Kathleen Alcalá is the author of a short-story collection three novels set in the American Southwest

Southwestern United States

The Southwestern United States is a region defined in different ways by different sources. Broad definitions include nearly a quarter of the United States, including Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas and Utah...

 and nineteenth-century Mexico

Mexico

The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...

 and a collection of essays. She teaches creative writing at workshops and programs in Washington state and elsewhere, including Seattle University

Seattle University

Seattle University is a Jesuit Catholic university located in the First Hill neighborhood of Seattle, Washington, USA.SU is the largest independent university in the Northwest US, with over 7,500 students enrolled in undergraduate and graduate programs within eight schools, and is one of 28 member...

, the University of New Mexico

University of New Mexico

The University of New Mexico at Albuquerque is a public research university located in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in the United States. It is the state's flagship research institution...

 and Richard Hugo House

Richard Hugo House

- About :Hugo House was founded in founded in 1997 by Linda Jaech, Frances McCue, and Andrea Lewis. These three writers believed Seattle needed a center for local writers and readers to find a community and create new work...

. Alcalá is also a co-founder of and contributing editor to The Raven Chronicles. A play based on her novel

Novel

A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....

, Spirits of the Ordinary, was produced by The Miracle Theatre of Portland, Oregon

Portland, Oregon

Portland is a city located in the Pacific Northwest, near the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers in the U.S. state of Oregon. As of the 2010 Census, it had a population of 583,776, making it the 29th most populous city in the United States...

. She served on the board of Richard Hugo House and the advisory boards of Con Tinta, Field’s End and the Centrum Writers Conference. She is the winner of several awards for her writing, including an Artist Trust/Washington State Arts Commission Fellowship in 2007.

Works

• Mrs. Vargas and the Dead Naturalist (Calyx Books)
• Spirits of the Ordinary (Chronicle; Harvest Books)
• The Flower in the Skull (Chronicle;Harvest Books)
• Treasures in Heaven (Chronicle; Northwestern University Press)
• The Desert Remembers My Name: On Family and Writing (University of Arizona Press)

Critical Reception

Charles de Lint

Charles de Lint

Charles de Lint is a Canadian fantasy author and folk musician. He is also the chief book critic for The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction....

, reviewing The Flower in the Skull, declared that "Alcalá is fast becoming one of my favourite writers," praising her work for the "richness [of her] characterization and settings."

External links

• Kathleen Alcalá's homepage