Luis Alberto Urrea, 2005 Pulitzer Prize finalist for nonfiction and
member of the Latino Literature Hall of Fame, is a prolific and
acclaimed writer who uses his dual-culture life experiences to explore
greater themes of love, loss and triumph.
Born in Tijuana, Mexico to a Mexican father and an American mother,
Urrea has published extensively in all the major genres. The critically
acclaimed author of 11 books, Urrea is an award-winning poet, essayist,
and novelist. The Devil's Highway, his 2004 non-fiction account of a
group of Mexican immigrants lost in the Arizona desert, won the 2004
Lannan Literary Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the
Pacific Rim Kiriyama Prize. A national best-seller, The Devil's Highway
was also named a best book of the year by the Los Angeles Times, the
Miami Herald, the Chicago Tribune, the Kansas City Star and many other
publications.
Urrea's most recent book, The Hummingbird's Daughter, is the culmination
of 20 years of research and writing. The historical novel tells the
story of Teresa Urrea, sometimes known as The Saint of Cabora and the
Mexican Joan of Arc. A national best-seller, The Hummingbird's Daughter
won the 2006 Pacific Rim Kiriyama Prize, making Urrea the first author
in the history of the prize to be nominated in both fiction and
non-fiction. It was named Southwest Book of the Year by the Arizona
Daily Star and a best book of the year by the Los Angeles Times, Chicago
Tribune, San Francisco Chronicle and many others.
Urrea's first book, Across the Wire, was named a New York Times Notable
Book and won the Christopher Award. Urrea also won a 1999 American Book
Award for his memoir, Nobody's Son: Notes from an American Life and in
2000, he was voted into the Latino Literature Hall of Fame following the
publication of Vatos. His book of short stories, Six Kinds of Sky, was
named the 2002 small-press Book of the Year in fiction by the editors of
ForeWord magazine. He has also won a Western States Book Award in poetry
for The Fever of Being and was in The 1996 Best American Poetry
collection.
Urrea attended the University of California at San Diego, earning an
undergraduate degree in writing, and did his graduate studies at the
University of Colorado-Boulder.
After serving as a relief worker in Tijuana and a film extra and
columnist-editor-cartoonist for several publications, Urrea moved to
Boston where he taught expository writing and fiction workshops at
Harvard. He has also taught at Massachusetts Bay Community College and
the University of Colorado and he was the writer in residence at the
University of Louisiana-Lafayette.
Urrea's other titles include By the Lake of Sleeping Children, In Search
of Snow, Ghost Sickness and Wandering Time. His writing has won an
American Book Award, a Western States Book Award, a Colorado Center for
the Book Award and a Christopher Award. Both The Devil's Highway and The
Hummingbird's Daughter have been optioned for film.
Urrea lives with his family in Naperville, IL, where he is a professor
of creative writing at the University of Illinois-Chicago.
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