Guest Author David Bowles Reading at Del Mar College April 10

Article by: Rosa Linda Reynoso

For those interested in reading books, Del Mar College (DMC) will present guest author David Bowles as he reads from his award-winning books on Wednesday, April 10. A Mexican-American author from deep South Texas, Bowles has written 14 books. After the reading, Bowles’ book collections will be available for purchase and signing.

Sponsored by the College’s Learning Resources and Mexican American Studies Program, the free reading begins at 7 p.m. in Room 514 of the White Library on DMC’s East Campus at Naples off Kosar at Staples. For more information, contact Alan Berecka, reference librarian and professor of Learning Resources, at 361-698-1933 or aberecka@delmar.edu. 

Bowles' book of selected poems, “They Call Me Güero: A Border Kid's Poems” (October 2018), won the 2019 Claudia Lewis Award for Excellence in Poetry and was named the 2019 Tomas Rivera Mexican American Children’s Book Award, 2019 Walter Dean Myers Honor Book for Outstanding Children’s Literature and the 2019 Pura Belpré Honor Book. The book was also named one of 2018’s best books by “School Library Journal” and “Shelf Awareness Magazine,” as well as one of five 2019 Notable Verse Novels by the National Council of Teachers of English.

Other books include Pura Belpré Honor Book “The Smoking Mirror” (March 2015), “A Kingdom Beneath the Waves” (April 2016), “Lords of the Earth” (October 2016), “The Hidden City” (September 2018), “Chupacabra Vengeance” (February 2017), “Strange Texas Tales That Never Die” (October 2014), and the critically acclaimed “Feathered Serpent, Dark Heart of Sky: Myths of Mexico” (May 2018), among others.

Among his recognitions, Bowles is a recipient of awards from the American Library Association, Texas Institute of Letters and Texas Associated Press. In 2017, Bowles was inducted into the Texas Institute of Letters in recognition of his literary accomplishments.

His work includes a translation of “El verano de las mariposas” (July 2018) of “The Summer of the Mariposas” by Guadalupe Garcia McCall and “Flower, Song, Dance: Aztec and Mayan Poetry” (August 2013), winner of the Soeurette Diehl Fraser Award for Best Translation.

This April, Penguin will publish “The Chupacabras of the Rio Grande,” co-authored with Adam Gidwitz. Also, planned for 2020 is the release of Bowles’ steampunk graphic novel “Clockwork Curandera” by Tu Books.

His work has also appeared in publications such as “Journal of Children’s Literature,” “Rattle,” “Strange Horizons,” “Apex Magazine,” “Nightmare,” “Asymptote,” “Translation Review,” “Metamorphoses,” “Huizache,” “Eye to the Telescope,” “Bookbird” and “Southwestern American Literature.”

Currently, Bowles is an assistant professor at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley in Edinburg.

For more information about Bowles, visit www.davidbowles.us.