Author Talk: No Filter and Other Lies | Crystal Maldonado in conversation with Yesika Salgado

You should know, right now, that I’m a liar.  They’re usually little lies. Tiny lies. Baby lies. Not so much lies as lie adjacent. But they’re still lies. Twenty one-year-old Max Monroe has it all: beauty, friends, and a glittering life filled with adventure. With tons of followers on Instagram, her picture-perfect existence seems eminently enviable.               Except it’s all fake.           Max is actually 17-year-old Kat Sanchez, a quiet and sarcastic teenager living in drab Bakersfield, California. Nothing glamorous in her existence—just sprawl, bad house parties, a crap school year, and the awkwardness of dealing with her best friend Hari’s unrequited love. But while Kat’s life is far from perfect, she thrives as Max: doling out advice, sharing beautiful photos, networking with famous influencers, even making a real friend in a follower named Elena. The closer Elena and “Max” get—texting, Snapping, and even calling—the more Kat feels she has to keep up the façade.     But when one of Max’s posts goes ultra-viral and gets back to the very person she’s been stealing photos from, her entire world – real and fake — comes crashing down around her. She has to figure out a way to get herself out of the huge web of lies she’s created without hurting the people she loves.   But it might already be too late.

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Crystal Maldonado is a young adult author who writes inclusive stories about fat, brown girls. Her debut novel, Fat Chance, Charlie Vega, is a 2021 New England Book Award winner, a Cosmopolitan Best New Book, and a POPSUGAR Best New YA Novel. Her next novel, No Filter and Other Lies, explores teenage life in the social media age—and the lies we tell to ourselves and others.

By day, Crystal works in higher ed marketing, and by night, a writer whose work has also been published in Latina, BuzzFeed, and the Hartford Courant. She earned her bachelor’s degree in English and journalism, with a minor in women’s studies, from the University of Connecticut. Currently, Crystal lives in western Massachusetts with her husband, daughter, and dog.

Yesika Salgado is a Los Angeles based Salvadoran poet who writes about her family, her culture, her city, and her fat brown body. She has shared her work in venues and campuses throughout the country.

Salgado is a two time National Poetry Slam finalist and the recipient of the 2020 International Latino Book Award in Poetry.

Her work has been featured in the Los Angeles Times, Teen Vogue, Univision, CNN, NPR, TEDx, and many digital platforms. She is an internationally recognized body-positive activist and the writer of the column Suelta for Remezcla.

Yesika is the author of the best-sellers Corazón, Tesoro, and Hermosa, published with Not a Cult.