Art & literature

Reflection & Renewal: Chican(x) Futurism An Evening at Gallery 2000 (Part 1)

Rose Padilla

Dec 15, 20244 min read

Reflection & Renewal: Chican(x) Futurism An Evening at Gallery 2000 (Part 1)

This exhibit challenges me to reframe past, present, and future as more cyclical than linear.

In/Visibility by Design: Karla Cornejo Villavicencio’s Debut Novel Catalina

Sonia Gonzalez

Dec 11, 20243 min read

In/Visibility by Design: Karla Cornejo Villavicencio’s Debut Novel Catalina

Catalina refreshes the campus novel by tackling issues like rising tuition, student activism, and racial diversity and undocumented status

Destination Mexico City: The 1970s Underbelly of Rock and Roll, Comics, & Noir in Velvet Was the Night

Elizabeth Martinez

Dec 4, 20245 min read

Destination Mexico City: The 1970s Underbelly of Rock and Roll, Comics, & Noir in Velvet Was the Night

In this historical fiction, noir romance novel, Moreno-Garcia captures the escalating violence between Mexico’s government and protesters.

"Poetry to Praxis: Yesenia Moya & Community Art Resistance in Southern Nevada"

Erika Abad

Dec 3, 20244 min read

"Poetry to Praxis: Yesenia Moya & Community Art Resistance in Southern Nevada"

"Son de Mi Ser" exhibit Challenges inarticulation and settler colonialism

Sophia Yip

Nov 14, 20244 min read

PUTINOIKA Unbound: Sophia Yip Reviews Braschi's Ingenious Multi-Genre Masterpiece!

PUTINOIKA writes against any definitions and forms while acknowledging the possibility of creating the unexpected!

Ujjwal Prasai

Oct 28, 20245 min read

Ujjwal Prasai Reviews Here to Stay: Poetry and Prose from the Undocumented Diaspora

Undocumented Writers as beings of this earth, of the countries of their or their parents’ origins, and equally of America

Welcome to Oxnard: An Interview with Cristina Herrera

Trevor Boffone

Oct 23, 20247 min read

Welcome to Oxnard: An Interview with Cristina Herrera

Welcome to Oxnard celebrates Michelle Serros all while paying homage to Oxnard

The Wondrous Poetic Futurisms in Pedro Iniguez’s Mexicans on the Moon

Melissa Castillo Planas

Oct 13, 20244 min read

The Wondrous Poetic Futurisms in Pedro Iniguez’s Mexicans on the Moon

nothing can prepare you for the unique voice that is Iniguez in his debut poetry collection Mexicans on the Moon!

An Altar of Stories: Rios De La Luz Crafts a Haunting Tapestry of Speculative Fiction

Danielle Garcia-Karr

Oct 11, 20244 min read

An Altar of Stories: Rios De La Luz Crafts a Haunting Tapestry of Speculative Fiction

Rios De La Luz's An Altar of Stories to Liminal Saints is speculative fiction that captivates readers and pushes the genre!

Miguel A. Briones's Macho No Machismo: Affirming Tender Masculinities

Paloma Aguirre

Oct 7, 20243 min read

Miguel A. Briones's Macho No Machismo: Affirming Tender Masculinities

El Paso native and current Austenite, Miguel A. Briones , reclaims Chicano masculinity in Macho No Machismo: Helpful and Nice , a...

Paloma Aguirre

Oct 7, 20243 min read

Paloma Aguirre Reviews Paola Mendoza and Abby Sher’s Sci-Fi YA Novel, Solis!

Paola Mendoza and Abby Sher’s YA novel, Solis asks, how imminent a future can dystopian fiction imagine for young readers?

Aunt Lute Press: El Mundo Zurdo’s Call for Collective Solidarity

Erika Abad

Oct 7, 20244 min read

Aunt Lute Press: El Mundo Zurdo’s Call for Collective Solidarity

Aunt Lute Books serves as a case study of what ethical solidarity looks like!

On Latinx Pop Culture & Poetics: An Interview with José Olivarez

Melissa Castillo Planas

Sep 27, 20248 min read

On Latinx Pop Culture & Poetics: An Interview with José Olivarez

Melissa Castillo Planas Interviews poet José Olivarez. The talk about Latinx pop culture, translation, COVID lockdown, migration. . .

Erika Abad

Sep 14, 20247 min read

Re-membering Outside the Box: Erika Abad Interviews Xochil Xitlalli

Erika Abad interviews two-spirit artist Xochil Xitlalli

Channeling Inner Diosa Energy: The Emma S. Barrientos Mexican American Cultural Center Connects Comunidad through Accessible Art & Conversation

Angel Avila

Sep 12, 20244 min read

Channeling Inner Diosa Energy: The Emma S. Barrientos Mexican American Cultural Center Connects Comunidad through Accessible Art & Conversation

Through community conversation, artists and community members connect, share, and reflect on what "Diosa energy" is.

Rose Padilla

Sep 2, 20244 min read

Rose Padilla Reviews Matt de la Peña & Paola Escobar's The Perfect Place!

