Damas wins the 2010 Mariposa Prize!

The 12th Annual International Latino Book Awards were awarded May 25, 2010, and Damas, Dramas, and Ana Ruiz was a winner! Damas received the Mariposa Prize, the award given for Best First Book (English), at this year's awards ceremony held during the BookExpo of America convention in New York City.

The kind wishes and congratulations received from fellow writers across the nation has been lovely. But the best thing of all is that the award came from Latino Literacy Now, a non-profit organization that promotes literacy and literary excellence within the Latino community. They created the Latino Book Awards in 1999. In addition, they are behind several Latino Book Festivals that take place in Latino-rich communities across the nation. The next one is in Houston this September.

I wasn’t the only celebrated writer. Colleagues and writers I’ve long admired were also recognized for their work, including: Carmen Tafolla, René Colato Laiñez, Oscar Hijuelos, Marjorie Agosín, Josefina López, Barbara Renaud Gonzalez, Carolina de Robertis, Lucha Corpi, and many others were recognized in over 50 categories.

Congratulations to all the award-winners!

Festival of Texas Writers

After some old-fashioned rabble-rousing, followed by a few days of diplomacy (and flak-catching), I will appear with John Phillip Santos, Barbara Renaud, and Emilio Zamora on a panel featuring Tejano Writers at this event on Saturday, May 8, in Austin, Texas. Long story. I promise to tell the tale when it's over.

In the meantime, click here to get a hint of what happened. It's all good. So far. And if you're in Austin, please come to the Scholtz Garten to get an earful of some hot-damn good writing by some of our best, Tejano writers. In my humble opinion, Santos is brilliant. Barbara Renaud is sublime, and Dr. Zamora is doing that all important work of documenting our history for the future.