For Writer liz gonzález, a Taco Best Describes her Creative Self
Long Beach-based writer liz gonzález has a simple and surprising answer when you ask her to describe her creative self. “Taco.” It took me a second to absorb her answer. “Taco?” I asked.
“The taco with, of course, my culture Mexican…and it would be a vegetarian taco with pinto beans de la olla…and then with some other things that aren’t considered Mexican.”
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Vanessa Angélica Villarreal just signed on as nonfiction editor at LA’s own Gold Line Press. She’s an innovative poet who isn’t constrained by genre; her work is electrifying, form-melting, challenging. I asked her about Gold Line’s upcoming chapbook contest and her work as an editor.
DSTL Arts is a nonprofit arts mentorship organization based in Los Angeles that “inspires, teaches, and hires emerging artists from underserved communities.” The acronym in DSTL Arts
This is the fifth interview in an ongoing series about the intersections of writing, teaching, and identity. Read Past Interviews in the series: Kathy Kottaras, Jimmy Santiago Baca, Mike Rose, Virginia Pye.
I first came across John Brantingham’s work when he sent in a poetry submission to TreeHouse Arts, which I quickly accepted (you can view that publication 
Anna: Can you tell me a little bit about Antígona González?
Cynthia Guardado is a fierce and unapologetically brown Salvadorian American female punk rockera, poeta, activista, y profe straight from Inglewooooood, California. Her poems have been published in PALABRA, A Magazine of Chicano & Latino Literary Art; The Packing House Review; and Razorcake’s very own Puro Pinche Poetry: Gritos Del Barrio.
When you read Mean by Myriam Gurba, you’re going to laugh, and cry, at some really gross and mean things – but that’s kinda the whole point. Mean is a very introspective book, exploring Gurba’s childhood, adolescence, and early adult life. By analyzing her own memory, Gurba forces the reader to do the same. She describes the book as a “novel that is memoiristic,” meaning not exactly a memoir, but not exactly fiction — it blends the two genres through memory, analysis, and retrospection.
This month, the novelist Viet Thanh Nguyen was awarded one of the most prestigious honors a writer can receive: the MacArthur “genius” grant, given to artists, thinkers, and public intellectuals whose ideas have 
Los Angeles Literature 