There's a Book for That: Hispanic & Latine Heritage Month
Welcome Hispanic & Latine Heritage Month which runs from September 15th through October 15th, during which time we honor the contributions of Hispanic Americans to the United States and celebrate their heritage and culture. Enjoy the following array of new and acclaimed titles – biography, memoir, cooking, fiction, history, and poetry – to mark the occasion.
NONFICTION
In this powerful and deeply felt memoir of translation, storytelling, and borders, Alejandra Oliva, a Mexican-American translator and immigrant justice activist, offers a powerful chronical of her experience interpreting at the US-Mexico border.
A young poet tells the unforgettable story of his harrowing migration from El Salvador to the United States at the age of nine in this moving, page-turning memoir hailed as “the mythic journey of our era.” (Sandra Cisneros).
Also Available in Spanish here.
From the New York Times bestselling author of I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter, an utterly original memoir-in-essays that is as deeply moving as it is hilarious.
“Equal parts pee-your-pants hilarity and break your heart poignancy—like the perfect brunch date you never want to end!”—America Ferrera, Emmy award-winning actress in Ugly Betty
Also Available in Spanish here
A sweeping history of the Latino experience in the United States. With family portraits of real-life immigrant Latino pioneers, as well as accounts of the events and conditions that compelled them to leave their homelands, Gonzalez highlights the complexity of a segment of the American population that is often discussed but frequently misrepresented.
“A serious, significant contribution to understanding who the Hispanics of the United States are and where they came from.”—The New York Times Book Review
The Pulitzer Prize–winning playwright and co-writer of In the Heights tells her lyrical story of coming of age against the backdrop of an ailing Philadelphia barrio, with her sprawling Puerto Rican family as a collective muse.
Also Available in Spanish here
Collected for the first time, here are Guevara’s letters, the vast majority never-before published in English.
As his daughter Aleida Guevara, also a doctor like her father, writes, “When you write a speech, you pay attention to the language, the punctuation and so on. But in a letter to a friend or a member of your family, you don’t worry about those things. It is you speaking, in your authentic voice. That’s what I like about these letters; they show who Che really was and how he thought. This is the true political testimony of my father.”
Also available in a Spanish language edition here
Meet the unsung Latino rebels, artists, and activists who changed the United States–from Dolores Huerta to Desi Arnaz to Lin Manuel Miranda–in this bold and entertaining graphic history.
FICTION
From the award-winning, best-selling author of When I Was Puerto Rican, a powerful novel of family, race, faith, sex, and disaster that moves between Puerto Rico and the Bronx, revealing the lives and loves of five women and the secret that binds them together.
From the acclaimed author of Dreaming in Cuban, a follow-up novel that tracks four generations of the del Pino family against the tumultuous backdrops of Cuba, the U.S., Germany, and Russia in the new millennium.
The best-known book by Cuba’s most important twentieth-century novelist, in its first new English translation in more than sixty years.
Dissatisfied with his empty, Sisyphus-like existence in New York City, where he has abandoned his creative dreams for a job in corporate advertising, a highly cultured aspiring composer wants nothing more than to tear his life up from the root. He soon finds his escape hatch: a university-sponsored mission to South America to look for indigenous musical instruments in one of the few areas of the world not yet touched by civilization. Retracing the steps of time, he voyages with his lover into a land that feels outside of history, searching not just for music but ultimately for himself, and turning away from modernity toward the very heart of what makes us human.
POETRY
A suite of poems that channels the legendary singer-songwriter Ritchie Valens to examine and question mid-twentieth-century conceptions of race and art, identity and desire.
Featuring a bilingual format for English and Spanish readers, The Border Simulator is a world-bending, lyrically rich debut poetry collection that reimagines the U.S./Mexico border as both a real place and a living simulation—and tells the story of a pair of siblings trapped between the two.
25 years of writing from one of our most gifted Latinx poets, featuring work from early explorations of machismo to new meditations on life as a single father, immigrant detention, and spiritual inquiry. This latest work by Hernandez reveals a writer whom former US poet laureate Juan Felipe Herrera calls “a titan—unafraid to take to the road, get his hands dirty, to fully immerse himself in the world of his subjects.”
COOKING
The vibrant flavors of Baja California inspire home cooks to recreate the flavor forward and passionate cuisine, inspired by the sea, and the land. The mission of this book is to help it be the next big thing out of your kitchen. Featuring a mix of both traditional and modern takes on signature Baja dishes, such as: Crab with Pickled Asparagus in Guajillo –Pork Broth; Cantaloupe Aguachile al Estilo de Californios, Puerto Nuevo-style Lobster Tortas; Golden Beet Pozole; and Smoked Pulled Lamb Shoulder with Seared Tomatillo.
ONE OF THE BEST COOKBOOKS OF THE YEAR: Boston Globe and Glamour
The definitive plant-based Mexican cookbook for a new generation, Provecho features one hundred of Edgar’s ingenious vegan recipes that honor the traditional, often meat-heavy classics of Mexican and Latin American culture while cooking with compassion. Many take thirty minutes or less, rely on readily accessible ingredients, and feature Salvadoran and Colombian influences. And they’re all organized by how meals are approached in Edgar’s family:
For more on these, and related, titles visit Hispanic Heritage Month, 2023
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