Nationality American Genre literary nonfiction | Name Wendy Ortiz Role Essayist | |
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Occupation non-fiction writer, essayist, memoirist Books Hollywood Notebook, Excavation: A Memoir |
Wendy c ortiz reading from excavation a memoir
Wendy C. Ortiz (born 1973) is an American essayist, creative nonfiction writer, fiction writer and poet.
Contents
- Wendy c ortiz reading from excavation a memoir
- Background
- Works
- Achievements and awards
- Book Reviews Articles and Interviews
- References

Background

Wendy C. Ortiz was born in Los Angeles, California in 1973. She earned her Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Arts from The Evergreen State College in 1995 and lived in Olympia, Washington for eight years before returning to Los Angeles where she presently resides. While living in Olympia, Washington, Ortiz was a mudwrestler, library worker, and editor and publisher of 4th Street, a handbound literary journal.

Ortiz went on to receive her Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing (2002) as well as her Master of Arts in Clinical Psychology (2010) from Antioch University in Los Angeles, California. Ortiz currently works at a Los Angeles clinic as well as in a private practice internship, finishing the final intern hours required for licensure as a marriage and family therapist in California.

She is co-founder, curator and host of the Rhapsodomancy Reading Series, which began at the Good Luck Bar in Los Angeles in 2004 and has continued ever since. The reading series will exist in other iterations and venues beginning in 2015. Ortiz was a Writer-in-Residence at Hedgebrook in 2007 and 2009 and has read at various venues including Secret City in Los Angeles, RADAR Reading Series in San Francisco, LitCrawl L.A.: NoHo, the West Hollywood Book Fair in Los Angeles, The Knitting Factory in Los Angeles, World Stage in Los Angeles, the Echo Park Poetry Festival in Los Angeles and the first Ladyfest in Olympia, Washington in 2000. Ortiz is an adjunct faculty in creative writing and has also facilitated creative writing workshops with Los Angeles youth in juvenile detention facilities.
Works

Ortiz is the author of three books: Excavation: A Memoir, (Future Tense Books, 2014) Hollywood Notebook (Writ Large Press, 2015), and Bruja (Civil Coping Mechanisms, 2016).

Ortiz's prose appears in print in California Prose Directory 2014 Red Light Lit Palabra: A Magazine of Chicano and Latino Literary Art and KNOCK 2/1. Her prose appears online in Mud City Journal, Poor Claudia, Hazlitt, Midnight Breakfast, Watershed Review, WhiskeyPaper, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, The Collapsar Brain, Child, Jaded Ibis Productions BLEED blog, The Coachella Review, The Nervous Breakdown, McSweeney's Internet Tendency, Literary Mama, Litro Magazine, Mutha Magazine Split Lip, Hedgebrook Farmhouse Table Blog, The New York Times, Specter: A Brooklyn-based Art Journal, PANK Magazine. and Specter Magazine.
Her piece "Mark Ruffalo ha visto tutto" was translated into Italian and published on the website Abbiamo Le Prove in 2014.'
Ortiz's poetry features in print in Wide Awake: The Poets of Los Angeles and Greater L.A,* Spillway, Cranky, Eclipse: A Literary Journal, Bedwetter, Calapooya 4th Street and Voices from the WTO. Her poetry appears online in Shabby Doll House, Hobart, Fanzine, The Rumpus, Luna Luna Finery Educe Sweet: A Literary Confection Two Hawks Quarterly Blood Orange Review womenwriters.net Poetry Magazine and Voices from the WTO.
Ortiz's book reviews, interviews and articles appear in Works In Progress. She also did interviews at The Rumpus.
Achievements and awards
Book Reviews, Articles and Interviews
Reviews of Wendy C. Ortiz's books appear in Los Angeles Review of Books LA Times. Fourculture Magazine, The Elizabeth Ayres Center for Creative Writing, Lunch Ticket, Winter Tangerine and Persephone Magazine.
A playlist for Excavation: A Memoir appears in Largehearted Boy.
Articles about Ortiz appear in Los Angeles Review of Books, Watershed Review, The Toast, Cultural Weekly, Volume 1 Brooklyn, Skylight Books Los Angeles, Lock Haven University, and In Search of Ada.
Interviews with Ortiz appear in Poets & Writers, KCRW, KCHUNG Oracle Hour, Mutha Magazine, Bustle, Electric Literature, The Rumpus, FORTH Magazine, VIDA, Somnambulist, Women Who Submit, The Normal School, Connotation Press, Otherppl, YAY! LA Magazine Critical Mass, UCR Palmdesert, Cari Luna, PANK magazine Literary Kitchen, Entropy, Break Thru Radio, Brevity, Specter Magazine, Midnight Breakfast, Welcome To Ladyville, The Rejectionist, Lunch Ticket LitroUSA, One Axe, Jenna Leigh Evans, AndiLit and ZYZZYVA blog.