The Flower in the Skull



The Flower in the Skull, Kathleen Alcalá's second novel, chronicles three generations of women descended from the Opata Indians of the Sonoran Desert. "Like the family in Alcalás previous novel," according to Publishers Weekly, "this one travels far--physically, spiritually, and emotionally--in order to survive."

It received the Western States Book Award and the Governer's Writers Award. (Chronicle Books, 1998, Harvest Books, 1999)




Selected Works

Creative Nonfiction
The Desert Remembers My Name
Essays on Family and Writing

“The Desert Remembers My Name makes an important contribution to discussions of ethnicity, identity, and the literature of place.”
–Bloomsbury Review
Fiction
Treasures in Heaven
"...a mesmerizing tale... the author explores the fascinating confusions and contradictions plaguing a culture precariously poised between tradition and modernization."
–Booklist
The Flower in the Skull
"She never forgot the power of storytelling as testimony."
–The Utne Reader
Spirits of the Ordinary
"Kathleen Alcalá's Spirits of the Ordinary is an enthralling book..."
–Paul Yamazaki, City Lights Books

"This book entered my dreams."
–Alberto Rios
Short Fiction
Mrs. Vargas and the Dead Naturalist
"Thoroughly satisfying."
–The New York Times Book Review

"By turns touching, entertaining, and surprising, and uniquely her own."
–Publishers Weekly

Find Authors