AUTHOR TONY CASTRO'S latest book, "The Prince of South Waco: American Dreams and Great Expectations," is his touching and provocative coming of age memoir about growing up in Texas in the 1950s and 1960s. The book is already drawing critical acclaim as a powerful Gatsbyesque drama of unrequited love driving a youthful passion to succeed at any cost. "Readers who step into Tony's Time Machine, 'The Prince of South Waco,' are in for a thrilling, lyrical ride, a true tale of romantic woes and raucous rebellion that will break readers' hearts," writes Preston Kirk, the former United Press International reporter who covered Texas. "Castro's coming-of-age story is a painfully poignant memoir of romance, racism and self-discovery fraught with recollections of lynchings, Jim Crow-ism, no-white-girl speeches, growing up Chicano and excelling as one of the best and brightest of emerging young journalists of his time. 'How do you reclaim your destiny when it has been so connected with a love that has been lost?' asks the author. And therein lies this soulful impasse." Bob Vickrey, a columnist at the Waco Tribune-Herald writes: "Tony Castro's honest and powerful memoir captures the essential American story of the struggle for cultural assimilation. The very best stories are written in blood, and in Castro's finely woven personal narrative, the reader can almost feel his heart beating." Castro is the author of the critically acclaimed and best-selling "Mickey Mantle: America's Prodigal Son" that has been hailed by The New York Times as the best biography about the Hall of Fame baseball legend. He is also the author of the landmark civil rights history "Chicano Power: The Emergence of Mexican America," which Publishers Weekly called "brilliant... a valuable contribution to the understanding of our time." Castro was a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University where he did graduate work on American Studies and international politics -- studying under Homeric scholar and translator Robert Fitzgerald and Mexican Nobel laureate Octavio Paz. He is currently working on a biography of Ernest Hemingway, and the 40th anniversary edition of "Chicano Power" will be published in 2014. As a journalist, Castro was a prize-winning columnist and political writer whose work has included covering American presidential campaigns since 1964, reporting on civil wars in Central America and traveling with his Chicano activist friend Carlos Guerra to Cuba in the late 1960s where they met with Fidel Castro. Castro's reporting has appeared in The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Dallas Morning News and The Texas Observer. He was a columnist at the Los Angeles Herald Examiner for the late legendary editor, Jim Bellows. A native of Waco, Texas, Castro is a graduate of Baylor University and was also a fellow at the Washington Journalism Center. He was a founding board member of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press and served as a trustee of the Greater Houston Human Relations Commission. Castro is also formerly a board member of the Los Angeles Press Club. Tony lives in Los Angeles with his wife Renee LaSalle and Jeter, their black Labrador retriever. Their two grown sons, Trey and Ryan, also reside in Southern California.  

Nieman Fellow, Harvard University; Los Angeles Press Club, board member; Robert F. Kennedy Foundation, board; Greater Houston Human Relations Commission, board