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Author Biography | Interview | Books by this Author | Read-Alikes
How to pronounce Raul Palma: rah-OOL PAHL-muh
Raul Palma is a second-generation Cuban American born and raised in Miami. His short story collection In This World of Ultraviolet Light won the 2021 Don Belton Prize. His writing has appeared in Alaska Quarterly Review, The Greensboro Review, Hayden's Ferry Review, and elsewhere. He is a member of the fiction faculty at Ithaca College, and the Associate Dean of Faculty and New Initiatives in Ithaca College's School of Humanities and Sciences. He earned his Ph.D. at the University of Nebraska, with a specialization in ethnic studies. A Haunting in Hialeah Gardens is his debut novel.
Raul Palma's website
This bio was last updated on 11/01/2023. In a perfect world, we would like to keep all of BookBrowse's biographies up to date, but with many thousands of lives to keep track of it's simply impossible to do. So, if the date of this bio is not recent, you may wish to do an internet search for a more current source, such as the author's website or social media presence. If you are the author or publisher and would like us to update this biography, send the complete text and we will replace the old with the new.
SCOTT SIMON, HOST: When Raul Palma's novel A Haunting In Hialeah Gardens opens, Hugo Contreras feels his life has shrunk. He lives in a small, bare cell of a Miami apartment after his beloved wife, Meli, has died. He cringes under medical debt, with only enough discretionary income to indulge in a single cafecito each week. One day, he gets another call from a debt collector, Alexi Ramirez, and is about to hang up when he learns he needs his help. Hugo is a babalawo. He spiritually cleanses haunted houses. And if he can banish spirits from Alexi's house, the collector will banish Hugo's debt.
Raul Palma, born and raised in Miami, is now on the fiction faculty at Ithaca College, and he told us earlier this week the idea for the book came when he was in graduate school in Nebraska, overwhelmed by student debt.
RAUL PALMA: It was actually - it was winter. And I remember I'd just driven home from campus, and the streets were slick, really icy, and got home, cold, tired. And I had a lot of work to do but began to wonder, how did I get here - right? - having spent so many years in Miami? And there was a degree when I began the project of just fondly remembering that warmth and this idea of being so far from home.
SIMON: There is one ...
Tananarive Due is an American Book Award–winning, Essence bestselling author of sixteen books, including Blood Colony, The Living Blood, The Good House, Joplin's Ghost, and Devil's Wake. She was also a contributor to ... (more)
If you enjoyed:
A Haunting in Hialeah Gardens
Try:
The Reformatory
by Tananarive Due
Marcial Gala was born in Havana in 1963. He is a novelist, a poet, and an architect and is a member of UNEAL, the National Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba. He won the Pinos Nuevos Prize for best short story in 1999. The ... (more)
If you enjoyed:
A Haunting in Hialeah Gardens
Try:
The Black Cathedral
by Marcial Gala
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