Orlando Ortega-Medina was born in Los Angeles to immigrants from Cuba. He studied English Literature at UCLA and has a Juris Doctor law degree from Southwestern University School of Law.
In August 1999, Orlando and his life partner expatriated to Canada in search of same-sex equal rights. And in 2005, taking advantage of Canada’s recognition of same-sex marriage, he and his partner were among the first same-sex couples to marry at Montreal’s Hotel de Ville. Subsequently, in 2014, pursuant to new legislation in the United Kingdom allowing same-sex couples to solemnize their marriages in religious houses of worship, Ortega-Medina and his husband were married in a Jewish wedding ceremony at West London Synagogue.
Orlando is the Senior Associate and founder of Ortega-Medina & Associates and holds US, UK, Canadian, and Israeli nationality.
His short story collection Jerusalem Ablaze was shortlisted for The Polari First Book Prize (2017). In 2018, he was named the Marilyn Hassid Emerging Author for the Houston Jewish Book & Arts Festival. He is the author of three novels, The Death of Baseball (2019), The Savior of 6th Street (2020), and The Fitful Sleep of Immigrants (2023).
