Aaron Michael Morales, Maria Luisa Ortega Hernandez, and Leticia Nixon

Wednesday July 28, 7pm – Author Event
Aaron Michael Morales author of Drowning Tucson (15.95 Coffee House Press)

Morales wrestles with nothing less than the parameters  of the human soul.”  Luis Alberto Urrea

“You will not forget Drowning Tucson. The characters will haunt you, and even after you know the stories are getting to you, you won’t be able to stop reading this book.” Leslie Marmon Silko

“This novel will not make you feel good. It will make you want to avert your eyes in the same way Richard Wright made you want to avert your eyes in Native Son. I am in awe of the muscular writing here, writing that is brave, honest, precise, and disciplined. Drowning Tucson  took my breath away.” Benjamin Alire Sáenz

Set in Tucson’s toughest neighborhoods during the late 1980s, this explosive novel follows the disintegration of the Nuñez family and the people whose paths they cross. From young gang members to crooken cops, and from murderous vigilantes to prostitutes plying their trade along the “Miracle Mile,” each character’s destiny is linked by crushing poverty, the brutal codes of the street, and the harsh nature of the desert. In this place of both drought and flood, “civilization” is every bit as dangerous as its surroundings.

María Luisa Ortega Hernández author of Housed Under Glass: A Story of Desire, Repression, Loss, and Healing

Housed Under Glass is A Story of Desire, Repression, Loss, and Healing.  Like many other U.S. Latina writers, María Luisa Ortega Hernández confronts the dehumanizing expectations of her religious heritage, heavily imposed on women. Obedient to her Catholic teachings by repressing her female sexuality over what became a life sentence without parole, María Luisa’s inner turmoil culminated in an extreme case of female sexual disorder. Intimately aware that her healing process required the recovery of her faithfully neglected body, she started a barefoot pilgrimage within to give expression to her wounded being and her long-silenced yearnings. Her voice—poetic and bilingual—denounces the oppressive control of her young female body and finds healing in the claimed right to her own true self.  Housed Under Glass: A Story of Desire, Repression, Loss, and Healing. / Tras paredes de cristal: una historia de deseo, represión, pérdida y sanación.  Massachusetts: CBH Books, 2005.

Leticia Roa Nixon
on Mexican Immigrants living in South Philadelphia
Leticia Roa Nixon will read some of the stories she had collected about the lives of Mexican Immigrants living in South Philadelphia. Leticia is writing a book on this subject with a grant from the Leeway Foundation. She is a photographer who had an exhibit at The Lighthouse of images  of the Philadelphia Afro-Latino Community.

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