A story that hits home

Natalia Sylvester, author of “Everyone Knows You Go Home,” read excerpts of her book, answered questions and donated to the archives last Friday in the Brownsville University Library.

After reading the first chapter of her book, Sylvester explained the story is about a man coming to visit his family from the dead but not being well received. One element of the story is the character Omar’s journey from the spiritual world to the physical world, which made Sylvester realize the story is also about immigration.

Sylvester moved to the United States at age 4 and grew up in Florida and the Rio Grande Valley. She said that although it was the only home she had known, it wasn’t one she belonged to.  

“I remember, also, speaking to my mom a lot and she would tell me that she never felt at home,” she said. “When she went back to Peru, she never felt at home there and yet, being here, she didn’t feel quite at home either.”

Asked how she would define a home, Sylvester answered that a home is a place where you somehow grew and that left an impact.

“I lived in Mission only three years … and it left such a huge impact on my life and I think in a lot of ways, I was always wanting to come back,” she said.

“Everyone Knows You Go Home” (Little A, 2018) was inspired by different aspects of Sylvester’s life and she considers it a homage to her mother. Sylvester learned a lesson that inspired a different chapter of her book.

“It was a really important lesson, to me, in the ways that language has a power,” Sylvester said. “Sometimes, power for good and other times, power to really dehumanize and to … very subtlety, in other ways, sometimes to separate people.”

The author currently works as a faculty member in Regis University in Denver, Colo., and a freelance writer in Texas, according to her website, nataliasylvester.com. She is a graduate of the University of Miami, where she earned a bachelor’s degree in creative writing. She previously published a novel titled, “Chasing the Sun” (Lake Union Publishing, 2014).

Sylvester told The Rider about her visits to the UTRGV campuses and mentioned it is incredible to see how different people have different things they connect to from the story.

“When you write something, all you hope is that it’ll connect with someone and so, to actually be able to come here and, like, and be in the Valley, which is where, like, the book is set and which is what inspired the book … it’s deeply meaningful to me to be here,” she said.

At the end of the event, Sylvester donated the original drafts of her book, which contained notes from herself, friends and her agent to the library archives. She hopes it is a window to the process of making the book.

“I just think it’s interesting to see, like, the different stages of a book and the different decisions that are made,” Sylvester said.

Her advice to aspiring authors is to realize that there is power to one’s true experiences and to not feel as if they have to fit in to what someone expects.

“Because I think we go through that a lot,” Sylvester said. “Thinking we somehow have to like fit in or, like, mold ourselves to a particular ideal, when in actuality, there’s someone out there who, like, desperately needs to hear your story.”

The event was sponsored by Gallery magazine, the University Library, the College of Fine Arts and the Department of Literature and Cultural Studies.