Sonora Slater

Sonora Slater is a freelance writer and journalist based in Sacramento, California. Her features focus on community life and the arts — the artists, dancers, painters, baristas, small-business owners and quiet neighborhood institutions that give the Sacramento region its character.

Her work appears in Comstock’s Magazine, Route Magazine, Barista Magazine, The Dirt and the Winters Express, with reporting that ranges from arts and culture profiles to city hall and local government. Recent pieces have followed a Davis dance company performing for Parkinson’s patients, an “American Gladiators” star built in Sacramento’s fitness scene, and a print-first newsroom keeping local journalism alive.

She got her start at UC Davis, where she served as executive editor of The California Aggie, the university’s student newspaper, and saw her essays selected for Prized Writing, the campus’s annual anthology of distinguished undergraduate work. She went on to intern at The Sacramento Bee, and her writing has also appeared in Oh Reader.

She is drawn to stories about how communities make and remake themselves — on stage, behind a counter, around a table, and in the rooms where decisions get made. Available for freelance assignments, profiles, and feature commissions.