Laura Esquivel

Laura Alicia Palomares Esquivel was born in Mexico City, Mexico, the daughter of César Esquivel and Josefa Valdés. Esquivel first worked as a kindergarten teacher. She started her writing career by writing stories and plays for her students to perform. She married director Alfonso Arau in 1975. She began writing for television, and in 1989 she wrote her first and best-known novel, Like Water for Chocolate. The novel became popular internationally, and was adapted to film in 1992. She has written and published continually since then. Her works include her memoir, Between Two Fires (1995), as well as The Law of Love (1996), Intimas Suculencías (1998), Estrellita Marinera (1999) Libro de las Emociones (2000), Swift as Desire (2001), Malinche (2006), Pierced by the Sun (2016) and El Diario de Tita (2016). Esquivel has also worked as a politician since 2008. In 2012, Esquivel ran and was elected as the Morena party’s Federal Representative to the Mexican government. She is currently divorced and continues to live in Mexico City.