THE LATINA BOOK CLUB

I open the book. Word-blindness. The pages are white! Is this really a blank diary, or just an ordinary schoolbook filled with frog-slippery tricky letters that know how to leap and escape? --Fefa THE WILD BOOK By Margarita Engle HMH Books for Young Readers, 2014 BEAUTIFUL. HEARTFELT. INSPIRING. A mother’s love is a powerful thing, and Fefa’s mother refuses the edict doctors proclaim. Dyslexia will not cripple her child, and so she teaches Fefa to see the world in a different light. SUMMARY:   But her mother has an idea. She gives Fefa a blank book filled with clean white pages. "Think of it as a garden," she says. Soon Fefa starts to sprinkle words across the pages of her wild book. She lets her words sprout like seedlings, shaky at first, then growing stronger and surer with each new day. And when her family is threatened, it is what Fefa has learned from her wild book that saves them. ABOUT THE AUTHOR:    M...

   The Latina Book Club’s PICK FIVE for this week are all middle grade books  that spark our fancy and imagination. Happy Reading. And as always, #ReadLatinoLit. MY YEAR IN THE MIDDLE By Lila Quintero Weaver Candlewick Press Sixth-grader Lu Olivera just wants to keep her head down and get along with everyone in her class. But Lu can’t stay neutral about the racial divide at school. Will she find the gumption to stand up for what’s right and to choose friends who do the same?   This story is based on the author’s childhood.     WHAT LANE? By Torrey Maldonado Nancy Paulsen Books As a mixed kid, Steven feels like he's living in two worlds with different rules--and he's been noticing that strangers treat him differently than his white friends. Hold on tight as Stephen swerves in and out of lanes to find out which are his--and who should be with him . THE DREAM WEAVER  By Reina Luz Alegre  S...

The Latina Book Club  wishes author  Chantel Acevedo  a Happy Book Birthday.   T he Muse Squad was released on July 7.  It’s Chantel's first middle grade book, and the first in a fantasy duology with a Cuban American heroine and diverse friends. MUSE SQUAD is an ode to girl power. Memorable. Magical. Moving.  Think Percy Jackson and the Olympians series and Disney’s  Hercules , and you’ll get the idea behind Chantel Acevedo’s MUSE SQUAD.  The heroine is 11-year old Callie, who turns out to be a Greek muse with lots of raw power. Now, Callie and the others in the Muse Squad must learn to use their power responsibly.     SUMMARY:   Callie Martinez-Silva didn’t mean to turn her best friend into a pop star. But when a simple pep talk leads to miraculous results, Callie learns she’s the newest muse of epic poetry, one of the nine Muses of Greek mythology tasked with protecting humanity’s fate in se...

The Latina Book Club supports our Black Brothers and Sisters   and our Afro Latinx / Black Latinx Communities during these hard times.   Black Lives Matter.    We See You. We Hear You.   We Support You. Aside from donating money to the different organizations supporting the movement and the protesters, we want to support Afro-Latinx / Black Latinx authors by purchasing and reading their books.   Below is a short list in no particular order.   We welcome additions to this list.     Happy Reading.   Take care and Stay Safe.   20 AFRO LATINX  /  BLACK LATINX WRITERS  NO ONE IS ILLEGAL: FIGHTING RACISM AND STATE VIOLENCE IN THE U.S.-MEXICO BORDER   by Justin Akers Chacón and Mike Davis (Haymarket Books) AN AFRICAN AMERICAN AND LATINX HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES By Paul Ortiz (Beacon Press) 13 WAYS TO LOOK AT A BLACK BOY By Tony Medina & 13 Artists ...

      Join The Latina Book Club is its week-long celebration of multicultural children's books and diversity. Arte Publico Press "The note was important, because even if you missed the visit, you'd still get to enjoy the surprise...To know that someone cared enough about you to come by." -- Grandma The bond between mothers and daughters is special, but the bond between Grandmothers and granddaughters is extraordinary.   Abuelitas / Grandmas are like BFFs, cohorts, protectors and wise women all rolled into one.   You can tell them things you can't tell your mother and know they are always in your corner. Lydia Gil's LETTERS FROM HEAVEN/ CARTAS DEL CIELO starts with the loss of an grandmother-granddaughter bond.   Our young heroine, Celeste, is struggling to deal with this loss and the changes in her life. Upon the loss of her beloved grandmother, her world changes literally overnight -- her mother has to get a second job and is ...

      Northampton House Press, January 2015 "Ever just wanna be who you are without the check-marks?"-- Justina Feliciano The Latina Book Club congratulates Dania Ramos on the publication of her debut novel, WHO'S JU?   It is the first in her 7th Grade Sleuths series, a contemporary middle grade novel featuring an amazing Latina tween heroine!   SUMMARY:   Justina Feliciano is adventurous, curious and smart.   She along with her fellow seventh-grade sleuths are on a case! Someone has vandalized the middle school drama club production and the newbie detectives must find out who before opening night. But there is an even greater mystery afoot!   Ju is given a genetics assignment at school.   At first, she thinks it's lame, until the mention of her assignment angers her mother and worries her father.   Suddenly, there are silences in her home, secrets in the attic; and now Ju has a different mystery to solve -- the case of...