On Sale November 7
Worm: A Cuban American Odyssey by Edel Rodriguez | ADULT NONFICTION
Hailed for his iconic art on the cover of Time and on jumbotrons around the world, Edel Rodriguez is among the most prominent political artists of our age. Now for the first time, he draws his own life, revisiting his childhood in Cuba and his family’s passage on the infamous Mariel boatlift.
When Edel was nine, Fidel Castro announced his surprising decision to let 125,000 traitors of the revolution, or “worms,” leave the country. The faltering economy and Edel’s family’s vocal discomfort with government surveillance had made their daily lives on a farm outside Havana precarious, and they secretly planned to leave. But before that happened, a dozen soldiers confiscated their home and property and imprisoned them in a detention center near the port of Mariel, where they were held with dissidents and criminals before being marched to a flotilla that miraculously deposited them, overnight, in Florida.
Through vivid, stirring art, Worm tells a story of a boyhood in the midst of the Cold War, a family’s displacement in exile, and their tenacious longing for those they left behind. It also recounts the coming-of-age of an artist and activist, who, witnessing American’s turn from democracy to extremism, struggles to differentiate his adoptive country from the dictatorship he fled. Confronting questions of patriotism and the liminal nature of belonging, Edel Rodriguez ultimately celebrates the immigrants, maligned and overlooked, who guard and invigorate American freedom.
Cross-Stitch by Jazmina Barrera | Translated by Christina Macsweeney | ADULT FICTION
It was meant to be the trip of a lifetime. Mila, Citlali, and Dalia, childhood friends now college aged, leave Mexico City for the England of The Clash and the Paris of Courbet. They anticipate the cafés and crushes, but not the early signs that they are each steadily, inevitably changing.
That feels like forever ago. Mila, now a writer and a new mother, has just published a book on needlecraft—an art form so long dismissed as “women’s work.” But after learning Citlali has drowned, Mila begins to sift through her old scrapbooks, reflecting on their shared youth for the first time as a new wife and mother. What has come of all the nights the three friends spent embroidering together in silence? Did she miss the signs that Citlali needed help?
Call You When I Land: A Memoir by Nikki Vargas | ADULT NONFICTION
At twenty-six years old, life looked a certain way for Nikki Vargas. She’d settled in New York City ready to join the ranks of the Carrie Bradshaws of the world, had landed in a promising advertising career, and was newly engaged to her college sweetheart. But between corporate happy hours and wedding dress fittings, she couldn’t shake a deep underlying sense of imposter syndrome, a voice telling her that she was rocketing towards a future that didn’t look like her. And so, she bought a plane ticket: first to Cartagena. Then to Panama. Then to Iguazú.
What begins with one freelance travel writing assignment escalates into a whirlwind, globe-spanning journey that would transform Nikki’s life. Taking her from the street food stalls of Vietnam to the cascading waterfalls of Argentina, Nikki uncovers shocking truths about her family, comes face to face with a new love interest – or two – and ultimately turns a no-name blog into the internationally celebrated venture of Unearth Women, the first major female-focused travel publication.
Told in transporting detail and candid reflections, Call You When I Land takes the familiar story of a woman going abroad to find herself and turns it on its head, as the act of traveling becomes, for Nikki, an exhilarating career path – and ultimately a tool to champion women’s voices across the world.
I Hop / Yo Salto by Joe Cepeda | PICTURE BOOK
I hop. / Yo salto.
I see cheese. / Veo queso.
I pay. / Pago.
A boy hops around town on his pogo stick, running errands to have a picnic with his grandma! This Theodor Geisel Honor book is now available in a bilingual board book edition.
This sweet story about having fun with family is perfect for the toddler that is always moving and bouncing. Very simple, easy-to-read text appears in English and Spanish, side by side, and accompanies Joe Cepeda’s bold, energetic artwork. The toddler-friendly story introduces the youngest readers to basic verbs and foods.
Lolo and Birdie: I'm Not Sleepy! / ¡No Tengo Sueño! by Angela Dominguez | PICTURE BOOK
Birdie is ready to go to bed, but when he approaches Lolo to say goodnight, Lolo isn't tired! Birdie tries everything to help Lolo get ready for bed: reading, snacks, brushing teeth, but Lolo has way too much to do.
