Sheila Colón-Bagley on Spreading a Joyous Tradition in La Noche Before Three Kings Day

A joyous spirit runs through La Noche Before Three Kings Day. In the bright foyer of a house, a Puerto Rican family has gathered. It’s the night before el Día de los Reyes Magos—the Jan. 6 holiday that marks when the Three Wise Men brought gifts to an infant Jesus.

In the living room, children are surrounded by rolls of gift wrapping paper and small boxes. Their collective voice says: “We wrapped our shoeboxes with glee and delight, knowing the Three Kings would be here tonight.”

La Noche Before Three Kings Day, out now from Harper, was written by debut children’s book author Sheila Colón-Bagley and illustrated by Colombian artist Alejandro Mesa. The book is a sparkling ode to Three Kings Day, a Christian feast day popular throughout Latin America and other parts of the world. There are a variety of ways it’s celebrated but, in this book, the holiday is seen through the eyes of Puerto Rican children. Too excited for the arrival of the Three Kings, they fight against bedtime and place their wrapped boxes beside the front door—an offering for the Three Wise Men’s camels.

Growing up, Sheila Colón-Bagley heard stories about el Día de los Reyes Magos. “My mom would gush about how kids would fill their boxes with grass and put the boxes under their beds,” she recalled. “And the Three Kings would come and leave them gifts.”

Though Colón-Bagley was born in Puerto Rico, she was raised in Philadelphia and didn’t celebrate the beloved Puerto Rican tradition at home.

But that all changed years later, once Colón-Bagley was herself a mother. Her eldest daughter, then 6 years old, had watched a Dora the Explorer episode featuring the tradition. “She came and she asked, ‘Mami, since we’re Puerto Rican, can we celebrate Three Kings Day?’” Colón-Bagley said. “I said, ‘Of course.’ I was just thrilled to share the magic with my children.”

About a decade or so ago, Colón-Bagley searched high and low for books about Three Kings Day and noticed there were “few and far between.” “The ones I found, for me, didn’t quite capture the magic that I saw in my girls’ eyes, and their experience,” she said. “So I decided to write one.”

As you read aloud the dual-lingual text of La Noche Before Three Kings Day, you may feel a familiar tug followed by delight at discovering it was inspired by “A Visit from St. Nicholas.” For years, Colón-Bagley read the famous Christmas poem by Clement Clarke Moore to her daughters. She wondered what it would look like if there was a book about preparing for Three Kings Day, instead of the arrival of Santa Claus.

“At its core, “La Noche Before Three Kings Day” is about the joy of celebrating a beloved holiday tradition with family—and the excitement children feel in partaking.”

Moore’s poem is widely known by its opening lines:

“‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.”

Colón-Bagley’s version begins:

“‘Twas la noche before Three Kings Day and all through the casa,
everyone was stirring, even Chico our chihuahua.”

“I love the similarities as well as the differences,” she said of her book and the famous poem. “I purposefully started with ‘everyone was stirring,’ because everyone knows the phrase, ‘no one was stirring, not even a mouse.’ I purposefully wanted to say, this is not that kind of quiet story. You know? We are having a ball. We’re having a party. We’re eating. We’re dancing. We’re celebrating.”

Colón-Bagley ended up setting the story aside to focus on raising her girls. By 2019, she felt it was time to revisit her work. “The writing was calling to me,” she said. She took writing courses and was later awarded a Las Musas mentorship under New York Times and international bestselling author Laura Taylor Namey. Colón-Bagley said Namey helped her hone in some of the rhyme and rhythm of the story.

At its core, La Noche Before Three Kings Day is about the joy of celebrating a beloved holiday tradition with family—and the excitement children feel in partaking. Over time, Three Kings Day has taken on greater meaning to Colón-Bagley. And she has big hopes for young readers who come across her book.

“For children like my daughters who celebrate the holiday, I want them to feel represented and seen, and recognize that their celebrations are worthy of being portrayed in books,” Colón-Bagley said. “I think it’s so important for all children to be able to see some facts about themselves in a book. So for sure, I want children who celebrate the holiday to see themselves, their family and be able to make that connection.”

And for children who don’t celebrate this holiday, the author hopes her book gives them an opportunity to learn about other traditions, and joyous experiences that Latinos and other people of color have.

“We are worth celebrating,” she added.