Matt de la Peña and Paola Escobar's kid's book, The Perfect Place, asks, what’s so great about being perfect, anyway?

To Cali, with Love: A Review of Writing the Golden State: The New Literary Terrain of California

Cristina Herrera

Aug 14, 20245 min read

To Cali, with Love: A Review of Writing the Golden State: The New Literary Terrain of California

Offers deeply personal accounts of pockets of California and their complexity!

Artistry and Culture of Texas’s Lowriders

Angel Avila

Jul 20, 20243 min read

Artistry and Culture of Texas’s Lowriders

The exhibit not only showcases three-dimensional objects of lowrider culture but also provides briefs about its history

Paloma Aguirre

Jul 8, 20242 min read

Paloma Aguirre Reviews Gume Laurel III's Samson and Domingo & Brujos of Borderland High!

Gume Laurel III’s books do something that not all YA texts do— they let queer teens be more than tropes of their sexuality.

Melissa Castillo Planas

May 31, 20245 min read

10 Latinx/ Latine Poets for Pride Month

“LatinX Marks the Wound and Space for Collective Healing”

Erika Abad

May 22, 20244 min read

“LatinX Marks the Wound and Space for Collective Healing”

I want to highlight how artists across the U.S. cross ethno-national borders to heal together.

“Structures of Feeling & The Edgar; or Abuelita’s Bowl Cut”

Frederick Aldama

May 21, 20243 min read

“Structures of Feeling & The Edgar; or Abuelita’s Bowl Cut”

It’s a way to intentionally affirm the Otherness that a conformist mainstream throws at youth.

Aldama & Itzel Usher in a Sci-Fi Worldbuilding Paradigm Shift: A Review of Labyrinths Borne

Ralph Villanueva

May 12, 20244 min read

Aldama & Itzel Usher in a Sci-Fi Worldbuilding Paradigm Shift: A Review of Labyrinths Borne

Aldama offers a path forward by offering readers an emotional, intellectually spirited & collectivist minded tale.

Cristina Herrera

May 5, 20248 min read

Frederick Luis Aldama Talks with Cristina Herrera: Misfits, Sonic Revolutions, Familial Reconciliations, & Craving More Fiction that Misfits Publishing Molds

I wanted Max Rodriguez to hit the hard truths but also, and overwhelmingly, to take readers to places of joy and compassion.

Frederick Luis Aldama’s Pressing Passion to Portray & Proclaim Powerful Truths of Youth Surviving in the US-Mexico Borderlands: A Conversation

Luis Torres

May 4, 202411 min read

Frederick Luis Aldama’s Pressing Passion to Portray & Proclaim Powerful Truths of Youth Surviving in the US-Mexico Borderlands: A Conversation

While the borderlands shape each protagonist differently, their individual stories thread together to form a greater tapestry.

Jonathan Hill and the Power of Encouragement

Dan Johnson

May 4, 202416 min read

Jonathan Hill and the Power of Encouragement

what I took from Hill's talk was a humble attitude of gratitude for all the little lights that shone in the dark, the simple gestures.

Cristina Herrera

Apr 21, 20245 min read

Mapping Latinidades On the Mad River: Cristina Herrera Reviews Lucrecia Guerrero’s Latest Novel

Lucrecia Guerrero’s latest novel, On the Mad River, set in the hardscrabble former factory town of Mad River, Ohio, we’re reminded of Latinx

Mariela Pinilla

Mar 27, 20243 min read

Mariela Pinilla Reviews The Absolutely (Almost) True Adventures of Max Rodriguez

The novel is exactly what the “misfits, botched-jobbers, and unapologetic originals” have been waiting for.

Sonia Gonzalez

Mar 14, 20243 min read

Sonia Gonzalez Reviews Olivas's Chicano Frankenstein

"He didn't seem to belong anywhere. Neither here nor there." This is how Daniel A. Olivas describes the unnamed protagonist of his new...

Chicano Frankenstein: Sci-Fi Fantasy or Gritty Everyday Realism?

Mariela Pinilla

Mar 3, 202411 min read

Chicano Frankenstein: Sci-Fi Fantasy or Gritty Everyday Realism?

Daniel Olivas’s powerful new novel, Chicano Frankenstein, takes place in a semi-futuristic— yet very present—United States. In this...

Dan Johnson

Feb 16, 20248 min read

Vulnerability Is My Superpower

Roughly 15 years ago, I had a major breakdown that derailed me from graduate school. It took several months and several diagnoses until...

Para Las “Callejeras,” the “Bad Women,” and All Those Mujeres Our Mothers Warned Us About: A Review of Estella Gonzalez’s Huizache Women

Cristina Herrera

Feb 7, 20245 min read

Para Las “Callejeras,” the “Bad Women,” and All Those Mujeres Our Mothers Warned Us About: A Review of Estella Gonzalez’s Huizache Women

My abuela, Mamá Chonita, was not an easy woman, nor was she what some would consider very affectionate. Her hugs and kisses were offered...