About Diana Kayla Hochberg

For most of her life, Diana Kayla Hochberg believed she knew where she came from. At 38, one unexpected conversation changed everything.

Born in Montreal, Canada, and raised in New York, Diana learned later in life that the story of her beginnings had been hidden from her. She came to understand herself as a late-discovery adoptee, although no legal adoption had ever taken place. She had been raised believing she was born in Manhattan, only to discover that she was actually born in Montreal and had been placed with the family who raised her through Montreal’s black-market baby trade.

That discovery began a search that would span more than three decades.

Diana followed records, family stories, historical documents, genealogy, and eventually DNA. Piece by piece, she uncovered a past that had been hidden from her since birth. What began as a search for names and answers became something much deeper. It changed the way she understood identity, family, belonging, and the meaning of truth.

That journey became the heart of her memoir, Connected: Finding My Truth, published in 2025. In the book, Diana shares not only what she discovered, but what it was like to realize that the story she had believed for most of her life was not the whole story. Connected is ultimately about identity, resilience, family, and the courage it can take to keep searching when the answers are difficult.

Her own search also led Diana to genealogy and to helping others explore their histories. Since 2017, she has been an active member of the British Columbia Genealogical Society and the National Genealogical Society. She has helped adoptees and others search for missing pieces of their family stories, uncover connections, and sometimes find answers they once thought might never come.

Long before becoming an author, Diana spent nearly two decades as an educator and more than 25 years in retail management. Both careers centered on something that has always mattered deeply to her: people. Teaching, mentoring, listening, and building relationships have been constants throughout her life. She holds a bachelor’s degree in education and an associate of arts degree in art history.

Photography gives Diana another way to tell stories. She has always been drawn to the details that capture something real about a person, a place, or a moment—often preserving what words alone cannot.

Service has also been an important part of Diana’s life for more than 40 years. She has volunteered with organizations supporting children, families, health, adoption, and scoliosis awareness. Having lived with scoliosis since childhood, she understands personally the importance of education, early detection, research, and support. Today, she serves as an honorary ambassador for the Setting Scoliosis Straight Foundation.

Since the publication of Connected: Finding My Truth, Diana has shared her story through author events, interviews, podcasts, conferences, workshops, book clubs, and speaking engagements. She has also been invited to speak twice at library programs for writers, where she has shared her experience as an author and the journey of bringing a deeply personal story to the page.

What began as Diana’s private search for answers has opened conversations with people carrying questions of their own about identity, family, adoption, secrets, and belonging.

Her writing is now moving in a new direction. After spending years telling the true story she once had to uncover for herself, Diana has turned to fiction. Her work explores many of the themes that have always fascinated her: secrets, trust, relationships, human behavior, and what happens when the truth is not quite what it seems.

Today, Diana lives in Sarasota, Florida, close to her family. She is a proud mother, stepmother, and grandmother. She continues to write, research, photograph, speak, and follow the questions that have shaped so much of her life.