Jerry Rodriguez, RIP

Jerry Rodriguez, whose crime novels THE DEVIL’S MAMBO and REVENGE TANGO were published by Kensington Books, lost his battle with cancer on Sunday. He was 46. The New York Daily News has the story and author Ivan Sanchez pays tribute to Rodriguez on his MySpace blog:

In this day and age
when we cyber-the-hell out of everything picking up the phone becomes a
chore to us. I wish I would have picked up the phone one last time to
actually check on the brother. Maybe he would have picked up, maybe he
wouldn’t have… But if we spoke I’m sure he would have shown the same
grace, poise and quick wit he always did.

 

The guy was beyond
intelligent and I looked forward to learning a lot from him as the
years went on. I only hoped that after ten years of writing and
learning from him and Jeff we’d keep the promise we made to change the
face of Latino literature.

 

I only knew him for a
short time but he impacted my life greatly. He will be missed… I guess
God needed a talented, intelligent, funny Latino writer to help him
pass the time.

(Thanks to Jason Starr for alerting me to the news)