MemberReyna_Grande

Originally from Mexico, I came to the U.S. at the age of nine to reunited with my father, who had left me in Mexico for eight years. I fell in love with reading when I was in middle school. At first, I read because I wanted to learn English faster. Then I read because it helped me escape my home, a home full of abuse. I started to write when I was thirteen years old for the same reasons I liked to read. In 2006 my first novel, Across a Hundred Mountains, was published. It was a fictionalized account of my own experiences growing up in Mexico without my father. In 2009 my second novel, Dancing with Butterflies, was published. I wrote a story of four women, at different stages in their lives, who share a common passion--Folklorico (Mexican folk dance). Now I have a third book coming out, my memoir The Distance Between Us, where I tell my own story of being left behind in Mexico by my parents, then my immigrant experience in the U.S. It is a coming-of-age story about my pursuit of my dreams.

My hobbies are reading and gardening. Writing is my passion and also my career, so I don't call it a hobby. I like to travel and that has been one of the best things about being a published author--to get to travel all over the country, and sometimes, even abroad. I also like to teach writing workshops and to do presentations at schools and meet young people.

I'm working on a new book, a novel about a sculptor, a priest, and a prostitute. Not sure what the book is 'about' yet, but I'm having fun discovering my characters.