Category: News

This weekend I threw a baby shower for my bestest friend, Jen Mahal. (Look at us from my wedding in 2000 … weren’t we dishy?) It’s a real moment of truth seeing the shy girl you met in high school drama class become a mother. As I looked across the table at her, I wondered what happened to the girls we were? Firmly ensconced in our thirties, we’re now wives and mothers; professional writers and journalists. It’s safe to say that we’re officially adults and yet speaking for myself, I don’t feel like one.

I certainly don’t dress like one as evidenced by this photo taken at the San Diego Burn Run in July:

I’m beginning to suspect that like F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Benjamin Buttons, the older I get, the less mature I become and you know what? I like the person I see in the mirror. She makes me laugh. She doesn’t get all het up over saying stupid things, or not appearing cool because she now knows that “cool people” are, in actuality, boring people who wouldn’t know a good fart joke if it came out of their own ass.

As we get older, our lives get harder and yet, it doesn’t help if you become hard. This past January I had to find a new agent and embrace that my writing had changed, rather than try to replicate what I’d been doing with my past books.

If I had allowed the experience to harden me, I don’t think I could’ve kept going. If I hadn’t learned to roll my eyes and channel anger into action, I wouldn’t have found my way out of the darkness. This summer I revised The Ballad of Aracely Calderon (again), I spent a lot of time with my family and published a feature story looking back at the life and career of Ritchie Valens (yes, I got to meet the Donna!); I profiled Jay Hernandez from Hostel in Latino Future and Jose Aponte, director of the San Diego County Library. Next month, I will see my very first cover story in Rise Up magazine about the civil rights case, Mendez v. Westminster. From the emails I’ve received, my story on biracial Latinas in LatinaVoz helped some readers understand the racism they’ve experienced from their own families.

I never would’ve had these adventures if I’d kept plodding along doing the same thing. This fall, starting with Ylse creator and star, Ruth Livier on Tuesday, I hope to introduce you to more women who are daring, playful and brave.

Best,
Mary

Summer Crowds at Mission Beach from Art.com

Pregnant Pause by Barbara Aliaga from Art.com

“Now don’t get out until I come around with the umbrella,” Dori ordered.

“Who are you to tell me what to do?” Grammy demanded.

“It’s wet outside.”

“So? I ain’t no wicked witch. I ain’t gonna melt.”

Thanks so much for checking out the sneak peek of my upcoming novel, The Guy Upstairs. I’m moving the updated version of this excerpt to the Free Reads section of my soon-to-be relaunched website. If you’d like to be notified when it’s up and ready for you to enjoy, please email me at: mary@marycastillo.com with the subject line “I want my free read.”

Or, meet Dori and her grammy in the anthology collection, Names I Call My Sister available in print or your favorite eBook!

Thanks,

Mary

“Ask Newmann, He Knows” from Art.com

This happened to me when I wrote In Between Men … I went through two full drafts and with each draft something died inside me when I hit Act II. But I was persistent back then and thought I could force the story to go exactly the way I wanted it to. Finally, I realized two things: stories must change and evolve (for me, anyway) and Act II is the place where bad ideas go to die.

Last week, the same thing happened with The Guy Upstairs. I finished the first draft, spent a lot of time fleshing out a revision plan and then got to work. I was cruising along through Act I, but with that dragging feeling in my gut that I ignored because I was convinced that I had the story down. But as I neared Act II, the threads unraveled and it became more and more apparent that the story wasn’t working. Sure enough, it died at page 100.

But I’m glad it happened now as opposed at the end of a tepid second draft. With In Between Men, I had to go back into a third draft where I discovered that I wasn’t telling the right story. (Originally, it was about Isa fighting for custody of her son.) The story that needed to be told was about a woman who falls victim to her own recklessness and yet, without that recklessness she would never have changed her life. This discovery made the writing more difficult, not to mention longer.

When The Guy Upstairs ran aground, I realized that I had better do a writer’s version of stop, drop and roll. I stopped writing and went outside to work on my garden (we planted four types of tomatoes, squash and herbs). Within two hours of refusing to think about the book, I realized what The Guy Upstairs is really about. But I wouldn’t take notes for two days because the other thing I’ve learned is that once you start writing it down, the committee upstairs starts hacking away at your babies.