---

Sheila Colón-Bagley is a stay-at-home mother of three. As a Puerto Rico native, she’s long dreamed of writing books featuring multicultural characters that children of all backgrounds would love—for her multicultural daughters, and kids like them—to have books about families who look and live like they do. She’s also a member of the SCBWI, was awarded a Spring 2020 Las Musas mentorship, and was a volunteer on the first-ever virtual Latinx Kidlit Book Festival in December 2020. She holds a Bachelor's degree in Journalism from Temple University and practiced public relations for over twenty-five years before becoming an author. She lives outside of Charlotte, NC, with her family, and their dog, Vader.

Amaris Castillo is an award-winning journalist, writer, and the creator of Bodega Stories, a series featuring real stories from the corner store. Her writing has appeared in La Galería Magazine, Aster(ix) Journal, Spanglish Voces, PALABRITAS, Dominican Moms Be Like… (part of the Dominican Writers Association’s #DWACuenticos chapbook series), and most recently Quislaona: A Dominican Fantasy Anthology and Sana, Sana: Latinx Pain and Radical Visions for Healing and Justice. Her short story, “El Don,” was a prize finalist for the 2022 Elizabeth Nunez Caribbean-American Writers’ Prize by the Brooklyn Caribbean Literary Festival. She is a proud member of Latinx in Publishing’s Writers Mentorship Class of 2023 and lives in Florida with her family and dog, Brooklyn.

Sara E. Echenique on Puerto Rican Resilience & Hope in Our Roof is Blue

Our Roof is Blue opens to a sun-yellow house in what appears to be un campo. Its front windows are cracked, and two others are boarded up with metal shutters. The flag of Puerto Rico is staked on the ground. In the distance are mountains and, if you peer closely, you’ll notice some trees are down.

In front of the yellow house, just beyond the entrance gate, a girl and her brother are feeding chickens.

“Our roof is blue, azul,” the little girl narrates. “But not cerulean like the sky, or an ocean aquamarine. It is a deep, bright blue like the feathers of a peacock or a blue macaw.”

A temporary blue tarp has replaced the siblings’ old white-gray roof after it was ripped away by Hurricane Maria. The keenly observant girl picks up on the differences. Their original roof used to keep the cool in, and didn’t really allow for the pitter-patter sounds of rain. This new roof, though, holds a puddle so large that their mother has to push it with a broom so water doesn’t dump in on them all.

And it is underneath this new roof that the girl detects a major change in her brother, Antonio. She used to fall asleep to his magical stories. But his tales have ceased.

Antonio hasn’t spoken a word since the storm.

Written by Sara E. Echenique and illustrated by Ashley Vargas, Our Roof is Blue is a tender picture book about resilience and rebuilding through the eyes of two Puerto Rican siblings. The story, out now from Charlesbridge, also speaks to the trauma that can be experienced from a natural disaster. The book also has a Spanish version—Nuestro techo es azul.

Puerto Ricans inspired her picture book debut, Echenique told Latinx in Publishing in a recent interview. The author and lawyer was born in Puerto Rico and now lives in South Florida, but her parents and extended family still live on the island.

“They were there during Hurricane Maria,” Echenique said of some of her relatives, including her parents. “And for those of us who were not on the island—part of the diaspora—it was just the most heart wrenching experience I think I’ve ever had.”

She recalled how difficult it was not knowing how her family was during Maria. She’d spend hours on the Internet, searching for information and the “David Begnauds of the world” who would post updates on social media. “We were lucky enough that they made it through the hurricane, but then all of the kind of after-effects were just so tragic,” she said.

At the time, Echenique’s children were still young. She said she began thinking of how they would have processed a natural disaster like this. “I tried to think of it through the eyes of the child, and that’s kind of where it originated,” she said of the idea for Our Roof is Blue.

Then when she was able to visit Puerto Rico a few months after Hurricane Maria, Echenique saw that people were still living without electricity, and all these “horrific things that were compounding on each other.”

Her biggest impression, though, was the number of homes that lacked a roof.

“So as you drive you would just see blue roof, after blue roof, after blue roof, after blue roof,” she said. “I was just blown away because these roofs are not intended to be permanent roofs. These tarps are intended to be 30-day temporary tarps. They’re not made for heat. They’re not made for withstanding long rain or wind or anything like that. They’re truly supposed to be temporary.”

