THE LATINA BOOK CLUB

Poetry is like a song, like a psalm, like a prayer. Poetry is different things to many people, and April being Poetry Month, The Latina Book Club is celebrating by featuring Latino poets all week long. We’d like to welcome poet Yolanda A. Reid . She’s written two novels and has a collection of poems, SONNETS TO THE JAPIM BIRD, coming out this June.  The collection is a series of mesmerizing poems set in Brazil depicting the forbidden love between an Amazonian indigenous woman (a Tupi-Kawahib) and her husband’s guest (a European explorer).  Here is a small sonnet for our reading pleasure. (Note: Yolanda is donating 10% of the ebook proceeds to Amazon Watch.)                            (X) Compare you? What to? Neither amethysts Nor diamonds evoke a love immortal, Faithful, honoured, untinged by betrayal, Unhindered and unhindering; my wrists Glittered with these stones, ago–we’...

The Latina Book Club's mission is to promote Latina / Latino authors, which we do through book reviews, author interviews, publicity announcements, book of the month selections, etc.  A new feature we are adding is "Writers Wednesdays."  The first Wednesday of each month we will feature a Latina / Latino writer talking about .....writing.   Enjoy! HOW I WROTE MY SECOND NOVEL, THE HONEYEATER by Yolanda A. Reid Writing, for me, is like breathing air. I always wrote little stories and poems as a child. We had lots of books in our home. My mom was a college professor, so during the summers she'd bring home boxes of books (literally) for us to read and have our fill. So in junior high and high school I read numerous books—especially in the summertime—as I wrote in my diaries. This, not surprisingly, turned out to be extremely beneficial for me as a writer. For that way, I practiced and fine-tuned my writing. Then, when I was about 19 years old, I wrot...

Yolanda is the author of PORRIDGE & CUCU: MY CHILDHOOD and THE HONEYEATER.  She will be featured on April 3rd on Writers Wednesdays.  Yolanda was also generous to offer a FREE E-Book to all Latina Book Club readers on March 11 and March 16 only.  See link at end. Please join me in welcoming Yolanda to The Latina Book Club. Q.  Tell us about your new book, PORRIDGE & CUCU: MY CHILDHOOD. What is it about? PORRIDGE & CUCU is the story of a young girl growing up with her family—first in Panama, then in New York. The novel chronicles the life of Yamila as a child—during carnival, in a Catholic girls' school, playing with friends, navigating a bicultural and bilingual existence, eating "porridge and cucu" (foods she ate as a child). Also, a few ghost stories as told by her grandfather. Q.  Is this story autobiographical? Tell us about your background. Where is your family from? where did you grow up? siblings? children? PORRIDG...