Julia Alvarez is a Dominican-American poet, novelist, and essayist. She was born in New York City and moved to the Dominican Republic with her Dominican-American parents when she was an infant. In 1960, though, her father’s involvement in the political rebellion forced her family to flee the country and return to New York. Alvarez’s poetry often explores her identity as a Dominican American. Her work focuses heavily on issues of assimilation and identity. She writes about childhood memories and the experience of being an immigrant. Alvarez has also written a number of novels, including How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents (1991) and In the Time of Butterflies (1994) which was set during the Trujillo dictatorship in the Dominican Republic.