Ivonne Lamazares

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She emigrated to Florida, United States, at fourteen years of age and currently lives in South Miami with her husband, poet Steve Kronen, and her daughter.

Lamazares is a professor at Miami-Dade Community College, where she holds a high position due to her excellence in teaching literature. Her short stories have appeared in Blue Mesa Review and in the Michigan Quarterly Review.

Lamazares was discovered at the Sewanee Writers Conference when she had only written the beginning of The Sugar Island. Her professors were so impressed by her work that they introduced her to a literary agent and shortly thereafter she signed a contract for the book. "I still cannot explain this. It's like being in a car out of control, going somewhere you never expected to go," says Lamazares about the sudden attention her work has received. Her novel was published in Spanish by Alfaguara, under the title: La isla de Tanya.