animated narratives and games of their own design, happily blending art (written, graphic, and musical) and analytical reasoning.

My great grandmother—my mother’s mother’s mother—was left as an infant on the doorstep of a parish priest in a farming village north of Venice, Italy, the secret love child of a Venetian woman of aristocratic standing. (Or so it is told.) When I was a young girl, my nonna assured me that this woman-line meant—beyond any doubt—that I was una principessa. As an Italian saying goes: "Se non è vero, è ben trovato." Roughly: Even if it's not true, it makes a great story....