Andrea Jeftanovic Avdaloff is a Chilean writer. Born in Santiago in 1970, she is considered one of the most prominent authors of her country. She is the author of the novels Escenario de Guerra (2000) and Geografía de la lengua (2007), and of two volumes of short stories: No aceptes caramelos de extraños (2013) and Destinos errantes (2016). Of Jewish and Serbian ancestry, Jeftanovic grew up among three religions – Russian Orthodox, Catholic and Jewish. She studied sociology at the Catholic University in Santiago de Chile and in 2005 she finished a doctorate in Hispano-American literature at the University of California, Berkeley. Jeftanovic is not afraid of controversy, and sees art as “a space for moral experimentation”. She has received several awards, including the Chilean Art Critics Circle Award and the National Book and Reading Council Award. Her work has been translated into several languages and it appears in foreign as well as national anthologies. She is a researcher at the University of Santiago, teaches literary workshops at the Gabriela Mistral Cultural Center among others, and writes about theater for El Mercurio newspaper.
