Professional services
MENTORING
Carmen will be happy to provide mentoring services on a one-on one basis, or by working with small groups. In either case, the objective will be to encourage the development of each writer's unique voice and craft.
When working with small groups, Carmen will use a workshop format – participants will read one another's writing ahead of time and offer their observations during meetings. Carmen will facilitate the discussions and provide detailed feedback to each participant.
Spanish and English. Poetry and prose. All levels.
EDITING
If you're working on short stories, a novel or a memoir, Carmen will help you with issues such as character development, structure and plot. As well, she will ensure that your story is not only well written, but also compelling.
If you're writing an article or essay, Carmen's experience as a journalist and professor will assist you in creating a piece that is concise, clear and effective.
Perhaps the biggest challenge to writing poetry is to convey the desired meaning by combining economic and layered language, imagery and rhythm. If you are a poet wanting to improve your craft, Carmen's background as a bilingual poet, in addition to her expertise as a music aficionado, will help you to do so.
Spanish and English.
Main publications
Atacama (2021)
From the saltpetre fields of northern Chile to a dance studio in Valparaíso, and on to Catalonia during the Spanish Civil War and Pablo Neruda's consular office in Paris, Atacama is moving, poignant and absorbing. Beautifully crafted, Rodríguez's novel is ultimately a story about the power of writing and the power of art, both to dramatize grief and to encourage remembrance. As drama and remembrance, Atacama succeeds admirably.
Retribution (2011)
When Tania, a thirty-six year old Vancouver artist receives a letter suggesting that her biological father may not be the man she has always known as such, her world turns upside down. As she struggles to understand the implications of this news and delves into her family's complex past, Tania discovers the ultimate retribution that her life represents.
REASONS to CONSIDER CARMEN'S WORK for your reading List
Rodríguez's books are compelling and beautifully written.
Rodríguez's books are compelling and beautifully written.
Rodríguez's books are compelling and beautifully written.
About ATACAMA:
"The fiction intermingles beautifully with the historical aspect of the novel, flowing so excellently together that I was left wondering what was real and what was not. While the historical events in the novel happened over 100 years ago, the depictions of tyranny, resilience, and crusading for the rights of the underrepresented still ring true today."
Tamanna T. - The Peak
Rodríguez's books are compelling and beautifully written.
Rodríguez's books are compelling and beautifully written.
"A story is like a house waiting to be inhabited. When readers enter and furnish it with their own possessions, the house comes to life. Thus, the story will acquire as many lives as there are readers – each reader infusing it with his or her unique experiences, feelings, world view...
A book club creates a space where readers can present
"A story is like a house waiting to be inhabited. When readers enter and furnish it with their own possessions, the house comes to life. Thus, the story will acquire as many lives as there are readers – each reader infusing it with his or her unique experiences, feelings, world view...
A book club creates a space where readers can present their furnished houses – their particular "reading" of the story – to the other participants, compare and discuss their perceptions and insights, and make meaning together."
Carmen Rodríguez
You will fall in love with her characters
Rodríguez's books are compelling and beautifully written.
Characters don't inhabit an abstract, undefined place or time
They're deeply human and you'll see glimpses of yourself and people you know in the way they feel, think and act. They'll make you laugh, cry, sigh and smile. And, they'll make you want to keep turning the page.
Characters don't inhabit an abstract, undefined place or time
Characters don't inhabit an abstract, undefined place or time
Characters don't inhabit an abstract, undefined place or time
They live in constant dialogue with very concrete socio-historical circumstances. This means that as you immerse yourself in their lives, you will also be learning about what's happening around them.
Rodríguez's books are universal in scope and appeal
Characters don't inhabit an abstract, undefined place or time
Rodríguez's books are universal in scope and appeal
Who wouldn't relate to stories about resilience, survival, exile, trauma, social justice, and individual and collective memory, not to mention family and love?
Rodríguez is a bilingual, bicultural writer
Characters don't inhabit an abstract, undefined place or time
Rodríguez's books are universal in scope and appeal
She straddles her Chilean roots and upbringing and her fifty years of adult life in Canada with ease and sensibility. This dual view of the world translates into a unique brand of writing; writing that is informed by two languages and two literary traditions; writing that brings to life the actual and cultural terrain of dual geographies.