Manuel Rivas was born in Coruña, Galicia, in 1957. He graduated in Media Studies at the Complutense University of Madrid and then worked as a journalist in the press, radio and television. As an author, he is best known for his seven novels and six collections of short stories. Five volumes have been published in English: The Carpenter's Pencil (2001, novel), In the Wilderness (2003, novel), Books Burn Badly (2010, novel), Vermeer's Milkmaid (2002, stories), Butterfly's Tongue (2000, stories). He is also a highly-regarded poet and essayist. All of his literary work is written in Galician. An edition of Rivas' poetry in Jonathan Dunne's English translation, From Unknown to Unknown (2009), brought together eighty of his poems, drawn from the collected edition published in Galician as Do descoñecido ao descoñecido in 2003.His publications include: (poetry) Libro do Entroido (1979), Balada nas praias do Oeste (1985), Mohicania (1987), Ningún cisne (1989), O pobo da noite (1996), A desaparición da neve (2009); (fiction) Un millón de vacas (1989), Os comedores de patacas (1991), ¿Que me queres, amor? (1996), O lapis do carpinteiro (1998), Ela, maldita alma (1999), A man dos paíños (2000), Galicia, Galicia (2001), As chamadas perdidas (2002), Contos de Nadal (2003), Os libros arden mal (2006), Todo é silencio (2010).Some of his work has been filmed in Spain: La lengua de las mariposas (Butterfly's Tongue), based on 3 interwoven stories contained in his collection Que me queres, amor? (Vermeer's Milkmaid in the English language edition), directed by José Luis Cuerda, and El lápiz del carpintero (The Carpenter's Pencil), directed by Antón Reixa.