Vanessa Angélica Villarreal

On March 20, Vanessa Angélica Villarreal (MEngLit) accepted one of 10 Whiting Awards at a ceremony at the New York Historical Society. The Whiting Foundation gives $50,000 each to 10 diverse emerging writers of fiction, nonfiction, poetry and drama. Vanessa was born in the Rio Grande Valley borderlands to formerly undocumented Mexican immigrants. She is the author of the collection Beast Meridian (2017) and the winner of the John A. Robertson Award for Best First Book of Poetry from the Texas Institute of Letters. Her work has been featured in BuzzFeed, The Boston Review, The Rumpus, The Los Angeles Times, NBC News and elsewhere. She is pursuing a doctorate in English literature and creative writing at the University of Southern California, where she is raising her son with the help of a loyal dog.