This delightful bilingual picture book is perfect for young readers who, like most, are reluctant for the day to end.
The Vulnerables by Sigrid Nunez | ADULT FICTION
Elegy plus comedy is the only way to express how we live in the world today, says a character in Sigrid Nunez’s ninth novel. The Vulnerables offers a meditation on our contemporary era, as a solitary female narrator asks what it means to be alive at this complex moment in history and considers how our present reality affects the way a person looks back on her past.
Humor, to be sure, is a priceless refuge. Equally vital is connection with others, who here include an adrift member of Gen Z and a spirited parrot named Eureka. The Vulnerables reveals what happens when strangers are willing to open their hearts to each other and how far even small acts of caring can go to ease another’s distress. A search for understanding about some of the most critical matters of our time, Nunez’s new novel is also an inquiry into the nature and purpose of writing itself.
Barbacoa, Bomba, and Betrayal by Raquel V. Reyes | ADULT FICTION
A surprise trip to Miriam's parents in Punta Cana, which should be filled with arroz con pollo and breezy days under the tamarind tree, quickly becomes a hunt for a possible property saboteur. But before Miriam can begin to uncover the person damaging the vacation rentals her parents manage, she’s called away to Puerto Rico to film a Three Kings Day special. She's welcomed to the blue ballast-stone streets of Old San Juan by crime scene tape, and things only get worse from there.
An anonymous personal gift on Miriam's doorstep on New Year's Eve screams stalker, and the 400-year-old guesthouse creaks and moans like there is something trapped in its walls. Luckily, her BFF, Alma, and their mutual friend Jorge are in town to keep her distracted between filming cultural segments for the network. But private chef tables and spa days come to an abrupt halt when Jorge's telenovela heartthrob novio goes missing. And there is something worrisome about Alma's too-perfect boyfriend—specifically, his duffle bag full of cash.
Will demon masks, African drumbeats, and dark alleys lead to Miriam's demise? Or will the mysterious events come together like the delicious layers of a pastelón?
American Shield: The Immigrant Sergeant Who Defended Democracy by Aquilino Gonell, Susan Shapiro | Foreword by Jamie Raskin | ADULT NONFICTION
Aquilino Gonell came to the United States from the Dominican Republic as a young boy. Although he spoke no English, he dedicated himself to his adopted land, striving for the American dream. Determined to be a success story, he joined the army to pay for college. He saw action in Iraq and returned home with PTSD. Believing in the promise of our government, he focused on healing himself and supporting his family. His hard work paid off when he landed a coveted position with the United States Capitol Police and rose to the rank of sergeant.
January 6, 2021, changed everything. When insurrectionists stormed the Capitol, Gonell bravely faced down the mob attempting to thwart the peaceful transfer of power. The brutal injuries he sustained that day would end his career in law enforcement. But when some of the very people he put his life on the line to protect downplayed or denied the truth of that day, he chose to speak out against the injustice done to him and the country. Chronicling what it means to live a life of conviction, one that adheres to the best ideas of our democracy, American Shield is a bold testament to the power of truth, justice, and accountability from a highly decorated officer and immigrant who exemplifies the greatest aspirations of a grateful nation.
Pedro and Marques Take Stock: A Picaresque Novel by José Falero| Translated by Julia Sanches | ADULT FICTION
In the favelas of Porto Alegre, Brazil, marijuana is hard to come by. Supermarket stock clerks Pedro and Marques spend their days unloading trucks, restocking shelves, and dreaming of a better life, of breaking the cycle of poverty that has afflicted their families and their community. Well-acquainted with the drug dealers in their neighborhood and seeing an opportunity to earn a little extra cash, they decide to start a weed-dealing operation.
The economic hierarchies of Porto Alegre are turned upside down as, almost accidentally, the two men build a thriving enterprise and get rich, quickly. Distribution grows from dime bags to kilos, and Pedro and Marques begin to plan for a future where low-wage work will never again be a necessity for them and their families. All too soon however, their operation starts attracting outsider attention, and cracks in their carefully crafted and seemingly untouchable world begin to show, culminating in one final, lethal showdown.
A witty, voice-driven, and electrifying portrait of poverty and a canny examination of the ethics of drug dealing and low-wage labor in the underbelly of Brazil, Pedro and Marques Take Stock is a contemporary picaresque novel of class and crime.
