Lea Aschkenas is a Northern California writer, public librarian, and a poet-teacher with California Poets in the Schools. Her memoir, Es Cuba: Life and Love on an Illegal Island, tells the story of the year she spent living in Cuba. Her children’s book, Arletis, Abuelo, and the Message in a Bottle, is based on a true message in a bottle story set in California and Cuba.

She has written for World Literature Today, Solstice: A Magazine of Diverse Voices, Salon.com, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Review of Books, and Poets Reading the News, among other publications. She has received grants, scholarships, and residencies from the Center for Cultural Innovation, The Community of Writers, Dorland Mountain Arts Colony, the Wellstone Center in the Redwoods, and Can Serrat Arts Centre in Spain.

Lea has served as a judge for the John and Patricia Beatty Award for children’s books and has given presentations about her books and librarianship at various venues including the Havana International Book Fair; the California Library Association annual conference; and the binational (US-Mexico) librarians’ conference, Seguimos Creando Enlaces.