Sergio Troncoso

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Sergio Troncoso
Born 1961
El Paso, Texas
Occupation Novelist, short story writer, essayist
Nationality United States of America
Subjects Chicano literature, philosophy in literature
Notable work(s) The Last Tortilla and Other Stories, From This Wicked Patch of Dust, Crossing Borders: Personal Essays, The Nature of Truth
Notable award(s) Premio Aztlán Literary Prize; Fulbright Scholarship; Literary Legacy Award; Southwest Book Award; Hispanic Scholarship Fund's Alumni Hall of Fame; Texas Institute of Letters
www.sergiotroncoso.com

Sergio Troncoso is an American author of short stories, essays and novels.

Biography

Troncoso, the son of Mexican immigrants, was born in El Paso, Texas. He grew up in Ysleta, an unincorporated neighborhood or colonia, on the east side of El Paso. His parents built their own adobe house, and the family lived with kerosene lamps and stoves and an outhouse in the backyard during their first years in Texas. Troncoso attended South Loop School and Ysleta High School, and later graduated from Harvard College and received two graduate degrees in international relations and philosophy from Yale University. He won a Fulbright Scholarship to Mexico, where he studied economics, politics, and literature. In 1999, his book of short stories, The Last Tortilla and Other Stories (University of Arizona Press), won the Premio Aztlán Literary Prize for the best book by a new Chicano writer, and the Southwest Book Award from the Border Regional Library Association.

In his story "Angie Luna," the tale of a feverish love affair in which a young man from El Paso rediscovers his Mexican heritage, Troncoso explores questions of self-identity and the ephemeral quality of love. "A Rock Trying to Be a Stone" is a story of three boys playing a dangerous game that becomes a test of character on the Mexico-U.S. border. "My Life in the City" focuses on a transplanted Texan's yearning for companionship in New York City. "Remembering Possibilities" delves into the terror of a young man attacked in his apartment while he takes solace in memories of a lost love. Troncoso typically sets aside the polemics about social discomfort sometimes found in contemporary Chicano literature and concentrates instead on the moral and intellectual lives of his characters.

His novel, The Nature of Truth (Northwestern University Press), was first published in 2003, and is a story about a Yale research student who discovers that his boss, a renowned professor, hides a Nazi past. A reviewer from Janus Head, a journal of Philosophy, Literature, and Psychology, wrote: "The subtlety, and fairness, with which Troncoso presents these conflicting frameworks [Nietzschean valor, Christian pragmatism, and blind inductivism] stand as the novel's crowning intellectual achievement, side by side with the artistic one: a convincing tale of murder and ruminating guilt." In 2003, Troncoso was also inducted into the Hispanic Scholarship Fund's Alumni Hall of Fame.

In 2011, Troncoso published two books. His second novel, From This Wicked Patch of Dust (University of Arizona Press), is a story about the Martinez family, who begins life in a shantytown on the U.S.-Mexico border, and struggles to stay together despite cultural clashes, different religions, and contemporary politics. A reviewer from The Dallas Morning News wrote: "In a media market where cultural stereotypes abound, it's refreshing to read a novel featuring Latino characters who are nuanced and authentic. Sergio Troncoso’s latest, From This Wicked Patch of Dust, follows a family from humble beginnings in a Texas border town through several decades as its members move beyond their Mexican Catholic culture to inhabit Jewish, Muslim and Ivy League spaces....These middle spaces have long been fodder for writers, though the El Paso-born and Harvard-educated Troncoso has created new, empathetic characters to explore it. No, the real beauty of this book is that it mines the rich diversity of tradition and culture among Latinos, as well as the commonalities they share with other Americans- love of family, faith and country." The novel was named as one of the best books of 2012 by Kirkus Reviews and won the Southwest Book Award from the Border Regional Library Association. The novel was chosen as a Notable Book by Southwest Books of the Year. Troncoso's novel was also a finalist for Reading The West Book Award from the Mountains and Plains Independent Booksellers Association, and was shortlisted runner-up for the biannual PEN/Texas Southwest Book Award for Fiction.

