I was born in New Jersey to Cuban parents. Educated in Miami (go Canes!) and New York, my fiction, nonfiction, and poetry appear in numerous journals and anthologies, including Flash Fiction Magazine, Literary Mama, The Bilingual Review/La revista bilingüe, Kweli Journal, Guernica, Letras Femeninas, and The Norton Anthology of Latino Literature. My short story collections, Oye What I’m Gonna Tell You from Ig Publishers which released Marielitos, Balseros, and Other Exiles in 2009, were #4 and #5 on the Guardian’s list of 10 of the best books to help understand Cuba. My little book of poems, Everyday Chica, won the 2010 Longleaf Press Poetry Prize and was followed by Everyday Chica, Music and More, a poetry CD set to Caribbean folk music was I was born in New Jersey to Cuban parents. Educated in Miami (go Canes!) and New York, my fiction, nonfiction, and poetry appear in numerous journals and anthologies, including Flash Fiction Magazine, Literary Mama, The Bilingual Review/La revista bilingüe, Kweli Journal, Guernica, Letras Femeninas, and The Norton Anthology of Latino Literature. My short story collections, Oye What I’m Gonna Tell You from Ig Publishers which released Marielitos, Balseros, and Other Exiles in 2009, were #4 and #5 on the Guardian’s list of 10 of the best books to help understand Cuba. My little book of poems, Everyday Chica, won the 2010 Longleaf Press Poetry Prize and was followed by Everyday Chica, Music and More, a poetry CD set to Caribbean folk music was released in 2011. I was the recipient of an individual artist grant from United Arts of Central Florida and was the 2009 Theodore Morrison Fiction Fellow at the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference. I am a Professor of English and faculty in the creative writing MFA program at the University of Central Florida in Orlando where I live with my family....more