Julia was born in New York in 1950, but she grew up in the Dominican Republic in the bosom of a wealthy family, soon her family and she had to emigrate forcibly to the United States. She studied philology and later literature. She is a well-known writer, who writes both fiction and non-fiction novels, both for young people, adults and children, as well as poetry. She rose to fame at the age of 41, with her novel “How the Garcia Girls Lost their Accents”, a novel that had a great impact both in Latin America and the United States.

Also later she wrote children‘s novels, with great success, novels for teenagers etc.

Julia, apart from writing novels, holds lectures, auditions, translations of Neruda‘s verses, etc. In 2014, former United States President Barack Obama awarded her for contributions to the arts and humanities.

Her novels have had a brilliant impact in the United States and Latin America, thus achieving Julia being awarded the Pure Belpré Author Award and named as one of the six Dominican-Americans who have contributed the most to both countries.