And yet, Echenique noted, there are many homes on the island today that are still using tarps as permanent. For the author, the tarp in Our Roof is Blue is a symbol of failure and hope.

In the book, the unnamed narrator, her brother, and their parents prepare for the storm. Through Vargas’ vivid and scribbly illustrations and Echenique’s clear words, readers are given a window through the preparation before an impending hurricane, and the fear during one. “We thought we were ready for anything that could blow our way,” the girl narrates. “But then… the storm blew loud and fierce all day and all night… I acted brave so I would feel brave. Inside, my heart was pounding.”

The story also touches on the power of community in helping to rebuild, and readers feel hope by the end.

“Young readers, she said, may have many takeaways. The biggest one she hopes they leave with is that Antonio and his sister are like them, regardless of what their lived experiences are.”

One of the most heartening elements of this story is the relationship between the unnamed protagonist and her brother, Antonio. Echenique said this sibling bond was drawn from her own relationship with her siblings.

“And then for me, the central focus [of the book] had to be one of hope, and one of resiliency, because I think that truly defines Puerto Ricans—especially those on the island,” she said. “Because of everything they’ve been through, they have no choice but to be like that. I wanted it to be a celebration of that and not necessarily a tragedy, even though of course there were a lot of tragedies that came out of it.”

Trauma can manifest in many different ways. In Our Roof is Blue, we see the main character’s brother, Antonio, stop speaking. Echenique recalled reading many news articles about Hurricane Maria, and one was about a young girl who hadn’t spoken since the storm. The author wondered how the girl would proceed. “Obviously there’s no follow-up in those types of stories,” she said. “In my mind, I wanted to see her on the other end of it.”

From Echenique’s perspective, stories were such a central feature of how her character, Antonio, expressed himself.

“And so to shut off that side of him so holistically and with such immediacy after this event, for me, was the most obvious way that you could show a child what he’s going through without stating it,” she said. “It was a way that felt digestible to me, and to them. . . Clearly he’s going through something, and in a way that they (readers) can understand it and potentially talk about it, too. Children don’t always have the words, and he didn’t have the words at that time.”

According to Echenique, Our Roof is Blue is also about climate change—though she said it may not be obvious to some. She said climate change affects children like Antonio and his sister every day, in a variety of ways. “This is something that’s going to be reverberating and affecting these children for the rest of their lives, potentially,” she said.

In the end, Echenique acknowledged that she has no control over what someone takes from Our Roof is Blue. Young readers, she said, may have many takeaways. The biggest one she hopes they leave with is that Antonio and his sister are like them, regardless of what their lived experiences are.

“I want them to feel that connection across whatever it is: gender, race, culture, language, whatever—and feel like that connection means that those people are worth advocating for, or worth advocating for yourself as well,” she said.

Echenique said Antonio’s sister helps him in Our Roof is Blue, but he really helps himself, too.

“I want children to feel that sense of empowerment as well,” she said. “Because without that, you’re not going to feel like they can change anything. And they can.”

---

Sara E. Echenique is a Puerto Rican lawyer and children’s author living in South Florida with her three young children, husband, and their rescue dog, Luna. She acquired a degree in English from Williams College and a law degree from the University of Michigan School of Law. After almost a decade practicing as a litigator in cold New York City, Sara decided to move her family to a place that felt more like her childhood home. 

Roaring Brook Press published her debut middle grade book, Hispanic Star: Roberto Clemente in September 2022 in both English and Spanish, which received a starred review from the School Library Journal and was long listed for the SCBWI Impact & Legacy Fund's Russell Freedman Award for Nonfiction for a Better World. Charlesbridge Publishing published her debut picture book, Our Roof is Blue (Nuestro techo es azul), in April 2023 in both English and Spanish. Visit www.saraechenique.com for more.

Amaris Castillo is an award-winning journalist, writer, and the creator of Bodega Stories, a series featuring real stories from the corner store. Her writing has appeared in La Galería Magazine, Aster(ix) Journal, Spanglish Voces, PALABRITAS, Dominican Moms Be Like… (part of the Dominican Writers Association’s #DWACuenticos chapbook series), and most recently Quislaona: A Dominican Fantasy Anthology and Sana, Sana: Latinx Pain and Radical Visions for Healing and Justice. Her short story, “El Don,” was a prize finalist for the 2022 Elizabeth Nunez Caribbean-American Writers’ Prize by the Brooklyn Caribbean Literary Festival. She is a proud member of Latinx in Publishing’s Writers Mentorship Class of 2023 and lives in Florida with her family and dog, Brooklyn.

