Vanessa Ramos was born in Texas and raised in Minnesota. She has dreamt about being many things: an astronomer, a paranormal investigator, a museum educator, an art historian, a curiosities curator, a paleontologist, and even an actress, but a writer is what she became. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing and an MA in Education from Hamline University. She has received awards, fellowships, and grants in support of her writing from the Texas Institute of Letters and The University of Texas, The Loft Literary Center and The Playwrights' Center in Minneapolis, and the Minnesota State Arts Board. She lives and teaches in the Twin Cities.

"Sixth-grader Selena Estrella Herrera's family moves to El Paso to help care for her grandfather, and she tries to reinvent herself by claiming her identity as *Strella--but the project her team chooses is about the singer Selena after whom *Strella is actually named."--