On Sale November 14
Best Amigas by Patricia Santos Marcantonio | MIDDLE GRADE
Juana Méndez and Diane Conrad are going to save each other's lives. Not with super heroics, but with a friendship that gets them through everything. And those girls are always up to something—eating goat burritos on July 4th, sneaking up on a garage roof to watch a couple kiss and wonder about romance, and surviving the meanest kid in school. Then another summer arrives, and ends in heartbreak and hope for the best amigas.
Ready Player Juan: Latinx Masculinities and Stereotypes in Video Games by Carlos Gabriel Kelly González | ADULT NONFICTION
Written for all gaming enthusiasts, this book fuses Latinx studies and video game studies to document how Latinx masculinities are portrayed in high-budget action-adventure video games, inviting Latinxs and others to insert their experiences into games made by an industry that fails to see them.
The book employs an intersectional approach through performance theory, border studies, and lived experience to analyze the designed identity “Player Juan.” Player Juan manifests in video game representations through a discourse of criminality that sets expectations of who and what Latinxs can be and do. Developing an original approach to video game experiences, the author theorizes video games as border crossings, and defines a new concept—digital mestizaje—that pushes players, readers, and scholars to deploy a Latinx way of seeing and that calls on researchers to consider a digital object’s constructive as well as destructive qualities.
One Impossible Step: Selected Poems by Orides Fontela | Translated by Chris Daniels | POETRY
In her lifetime, Orides Fontela resisted all labels, all attempts to situate her work in a particular movement, school, tendency, or tradition. Here, in her first ever English-language collection, Fontela’s poetry continues to defy easy categorization. In these concise, meditative poems, Fontela’s bird and flower, water and stone, blood and star can be read as symbols, indicating a possible tendency toward mysticism. Including an illuminating statement of poetics and excerpts from her often acerbic interviews, One Impossible Step introduces English-language audiences to an iconoclast who remains one across languages and decades.
The Dialectic Is in the Sea: The Black Radical Thought of Beatriz Nascimento by Beatriz Nascimento | Edited and Translated by Christen A. Smith, Bethânia N F Gomes, Archie Davies | ADULT NONFICTION
Beatriz Nascimento (1942–1995) was a poet, historian, artist, and political leader in Brazil’s Black movement, an innovative and creative thinker whose work offers a radical reimagining of gender, space, politics, and spirituality around the Atlantic and across the Black diaspora. Her powerful voice still resonates today, reflecting a deep commitment to political organizing, revisionist historiography, and the lived experience of Black women. The Dialectic Is in the Sea is the first English-language collection of writings by this vitally important figure in the global tradition of Black radical thought.
The Dialectic Is in the Sea traces the development of Nascimento’s thought across the decades of her activism and writing, covering topics such as the Black woman, race and Brazilian society, Black freedom, and Black aesthetics and spirituality. Incisive introductory and analytical essays provide key insights into the political and historical context of Nascimento’s work. This engaging collection includes an essay by Bethânia Gomes, Nascimento’s only daughter, who shares illuminating and uniquely personal insights into her mother’s life and career.
Lotería: Poems by Esteban Rodriguez | POETRY
A traditional game of chance popular in Mexico and in Mexican American culture, Lotería is poetically rendered in Esteban Rodríguez’s eighth collection, with each poem revolving around one of the fifty-four cards. Using the image presented as a catalyst for exploration and self-reflection, Rodríguez unveils the familial journey between two countries and cultures through both a surreal and narrative lens. Here, a mother unearths a severed hand in the desert. A father discovers his heart among a heap of discarded items. And at one point, the speaker—toggling between his role as witness and son—finds himself in a canoe on a river contemplating the meaning behind an authentic experience. Lyrical, insightful, and honestly engaging, Lotería sheds light on a world that doesn’t so easily reveal itself, adding to Rodríguez’s prolific and important oeuvre.
On Sale November 21
Central American Migrations in the Twenty-First Century | Edited by Mauricio Espinoza, Miroslava Arely Rosales Vásquez, Ignacio Sarmiento | ADULT NONFICTION
The reality of Central American migrations is broad, diverse, multidirectional, and uncertain. It also offers hope, resistance, affection, solidarity, and a sense of community for a region that has one of the highest rates of human displacement in the world.
