AM Montes de Oca was born in Guadalajara, Mexico. She has earned both her MSc and PhD at the University of Edinburgh and has won two writing awards for short stories; the Keith Wright Prize from the University of Strathclyde, and the Sloan Prize from the University of Edinburgh. She has taught English (literature and composition) in the United States, Mexico, Egypt, and Japan. After spending the past eleven years living on four continents and travelling to more than thirty countries, AM Montes de Oca has now settled in Charlotte, NC, where she teaches writing classes and tends to stare at peop...