Toño Malpica studied Computer Engineering at the UNAM. He has written and staged several plays. He has received several awards and recognitions, such as the 2002 and 2005 Gran Angular Prize, the Rosario Castellanos 2004 Short Novel Prize, the 2005 National Reading and Children's Literature Castle Award, the 2007 National Vuelta de Nut Award, the Premio The Steam Boat 2007 and the XI SM Iberoamerican Prize for Children and Youth Literature 2015. In El Naranjo he has published The Harmonica and The Thousand Years of Pepe Corcueña.