Author Q & A: Vlad, the Fabulous Vampire by Flavia Z. Drago

Deep in the Dark Woods lives a vampire named Vlad. He loves fashion, but wears only black outfits like his friends. Black is an all-time classic in their world.

But Vlad has a big secret beneath his cape: He has pink cheeks—so bright that they make him look horribly alive. The stout vampire worries his friends would stop liking him if they found out. So he devises a plan. Vlad turns his fashion obsession to good use by designing clothes that can hide his rosiness.

Soon after, Vlad discovers that his friend, Shelley, also has a secret of her own. Could they figure out how to be comfortable in their own skin, together?

Vlad, the Fabulous Vampire is a charming and uplifting book about the journey to self-acceptance by acclaimed author-illustrator Flavia Z. Drago. Out now from Candlewick Press, the picture book is the latest installment in Drago’s World of Gustavo series—a delightfully monstrous world that began with her 2020 New York Times #1 bestseller, Gustavo, the Shy Ghost. The book’s Spanish version—Vlad, el vampirito fabuloso—was released simultaneously.

Drago, who was born in Mexico City and now lives in the UK, spoke with me on behalf of Latinx in Publishing about the creation of Vlad the vampire, what keeps her drawn to this world of monsters, and more.

“Monsters are misfits. Monsters are just reflections of ourselves, in a way. But in making monsters fearful, we have kind of detached ourselves from the things that we fear about ourselves as well, so to speak. So I just think it’s good to look back at them. ”

— Flavia Z. Drago

This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

Amaris Castillo (AC): Congratulations on Vlad, the Fabulous Vampire! What inspired this story?

Flavia Z. Drago (FZD): That’s a good question. I did Gustavo, the Shy Ghost, which is a book about a ghost. After I finished that book, I started working on Leila, the Perfect Witch, a book about a witch. I had this little vampire character who appeared as I was doing sketches for another book actually, called Monsters Play… Peekaboo! It’s monsters playing hide and seek, and I basically drew sheets with different shapes and you need to guess which monster is hiding underneath each sheet. The sketches for the book had different monsters, and one of them was a vampire.

As I was working on Leila, I was allowing myself to do a bit of play with the pencil on the sketchbook. And I drew the vampire wearing pink clothes. I thought it could be fun to have a gothic-looking character wearing something that would feel very opposite to what a gothic world is. I didn’t do anything with him. I just knew I liked him and I showed it to my publishers, and they also liked him. We knew we wanted to make a book, so as I was working on Leila, I had the idea that the next book was going to be about a vampire. But then I didn’t know what his problem was going to be. I knew that he was a vampire who liked wearing pink, but I didn’t know what his story was.

It was actually my partner who suggested, “Well, maybe he has rosy cheeks and that’s his problem. And he wants to hide his cheeks [by] wearing clothes.” So he’s a vampire who likes pink. He feels very self-conscious about having rosy cheeks that make him look very much alive, which is not what a vampire is supposed to look like. I thought it could be fun to play with that and make it a book about learning how to love yourself—which is an everyday task, and which we all struggle with in very different ways.

AC: Your main character, Vlad, has a passion for fashion, but dresses only in black like all of his vampire friends. He’s been keeping a secret—that he has rosy cheeks. He feels a need to hide this from others. How did you decide on this particular struggle for your vampire protagonist?

FZD: I thought it was fitting. It was a black-and-white world, and Vlad is going to be very happy to live in that world. He’s very creative and he loves fashion. There’s nothing he loves more than fashion. But because he has this problem with his rosy pink cheeks, he feels like he can’t wear fun clothes because he has to cover his cheeks with the same boring black outfit all over again. So he can’t be himself. He can’t be who he really wants to be.

And so one day, he has this idea: Maybe I can actually use fashion to cover my cheeks. But that’s a bit futile because, in the end, that’s not who he really is. He is a vampire who has pink rosy cheeks, and he needs to learn how to love it. The thing I didn’t know was that he was going to have this friend who ends up being a key character in this story.

AC: I love his friend because she had a secret as well. I don’t want to give out a spoiler, but that was really cute.