Crossing Borders: Personal Essays (Arte Público Press) was also published in 2011, and is a collection of sixteen essays about how Troncoso made the leap from growing up poor along the border to the Ivy League, his wife's battle against breast cancer, his struggles as a writer in New York and Texas, fatherhood, interfaith marriage, and Troncoso's appreciation of Judaism. A reviewer for The El Paso Times wrote: “These very personal essays cross several borders: cultural, historical, and self-imposed....We owe it to ourselves to read, savor and read them again.” The collection of essays won the Bronze Award for Essays from ForeWord Reviews, and Second Place for Best Biography in English in the International Latino Book Awards.

Troncoso was inducted into the Texas Institute of Letters in 2012.

In 2013, he co-edited Our Lost Border: Essays on Life amid the Narco-Violence (Arte Público Press), a collection of essays on how the unique bi-national and bi-cultural existence along the United States-Mexico border has been disrupted by recent drug violence. Publishers Weekly called it an “eye-opening collection of essays,” and the San Antonio Express-News said it was “exceptionally beautiful and poignant writing.” In 2013, Troncoso also received the Literary Legacy Award from the El Paso Community College.

A revised and updated paperback edition of Troncoso's novel, The Nature of Truth, was published by Arte Público Press in 2014.

Troncoso's stories have been featured in many anthologies, including Critical Thinking, Thoughtful Writing (Cengage Learning), Camino Del Sol: Fifteen Years of Latina and Latino Writing (University of Arizona Press), Latino Boom: An Anthology of U.S. Latino Literature (Pearson/Longman Publishing), Hecho en Tejas: An Anthology of Texas-Mexican Literature (University of New Mexico Press), Once Upon a Cuento (Curbstone Press), City Wilds: Essays and Stories about Urban Nature (University of Georgia Press), and New World: Young Latino Writers (Dell Publishing). His work has also appeared in Pembroke Magazine, Encyclopedia Latina, Newsday, The El Paso Times, Hadassah Magazine, Other Voices, Blue Mesa Review, and many other newspapers and magazines.

Bibliography

Books

Anthologies (contributing author)

  • New Border Voices: An Anthology (Texas A&M University Press, 2014)
  • Critical Thinking, Thoughtful Writing (Cengage Learning, 2014)
  • Writing for Life: Paragraphs and Essays (Pearson Longman Publishing, 2013)
  • Writing for Life: Sentences and Paragraphs (Pearson Longman Publishing, 2013)
  • Nuestra Aparente Rendicion (Random House Mondadori, 2011)
  • You Don't Have a Clue: Latino Mystery Stories for Teens (Arte Público Press, 2011)
  • Camino Del Sol: Fifteen Years of Latina and Latino Writing (University of Arizona Press, 2010)
  • Literary El Paso (Texas Christian University Press, 2009)
  • Hit List: The Best of Latino Mystery (Arte Público Press, 2009)
  • Hecho en Tejas: An Anthology of Texas-Mexican Literature (University of New Mexico Press, 2007)
  • Encyclopedia Latina: History, Culture, and Society in the United States (Grolier Scholastic, 2005)
  • Latino Boom: An Anthology of U.S. Latino Literature (Pearson Longman Publishing, 2005)
  • Once Upon a Cuento (Curbstone Press, 2003)
  • Tierra Adentro: Cuentario (Consejo Nacional para la Cultura y las Artes, 2002)
  • City Wilds: Essays and Stories about Urban Nature (University of Georgia Press, 2002)
  • New World: Young Latino Writers (Dell Publishing, 1997)

Anthology (editor)

  • Our Lost Border: Essays on Life amid the Narco-Violence, co-edited with Sarah Cortez, (Arte Público Press, 2013)

External links

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