Lynn Downey is an award-winning historian of the West, novelist, short story writer, and a consulting archivist.

Lynn’s debut historical novel, "Dudes Rush In," is set on an Arizona dude ranch in the 1950s. The book won a Will Rogers Medallion Award, and placed first in Arizona Historical Fiction at the New Mexico-Arizona book awards. The next book in this series, titled "Dude or Die," was released in October of 2023.

She was the Historian for Levi Strauss & Co. in San Francisco for 25 years. Her biography of the company’s founder, "Levi Strauss: The Man Who Gave Blue Jeans to the World," won the Foreword Reviews silver INDIE award. Her latest nonfiction book is "American Dude Ranch: A Touch of the Cowboy and the Thrill of the West," a cultural history of the dude ranch, America’s original vacation. It was reviewed in The Wall Street Journal, True West, Cowgirl, and The Denver Post. When she’s not writing, Lynn works as a consulting archivist and historian. Her clients include the Charles M. Schulz Museum in Santa Rosa, California; Beaulieu Vineyard in Rutherford, California; the Desert Caballeros Western Museum in Wickenburg, Arizona; and the Chemehuevi Indian Tribe in Lake Havasu City, Arizona.

She is the past president of Women Writing the West, a member of the Western Writers of America, and is on the board of the Frank Lloyd Wright Marin County Civic Center Conservancy in San Rafael, California.

She lives in Sonoma County, California.