Quintero, Sofia 1969- (Black Artemis)

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Quintero, Sofia 1969- (Black Artemis)

PERSONAL:

Born 1969. Education: Barnard College, secondary school teaching certificate, 1990; Columbia University, B.A., 1990, M.P.A., 1992.

ADDRESSES:

Home—New York, NY. Office—Chica Luna Productions, 2576 Broadway, #152, New York, NY 10025. Agent—Jennifer Cayea, Nicholas Ellison Agency, 55 5th Ave., New York, NY 10003.

CAREER:

Writer and activist. Chica Luna Productions, New York, NY, cofounder, 2001—; Sister Outsider Entertainment, New York, NY, cofounder. Member of the board for the Brecht Forum, the New World Foundation, Chica Luna Productions, and the Advocacy Institute.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Montage Entertainment Diversity in Screenwriting award, 1998, for Interstates; San Francisco Black Film Festival, best screenplay award, 2001, for Interstates.

WRITINGS:

(With others) Friday Night Chicas: Sexy Stories from "La Noche," St. Martin's Griffin (New York, NY), 2005.

Divas Don't Yield (novel), One World/Ballantine Books (New York, NY), 2006.

SCREENPLAYS

Interstates, 2001.

Corporate Dawgz, 2002.

Blind Date, 2005.

UNDER PSEUDONYM BLACK ARTEMIS

Explicit Content, New American Library (New York, NY), 2004.

Picture Me Rollin', New American Library (New York, NY), 2005.

Burn, New American Library (New York, NY), 2006.

Also writer of the screenplay M.L.B. Author of the Black Artemis blog. Contributor to periodicals and Web sites, including Ms., Blu, Fuego, 360HipHop.com, PoliticallyBlack.com, MiGente.com, New York Post, New York Daily News, Latina, Upscale, and the New York Times.

SIDELIGHTS:

Sofia Quintero, the self-proclaimed "Ivy-league homegirl," was born into a Dominican/Puerto Rican family in New York. After graduating from Columbia University, Quintero began writing books and feature-length screenplays. Her first screenplay, Interstates, won several awards, giving Quintero added momentum to continue as a writer. Already a freelance writer and contributor to a number of magazines, periodicals, and Web sites, Quintero adopted the pseudonym Black Artemis and published her first book, Explicit Content, in 2004. This "hiphop" style of writing was followed up with Picture Me Rollin' in 2005 and Burn in 2006.

Under her birth name, Quintero writes chica lit. The novelization of Interstates, which fits this category, was published as Divas Don't Yield in 2006. This book tells of the adventures and misadventures of four Latinas on a cross-country trip from New York to San Francisco. The problems they face are varied, from Hazel's unrequited lesbian love of Jackie and Lourdes' issues with her parents to boyfriends and all-curing moonstones. Leah Greenblatt and Clarissa Cruz, reviewing the book in an Entertainment Weekly article, called the characters "vividly drawn." They wrote, however, that the dialogue seemed "preachy." In a Booklist review, Whitney Scott called the novel "sassily smart" and concluded that the flow of the story provides for a "thoroughly enjoyable romp."