Jessica Barksdale Inclan's Biography

Jessica Barksdale Inclán's debut novel Her Daughter's Eyes, published in 2001, was the premier novel published under New American Library's new imprint Accent. Her Daughter's Eyes was a final nominee for the YALSA Award for the best books of 2001 and best paperbacks for 2001 and has been published in Dutch and Spanish. Her next novel The Matter of Grace was published in May 2002 and was re-released in a mass market version in May 2004. Her third, When You Go Away, came out April 1, 2003. Her fourth, One Small Thing, was published April 2004, and was translated into in Dutch and Spanish. Walking With Her Daughter, was published in April 2005, and her sixth, The Instant When Everything is Perfect in February 2006. Starting in June 2006, she published the first in a trilogy from Kensington Books, When You Believe. Reason to Believe was published October 2006 and Believe in Me in March 2007. Her next trilogy began with Being With Him in February 2008, Intimate Beings in October 2008, and The Beautiful Being in 2009. She is a 2002 recipient of the CAC Artist’s Fellowship in Literature. Inclán teaches composition, creative writing, mythology, and women’s literature at Diablo Valley College in Pleasant Hill, California, and on-line and on-land creative writing courses for UCLA extension. She has studied with Sharon Olds, Anne Lamott, Kate Braverman, Grace Paley, Marjorie Sandor, and Cristina Garcia. Her short stories and poems have appeared in Rockhurst Review, Hotwired, The Salt Hill Journal, Free Lunch, The West Wind Review, The Prairie Star, Gargoyle and many other journals and newspapers. Her short story Open Eyes was given first prize by Sandra Cisneros for El Andar magazine's 2000 writing contest. She co-edited a women’s literature/studies textbook Diverse Voices of Women (Mayfield Publishing, 1995). Ms. Inclán has degrees in sociology and English literature from California State University, Stanislaus, and a Master’s degree in English literature from San Francisco State University. Ms. Inclán lives in Oakland, California, and is waiting for good news from her new agent about her young adult novel The August Garden.