Pierre Delattre is a writer and painter living in the foothills of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains in northern New Mexico. Tales of a Dalai Lama was his first book of fiction, followed by Walking On Air; Episodes, a memoir; and, most recently, a book of essays, The Art of Beauty. He has has published stories, poems and essays in many magazines, and has worked in radio, theater, television, and film. During the Beat era, his coffee house in San Francisco's North Beach, The Bread and Wine Mission, was a gathering place for poets, actors and musicians. For a time, Delattre lived and taught in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, aligning himself with the 'magical realists' both in writing and in painting. As a painter, he manages his own studio/gallery in Truchas, New Mexico where he also holds salons and workshops on the relationship between the arts and the spiritual disciplines. He can be contacted via his website: pierredelattre.com.