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After earning a bachelor's degree in communications and political science from the University of Washington, Julie McDonald Zander worked a decade as a newspaper reporter and nine years as an assistant city newspaper editor. Then, in 1999, she started her personal history business, Chapters of Life, which has published more than 90 individual, family, business, community, and organizational histories.
She served four years as Northwest regional co-coordinator for the Association of Personal Historians and organized the international APH conference in Portland in 2006. Julie edited newsletters for the Oregon Christian Writers and Women Entrepreneur Organization of Washington. She also co-chaired OCW’s Cascade Writing Contest, designed the OCW summer conference notebook, and co-founded the Southwest Washington Writers Conference, where she still serves as president. And, to keep her hand in journalism, she has penned a column once a week for The Chronicle in Centralia, Washington, since May 2007.
In 2024, she launched her fiction imprint, St. Helens Press, and published her debut novel, The Reluctant Pioneer, inspired by a true story. It won a silver Will Rogers Medallion for inspirational novels and American Bookfest’s 2025 Best Book Award for religious fiction. It was also a finalist for Western Writers of America’s Best Historical Novel and the Laramie Award. Her second novel, Shattered Peace: A Century of Silence, was released in the spring of 2025. St. Helens press also published two additional books that year—The Grace Writers by Heather Morse Alexander and Silver Wings Falling Down by Yvonne Kays.
Julie and her husband, Larry, have two grown children and live in the Northwest.
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