Bárbara Renaud González is a Tejana born in South Texas, who grew up in the Texas Panhandle. She graduated with a B.A. in Social Work from the University of Texas Río Grande Valley and a Masters of Social Work from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. She worked in Washington D.C., followed by postgraduate work at the Harvard Kennedy School, studying Immigration and Labor. Her novel, Golondrina, why did you leave me?, was the first Chicana novel published by the University of Texas Press in 2009. She is also the author of The Boy Made of Lightning, an interactive children’s book on the life of the late, great, voting rights activist, Willie Velásquez.