“How to Date a Flying Mexican” comes to the Alameda Free Library in a live streamed event on January 25, 7:00 p.m.

 

Happy new year! I was a bit out of commission with a bad case of COVID all December (I am fully vaccinated and boosted, so it could have been worse). But I am back in the saddle.

And this month, I am excited to let you know about an upcoming book event! Join me (virtually) on January 25, 7:00 p.m., as I discuss my short-story collection How to Date a Flying Mexican: New and Collected Stories (University of Nevada Press). I will be interviewed by the wonderful poet, León Salvatierra.

The event will be streamed live and is sponsored by the Friends of the Alameda Free Library. Register now at this link. It helps the event planners if you can register early, so if you have a moment, please do so. We will be discussing many things including the writing life, the creation of this short-story collection, and also preview the forthcoming Spanish translation of How to Date a Flying Mexican which will be released in May. I hope to see you (virtually) there!

Praise for How to Date a Flying Mexican

"How to Date a Flying Mexican is a beautifully realized work that comes out of the depths of the Mexican and Mexican American cultural experience." 

     —Michael Nava, Los Angeles Review of Books

"Throughout all of his stories, there are strong Chicano characters, who embody tales that range from the laugh-out-loud funny to the heartbreaking. A timely retrospective from an important voice in Latinx literature." 

     —Wendy J. Fox, BuzzFeed

"Prompted by tragedy—the death of his father and the pandemic—Olivas revisits decades of writing to produce this collection of new and previously published stories. Olivas’s work is surreal, dystopian, critical, and introspective, ultimately moving into contemporary political rhetoric." 

     —Alta Journal

"Daniel Olivas loves to tell stories and his writing reflects that joy. Every story is told with a wink and a smile, encouraging you to follow along for the ride."

     —Maceo Montoya, associate professor of Chicano/a Studies, University of California, Davis, and author of Preparatory Notes for Future Masterpieces

"From gritty realism to mythic and sci-fi speculative, Olivas dishes up an exquisite feast of short fictions filled to the brim with small and outsized everyday struggles—and failures."

     —Frederick Luis Aldama, award winning author and Jacob & Frances Sanger Mossiker Chair in the Humanities at UT Austin 

"This kinetic new collection of stories is exuberant and poignant, filled with the homegrown details of Latinx life as well as a kind of cheerful, saucy magic."

     —Yxta Maya Murray, law professor, Loyola Law School and author of The World Doesn’t Work that Way, but It Could: Stories

"Olivas intertwines Chicana/o and Mexican culture and history such as gods, curanderismo, education, immigration, and many other important factors into each story. The flawless incorporation of these two identities mixed with the peculiar characters in magical plots makes for memorable and quirky tales.... It was an honor to step into his strange, little world."

     —Melissa Gonzalez, Latinx in Publishing

"...How to Date a Flying Mexican is a delight of fancy, style, and scope."

     —Gustavo Arellano, KCRW

"A skilled, creative, entertaining and thought-provoking writer who has impressively mastered the short story format, Daniel A. Olivas' new anthology, How to Date a Flying Mexican: New and Collected Stories, will prove to be a welcome addition to community, college, and university library Hispanic-American Literature collections."

     —Midwest Book Review

"Daniel Olivas’ stories are going to stick with us for quite awhile. Empathetic, touching, intelligent, fierce, and poetic."

     —Writer's Bone

"Prepare to be enchanted—there’s magic within."

     —Stanford Magazine