Rob Rogers
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Rob Rogers is an award-winning writer and attorney from Orlando, Florida. His first book, a memoir titled Finding My Way Home: Fighting Depression Backpacking in Central Florida, will win a Florida Authors & Publishers Association (FAPA) President’s Award in August. Rob’s essays have been published in Still Points Art Quarterly, Four Tulips, The Florida Writer, Wilderness House Literary Review, and Go World Travel and on FloridaHikes.com.
Rob has been writing analytical, critical, and creative nonfiction since before college, but he began writing creative nonfiction in earnest in 2024 after experiencing mental health problems and coping with them by hiking and backpacking. After writing an article about his backpacking experiences, he was inspired to turn that article into his first book, Finding My Way Home: Fighting Depression Backpacking in Central Florida, which was published in November 2024. The experience lit a fuse that has led him to continue writing creative nonfiction about hiking, backpacking, and depression when not practicing law. A common theme of Rob's creative writing is exploring emotional growth and overcoming pain by connecting with the outdoors, and he strives to immerse the reader in his characters' full sensory perceptions of the places he visits (both geographic and psychological) and the challenges he faces there. Rob also writes articles on backpacking and travel for outdoor travel magazines, as well as articles on legal analysis for legal publications including Law 360. Rob also writes a blog called the Central Florida Backpacking Desk Jockey. |
Finding My Way Home: Fighting Depression Backpacking in Central Florida
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Memoir/Health and Wellness
After losing more than 100 pounds, Rob Rogers, a lawyer and self-described "desk jockey," decided to try backpacking at a state park near his Central Florida home. This followed an impulse purchase of a tent and backpack, despite having not camped since adolescence. When the recurrence of severe depression forced him to take a medical sabbatical, he discovered that backpacking in the Central Florida wilderness helped him cope with his inner demons; it also fostered a love affair with the natural spaces near his home. In Finding My Way Home, Rob details the adventure of learning to solo backpack in local state parks and forests, including Lake Louisa State Park, Lake Kissimmee State Park, the Withlacoochee State Forest, and the Green Swamp. He also describes in vivid and at times frightening detail his struggles to cope with bouts of melancholy and intermittent explosive disorder. 
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