The University of Arizona Press
July 9, 2025
Melani Martinez, author of The Molino: A Memoir, spoke with poet Logan Phillips last winter as part of the Tumamoc Author Series. In this Southwest Center video of the event, hear Martinez read a short excerpt from her memoir. She then tells stories of her family, who owned and operated El Rapido restaurant in downtown Tucson. Phillips asked about how she came up with the format of her memoir, and Martinez responded, “I understood what the book could be structurally after having found the character of ‘El Pensamiento’ [the thinker] to help shape the stories. There are two narrative voices: my narrative voice and the other persona is a character called El Pensamiento. To some degree, I needed a conversation to do the book, so he allowed me to converse with him.”
The event was presented by Desert Laboratory on Tumamoc Hill, The University of Arizona Press, and The Southwest Center.
Melani “Mele” Martinez is a senior lecturer at the University of Arizona, where she teaches writing courses. Her family has lived in the Sonoran Desert for at least nine generations. The Molino weaves together history, culture, and Mexican food traditions, in the story of her family’s life and work in the heart of their downtown eatery, El Rapido. Opened by Martinez’s great-grandfather, Aurelio Perez, in 1933, El Rapido served tamales and burritos to residents and visitors to Tucson’s historic Barrio Presidio for nearly seventy years. For the family, the factory that bound them together was known for the giant corn grinder churning behind the scenes—the molino.