Central American Migrations in the Twenty-First Century tackles head-on the way Central America has been portrayed as a region profoundly marked by the migration of its people. Through an intersectional approach, this volume demonstrates how the migration experience is complex and affected by gender, age, language, ethnicity, social class, migratory status, and other variables. Contributors carefully examine a broad range of topics, including forced migration, deportation and outsourcing, intraregional displacements, the role of social media, and the representations of human mobility in performance, film, and literature. The volume establishes a productive dialogue between humanities and social sciences scholars, and it paves the way for fruitful future discussions on the region’s complex migratory processes.
Leo Messi by Maria Isabel Sanchez Vegara | Illustrated by Florencia Gavilán | PICTURE BOOK
In this book from the highly acclaimed Little People, BIG DREAMS series, discover the incredible life of Leo Messi, one of the world's most skilled and celebrated soccer players.
This powerful book features stylish and quirky illustrations and extra facts at the back, including a biographical timeline with historical photos and a detailed profile of the footballer’s life.
Flesh and Spirit: Confessions of a Young Lord by Felipe Luciano | ADULT NONFICTION
Growing up fatherless and poor, Felipe Luciano didn’t yearn for wealth or dream of becoming a famous actor or athlete. He was tired of being poor and ached to be a man, to reach that point of sagacity, courage, and independence that would signal to the world that he was now a warrior, ready to fight the battle for truth and justice, to slay the dragon of evil, whatever that might be. In Flesh and Spirit, Luciano paints a vivid portrait of his life in New York City as a member of the city’s Latino community as well as his pivotal role in the Young Lords and The Last Poets.
Luciano’s memoir begins when as a teenage Brooklyn gang member he is convicted of manslaughter. This pivotal moment changes the trajectory of his life. The American kid raised on Davy Crockett and Superman TV tales emerged from the womb of prison into a harsh, new monochromatic black/white world without the benefit of rose-colored glasses. It was a painful shattering of all his childhood beliefs and the realization that he was a poor Black Puerto Rican in white America clutching onto values that didn’t work. The only flotsam in this churning sea of ’60s social turmoil was college, poetry, revolutionary activity, and sometimes God. After getting an education, Luciano went on to become an acclaimed poet and political activist who advocates for the Latino population of New York City, for the kids growing up in the same circumstances he did.
Sparing no one―not the revolutionaries, the Revolution, nor the author himself―Flesh and Spirit is written with honesty and humility to help guide young people of color and other Americans through the labyrinths of ideology, organization, missteps, false paths, and phony societal promises.
Critical Hits: Writers Playing Video Games | Edited by Carmen Maria Machado, J. Robert Lennon | ADULT NONFICTION
From the earliest computers to the smartphones in our pockets, video games have been on our screens and part of our lives for over fifty years. Critical Hits celebrates this sophisticated medium and considers its lasting impact on our culture and ourselves.
This collection of stylish, passionate, and searching essays opens with an introduction by Carmen Maria Machado, who edited the anthology alongside J. Robert Lennon. In these pages, writer-gamers find solace from illness and grief, test ideas about language, bodies, power, race, and technology, and see their experiences and identities reflected in―or complicated by―the interactive virtual worlds they inhabit. Elissa Washuta immerses herself in The Last of Us during the first summer of the pandemic. Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah describes his last goodbye to his father with the help of Disco Elysium. Jamil Jan Kochai remembers being an Afghan American teenager killing Afghan insurgents in Call of Duty. Also included are a comic by MariNaomi about her time as a video game producer; a deep dive into “portal fantasy” movies about video games by Charlie Jane Anders; and new work by Alexander Chee, Hanif Abdurraqib, Larissa Pham, and many more.
On Sale November 28
Cubanthropy: Two Futures That Happened While You Were Busy Thinking by Iván de la Nuez | Translated by Ellen Jones | ADULT NONFICTION
Essays on Cuba and the Cuban diaspora, on racism and Big Data, Guantánamo and Reggaeton, soccer and baseball, Obama and the Rolling Stones, Europe and Donald Trump—de la Nuez approaches his criticism with singularity of purpose. In Cubanthropy he does not set out to explain Cuba to the world, but rather to put the world into a Cuban context.
