This evening in Querétaro I'll be presenting El último príncipe del Imperio Mexicano, which is the Spanish translation (beautifully done by Mexican writer Agustín Cadena) of The Last Prince of the Mexican Empire, my novel based on the true story of Agustín de Iturbide y Green in the court of Maximilian. The event will be at the Galería DRT, 5 de Mayo No. 80, esquina Altamirano, Centro Histórico, and it is thanks to my good friend the very talented writer Araceli Ardón. (By the way, her superb short story about Querétaro of the 1930s, "It is Nothing of Mine," appears in my anthology, Mexico: A Traveler's Literary Companion -- read her complete story at the website of National Public Radio).
Querétaro, one of Mexico's largest and most distinguished cities,
has long been associated with Maximilian. During the Second Empire, its deeply Catholic conservatives supported him and, in 1867, when Maximilian surrendered to the Juaristas, after a trial, he was executed just outside the city's center, on the Cerro de las Campanas. (The photo, above, is of the chapel dedicated to Maximilian on the Cerro de las Campanas.)
I will be presenting the novel in Mexico City a little later this year, and it is truly an honor to be able to present it today in Querétaro with Araceli Ardón.
There should be plenty of time for Q & A, and there will be copies of the novel in Spanish for sale at the event, which as ever, I'm delighted to sign. The novel is widely available in Mexico at bookstores such as Sanborn's, Gandhi, Sotano, etc., as well as CostCo and (yes) Office Depot. Click here for full information on how to find a copy in Spanish and here for information in English.
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This Saturday, Mónica Lavín, a well-known Mexican literary novelist-- whose short story "Day and Night" also appears in Mexico: A Traveler's Literary Companion-- will be giving a special seminar for the San Miguel Writers Conference in nearby San Miguel de Allende. On Sunday, also for the conference, I'll be reading, briefly, from the original English version of the novel, and giving a 90 minute workshop on "Techniques of Fiction: A Supersonic Overview."
Next week: The Bay to Ocean Writers Conference in Maryland, and a one day "Techniques of Fiction" workshop at the Writer's Center in Bethesda, Maryland.
More anon.
