Cristina Bendek is an author from the Caribbean islands. She was born on the island of San Andrés in October 1987. Los cristales de la sal (Salt Crystals) her first novel, won the 2018 Elisa Mújica National Narrative Prize (Colombia). It has been translated into Portuguese (Editora Moinhos, 2021); Danish (Aurora Boreal, 2020); and English (Charco Press, 2022). Her work in journalistic genres circulates in digital and print media, where she offers a cultural and political analysis of the Caribbean and the international dispute between Colombia and Nicaragua over the sea of the San Andrés Archipelago.