Watsonville Poet Laureate Victoria Bañales recently earned a Best Poetry Book Award from the International Latino Book Awards (ILBA) for her latest book, The Sun Will Not Harm You by Day, Nor the Moon by Night.
Bañales said three books were selected for this category, and winners will receive a gold, silver or bronze medal.
Awardees won’t know which they have won until the ILBA Awards Ceremony Oct. 3 at Cal State University San Marcos.
ILBA is part of Empowering Latino Futures (ELF) and is billed as the largest gathering of Latinx award-winning authors in the United States. Edward James Olmos and Kirk Whistler founded it in 1997.
This year, the awards included 87 categories and 292 judges.
In addition to receiving a Best Poetry Book Award, Bañales’ book received an honorable mention for the Juan Felipe Herrera Best Poetry Book Award, “which is a double honor,” she said.
Bañales was the first in her family to attend college, but like many young people, she was unsure where her path would take her.
She changed her major several times before settling on a path.
Bañales went on to earn a bachelor’s degree and then a master’s degree at San Francisco State University before earning a joint master’s-Ph.D. at UC Santa Cruz in literature and feminist studies.
She now teaches Chicanx/Latinx literature, fiction writing and English composition at Cabrillo College’s Watsonville campus, which she calls her “dream job.”
“You follow your dreams, you follow your passion and things work out in the long run, and I’m glad I did, because that’s what makes me happy,” she said.
In January 2025, Bañales was named Watsonville’s poet laureate, a position she will hold for two years.
