A graduate of UCR�s Creative Writing department, his early work was first collected in 1996 as Look Back and Laugh for the Chicano Chapbook Series, edited by Gary Soto. The following year he began publishing under the surname "Jaime-Becerra" and shortly thereafter, a limited-edition collection of prose poems, entitled The Estrellistas Off Peck Road, was released locally by Temporary Vandalism. He earned an MFA in fiction at UC Irvine in 2001. His collection of short stories, entitled Every Night Is Ladies' Night was published by Rayo, the Latino imprint of HarperCollins.