Maryanne Giustino O’Dowd began her career in journalism and spent years as a public relations executive shaping narratives for diverse businesses and audiences. Her news and feature stories appeared in Chicago-area publications, including the Chicago Tribune, Suburban Chicago Sun-Times, Lerner Newspaper Group, and Journal Topics Newspapers. She has returned to the creative core of her craft—storytelling, and is now working in new formats, including fiction and poetry. She is in the process of completing her first novel. 

Her writing blends journalistic precision with a poet's sensitivity and a strategist’s insight to uncover deeper truths. Maryanne often connects the dots between seemingly disparate moments and weaves universal threads that bind people together.

She is a facilitator of the 2025 Telling The Truth of Our Lives program at Write On, Door County. She received her B.A. in journalism from Columbia College, Chicago, and attended the college's Master's in Public Affairs Reporting program as a John Fischetti scholar.

After more than 50 years as a Chicagoan, Maryanne now resides with her husband in beautiful Door County, WI.