The granddaughter of Mexican immigrants, Patricia Santos Marcantonio grew up in southern Colorado. Her family loved to tell stories and she loved to listen to them, eventually wanting to tell her own. Her parents even bought her a second-hand typewriter.
Much of her work features Hispanic characters and culture and often reflects the tales she heard as a kid, the people she knew, and her experiences growing up as a Mexican-American.
Best Amigas was inspired by that experience.
Her courtroom drama novel Verdict in the Desert, published by Arte Público Press, the largest US publisher of contemporary and recovered literature by US Hispanic authors and affiliated with the University of Houston, was sparked by a murder trial she covered as a newspaper reporter and grew into a story about intolerance and love.
A voracious reader, she didn’t see many Hispanics in books growing up and she wanted to remedy that with her children’s book Red Ridin’ in the Hood and Other Cuentos, which retold familiar fairy tales with Hispanic flavor. It earned an Anne Izard Storyteller’s Choice Award and was named an Americas Award for Children’s and Young Adult Literature Commended Title. She also wrote a play based on the book.
With an Alexa Rose Foundation Grant she produced and directed her original play, Tears for Llorona, a retelling of a Mexican ghost story she heard as a kid.
She is also the author of the Felicity Carrol mystery series about a strong female solving crime with the confines of Victorian society.
Her screenplays placed first in the Willamette Writers Kay Snow contest, as well as in the top percentage of the Phoenix Film Festival, Stage 32 Blood List, MORE Women in Film and Screenwriting Expo 5 competitions.
As a journalist, she earned several state and regional awards and was named a Newspaper Association of America New Media Fellow.
She lives in Boise, surrounded by her family and is still telling stories.
Regal House Publishing and Fitzroy Books is delighted to bring your Patricia’s novel Best Amigas in the fall of 2023.
