All About Liz . . .
Come meet Liz, Tues. July 14th @ Books & Books, 264 Aragon Ave from 8-10 pm
Liz Balmaseda, a two-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize, has a gift for breathing human complexity into issues that many see only in black and white. A writer for The Palm Beach Post and former columnist for The Miami Herald, she now ventures into fiction with SWEET MARY, a timeless tropical noir.
Born in Cuba in 1959, Liz was awarded her first Pulitzer Prize in 1993 for her writings on the plight of Haitian refugees and the Cuban-American population. She shared a second Pulitzer Prize in 2001 for the coverage of the federal raid to seize refugee boy Elián González. That year she was also honored with the Hispanic Heritage Award for writing excellence at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C.
Her debut novel, Sweet Mary (ATRIA/ Simon & Schuster, 7/14/09), tells the ripped-from-the-headlines, Miami story of a model citizen mistaken for a drug queen.
Liz’s journalistic career has brought her a range of assignments as a news reporter, feature and magazine writer, and network TV producer. In the mid-1980s she was based in El Salvador as the Central America bureau chief for Newsweek magazine. Later, before returning to The Miami Herald for stints as a Sunday magazine writer and columnist, she worked as a Central America-based field producer for NBC News.
She has co-authored two books, I Am My Father’s Daughter, the memoir of anchorwoman María Elena Salinas (HarperCollins, 2006), and Waking Up in America, the memoir of homeless advocate Dr. Pedro José Greer Jr. (Simon & Schuster, 1999). She has also contributed essays to various anthologies, as well as to the Oxford Encyclopedia.
In 2000, she was an associate producer and writer for HBO’s film on jazz trumpeter Arturo Sandoval, For Love or Country, starring Andy García. She co-wrote a second screen project for HBO, based on her book Waking Up in America.
She has appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show, ABC Nightline, Good Morning America, and The Today Show.
Liz lives in Miami, Florida.
