Ray Gonzalez, author of Feel Puma: Poems
Poetry category, sponsored by Wellington Management, Inc.
Each week leading up to the 33rd annual Minnesota Book Awards announcement, we are featuring exclusive interviews with our 36 finalists. You can also watch the authors in conversation with their fellow category finalists here.
In a year defined by a pandemic and its fallout, virtually everything about our lives has changed in some way. How has COVID-19 impacted your writing habits and preferences? Has the unique zeitgeist of the past year influenced your writing output in any ways that you can pinpoint? 
The pandemic reinforces the solitude of a writer where there is more time to write and read because of the isolation. I find this sad and surprising.
Would you tell us one or two things about your finalist book that you are particularly proud of, and why? (Sure, it may feel a bit un-Minnesotan to say so, but it’s not boasting if we ask!)
I am pleased at the way my sequence of poems about the American West have been received. Many writers, of course, have written about it and yet, it takes someone from the region to capture personal and historical moments in a universal manner.
What do you hope that your audience learns or takes away from your book?
That poetry, no matter where you come from, is for everyone.
Minnesota enjoys a reputation as a place that values literature and reading. If this sentiment rings true for you, what about our home state makes it such a welcoming and conductive place for writers?
There is huge public support for what writers do and this does not happen in every state of the country.
What advice would you give to an aspiring writer with an interest in your category?
Read and read and don’t stop reading poetry.
Tell us something about yourself that is not widely known! (It doesn’t have to be about your writing.)
I write a great deal of nonfiction alongside my poetry.
Ray Gonzalez is the author of a memoir and several books of poetry. He has received the PEN Oakland-Josephine Miles Book Award and the Latino Heritage Award and is a three-time Minnesota Book Award-winner. He teaches literature at the University of Minnesota.