When agents say no and no and no and…

Text banner that says, "I'm sorry to say that OFELIA AND NORMA is not a match for my list. Please remember that the publishing industry is very subjective, and another agent may feel differently."

A year ago I began querying agents to represent my recently completed novel OFELIA AND NORMA. In the book publishing world, an agent is the first tier of gatekeepers, the ones who decide which manuscripts to select to submit to the next tier of gatekeepers, the editors at publishing houses who then decide which to…

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My AWP 2022: All real, all true

Headshot of five women standing next to each other

AWP – that annual mega writing conference that some abhor and others adore, or at least like well enough to attend when they can and feel a pang of regret when they can’t. I last attended in 2019 in Portland, canceled my plans for 2020 in San Antonio as the pandemic loomed, and tuned in…

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Rejection and Acceptance

A series of the word "Declined"

Rejection is part of a writer’s life. We all know this. Rejections will outnumber acceptances. It’s a statistical certainty. So we learn to respond to rejection with acceptance—at least intellectually. But our very human emotions insist otherwise. When I receive a rejection for my work, the first thing I feel is disappointment, and then a…

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Living Color: Angie Rubio Stories one year later

Drawing of a girl writing at a desk with lamp

This month marks the one-year anniversary of the publication of Living Color: Angie Rubio Stories about a brown girl just wanting to be seen and heard. It’s been weird and fun, celebrating online. Each time after an event, watching faces disappear from my screen was an eerie and sad thing. At some events, the audience…

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Lessons from a techno-bumbler’s video pitch

Donna Miscolta video pitch photo

I don’t get out much because there’s this virus out there that could infect my vaccinated self and potentially sicken me, not to mention make me a vector of contagion. So to break up my apartment-bound life where, after a morning bike ride, much of my day is spent at my laptop, I recently signed…

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What Angie Rubio Owes to My Junior High English Teacher

In less than two months, Angie Rubio will enter the world as the shero of her own relatively ordinary, yet microaggression-ridden life when Living Color: Angie Rubio Stories is released from Jaded Ibis Press on September 21. You can pre-order your copy from the terrific folks at Elliott Bay Books. Writer Kathleen Alcalá sums up…

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Small presses, important voices

Without the existence of small presses, it’s pretty certain I would not have two published books and another forthcoming to my name. Small presses, some of which release only a few books each year, are run with limited resources by small, dedicated staffs. Many were established to publish books that have been overlooked (or underlooked?…

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The hope of Angie Rubio in this election year

For the second time, the publication of a book of mine coincides with a presidential election year. Living Color: Angie Rubio Stories will be published this fall, five weeks ahead of election day. While fall is a busy time for new books to arrive on the scene, my concern is not that Living Color will…

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