I’ve been writing the new story since Sunday and the idea has been gaining momentum. The committee grumbles when I sit down to write (which it always does), but my gut tingles with excitement and the heroine’s voice becomes much more distinct and alive. I’ve written about twenty pages of new material and I think this is it.

Or, I’m full of it and still have no idea what the hell I’m doing.

I guess I’ll know for certain when I reach page 100.

If you regularly read this blog, you’ve heard me talk about a Mariachi book that I’ve been working on. (If this doesn’t sound familiar, check out the sneak peek that was part of the Chica Lit Valentine’s Day Tour.)

I just about fell out of my chair when I heard about Compañeras, the upcoming PBS series Independent Lens documentary about Mariachi Reyna de Los Angeles, America’s first all-female mariachi, founded in 1994. Hosted by Terrence Howard, the show will air at 10 p.m. on April 1, 2008.

The most prominent of Mexican mariachi – Mariachi del Sol and Mariachi Vargas de Tecalitan – are presently and historically all male. Female mariachi are still frowned upon or considered a joke in Mexico. When I wrote The Ballad of Aracely Calderon, my challenge was to help the readers understand what an uproar it would be if a woman – in Aracely’s case, an American-born daughter of a family of mariachi – took the lead of such a prestigious mariachi group … even in 2008. But when I saw Linda Ronstadt ride a train on-stage during her performance in Canciones de Mi Padre, she was like a queen and I kept that image in my head as I wrote Aracely. To me, female mariachi are regal. The fact that they persist in spite of the misogynist attitude of their male counterparts makes them heroes in my eyes.

As for my book, The Ballad of Aracely Calderon, I’ve decided to dress up like a mariachi for my new author photo!

“The Ballad of Aracely Calderon” by Mary Castillo, http://marycastillo.blogspot.com/2008/02/por-un-amor.html

“The Painting” by Mayra Calvani, http://www.thedarkphantom.wordpress.com/

“A Box of Valentines” by Jamie Martinez Wood, http://jamiemartinezwood.blogspot.com/

“Missed Connections” by Margo Candela, http://www.margocandela.blogspot.com/

“Dream Catch Me” by Barbara Caridad Ferrer, http://fashionista-35.livejournal.com/

On Tuesday I went to the local history room of the National City Public Library to start researching for my book. My first discovery was my Grandma Nana’s (my great grandmother) address in the city directory for 1929. I also found my great great great grandmother’s listing and realized that she lived three blocks down from my Grandma Nana (her grand daughter). The librarian gave me a list of the oral histories done in the 1980’s and there was my Great Uncle John who used to ride down to visit my Grandma Mary (my mom’s mom) on his Harley. He was in his late 70’s at the time.

Listening to his tape, I uncovered a family secret. My Grandma Mary told my mom that she had been born in Mazatlan. According to my Great Uncle John, they were born in San Ysidro and then taken to Mazatlan by an Aunt Catalina who registered them as Mexican citizens. The plan was that their parents would return to Mexico. But when the revolution broke out in 1911, she hightailed it out of Mexico and brought them back to San Diego. A few years later in 1913, their father was shot and killed in a gambling hall, forcing my Great Grandmother Inez to work in a Chinese laundry from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. every day for $1 per day. My Great Uncle John, then 11 years old, went to work for Japanese farmer so his mother wouldn’t have to work so hard.

I could go on with more stories but there’s something magical and poignant about finding the people who gave you the color of your hair or the shape of your chin in an 80 year-old phone book. Suddenly, they’re not blurry faces in old photos, or names on county documents. They’re people who lived. When I heard about my widowed great grandmother who couldn’t read or write, and could understand English but not speak it (or Chinese, presumably) having to wash laundry to support her two children … man, that puts my problems in perspective!

But it also makes me so proud and yet, so humble. Ever since Tuesday, I walk through my house with such an appreciation for my education, my home and the Little Dude’s toys that litter every room. I think about the books that are on the shelves in front of me, around me and on the floor and that I can write these words when almost a 100 years ago, my great grandmother was boiling clothes and then scrubbing them on a board. (What did she think about, I keep wondering.) I thought my mariachi book would be the most special story I’d ever written. But this new story that I’m working on is taking me into new territory. So I hope you won’t be bored as I share my stories along the journey.

Best,
Mary