Mireya S. Vela is a Mexican-American creative nonfiction writer, storyteller, and artist. Vestiges of Courage is her work of collected essays. In her work, Mireya addresses the needs of immigrant Mexican families and the disparities they face every day. She tackles issues of inequity and how ingrained societal systems support the (ongoing) injustice that contributes to continuing poverty and abuse. Her work has been published in Hippocampus Magazine, Noble/Gas Quarterly, Not Your Mother’s Breastmilk, The Nasiona, Miracle Monocle, Blanket Sea, and Collective Unrest, and she is also a visual artist. She she lives in Los Angeles has two children, a 27-year-old son and a 13-year-old daughter. She describes writer-motherhood in three words as OMG, WTF, LMAO