FZD: I think it’s something that happens to all of us. We feel ashamed of something about ourselves, and the only way of getting through it is [by] recognizing it and maybe sharing it with others. So that’s what the characters in my book need to do. They just don’t know how to, and then they find out.

AC: This story is set in the same world as your best-selling picture book, Gustavo, the Shy Ghost. And by now, you’ve had several books on monsters and witches. You bring your signature flair to the other characters—bats, witches, ghosts. What about this world keeps drawing you back in?

FZD: It all just started with Gustavo. When I made Gustavo, I wasn’t aware that I was going to end up developing a whole world of monsters. After I finished Gustavo, I baked a unicorn cake with my family and I posted the pictures on Instagram. When I was having a chat with my agent, Claire Cartey, she was like, “Why don’t you make a book about baking?” I was like, “No, that’s just boring.” And then I was like: Hang on a minute. I have a witch. Witches bake gingerbread houses. And that’s just a really fun and good excuse to draw witches [Laughs]. I’ve always loved horror films and folk tales, so I thought it could be a really fun opportunity to draw some of the things that I enjoy the most.

As I was working on Leila, the Perfect Witch, I ended up thinking about Vlad. And at the same time, I started doing this PhD and researching horror as a genre in the children’s picture book format or medium. I guess it just coincided. I started making books about monsters and then I decided to become a researcher. That just prompted me to think more deeply about monsters and how I could use them in my picture books—and that’s what I’ve started to do.

AC: There’s a big lesson here in being yourself, and how sometimes you need a friend to help you get there. How did you work to bring that onto the page?

FZD: That was really, really hard, because I didn’t want it to be preachy. So I wrote and rewrote the words many times. I wanted to keep it as open as possible because I didn’t want to say, ‘This is how you should feel about yourself.’ I wanted to keep it open, so that whoever is reading it could identify with what Vlad is going through. So I had to think very carefully about the words on the page.

My publishers and I went back and forth, and back and forth. We had many, many proofs. I think there’s at least maybe 13, 15 different proofs with different writing. Up until the last minute I was still thinking of changing the ending. But it just ended up being what it is now.

AC: What are you hoping readers take away from Vlad the Fabulous Vampire?

FZD: I want them to enjoy the world that I’ve created and enjoy all of the details. I want them to feel the love for monsters that I feel. Monsters are misfits. Monsters are just reflections of ourselves, in a way. But in making monsters fearful, we have kind of detached ourselves from the things that we fear about ourselves as well, so to speak. So I just think it’s good to look back at them. 

On the other hand, I would like for people to see the book. Hopefully they’ll identify with Vlad in one way or another—whether it’s because they feel self-conscious about their physical appearance, about their identity, about their nationality—about anything. This is why I think vampires and monsters also work, because they don’t point out to a single thing you’re afraid of. You can be anything. So it’s very versatile in that sense.

---

Flavia Z. Drago was born and raised in Mexico City. As a child, she wanted to be a mermaid. When that didn’t happen, she began her career as a graphic designer and a children’s book illustrator. Her debut, Gustavo, the Shy Ghost, was a smashing success and #1 New York Times bestseller. She is also the author-illustrator of Leila, the Perfect Witch and two monster-themed board books, Monsters Play… Counting! and Monsters Play… Peekaboo! She loves colors, textures, and shapes and enjoys creating them with different materials and a bit of digital sorcery. Flavia Z. Drago divides her time between the UK and Mexico.

Amaris Castillo is an award-winning journalist, writer, and the creator of Bodega Stories, a series featuring real stories from the corner store. Her writing has appeared in La Galería Magazine, Aster(ix) Journal, Spanglish Voces, PALABRITAS, Dominican Moms Be Like… (part of the Dominican Writers Association’s #DWACuenticos chapbook series), and most recently Quislaona: A Dominican Fantasy Anthology and Sana, Sana: Latinx Pain and Radical Visions for Healing and Justice. Her short story, “El Don,” was a prize finalist for the 2022 Elizabeth Nunez Caribbean-American Writers’ Prize by the Brooklyn Caribbean Literary Festival. She is a proud member of Latinx in Publishing’s Writers Mentorship Class of 2023 and lives in Florida with her family and dog, Brooklyn.

Review and Author/Illustrator Q & A: Cool Green: Amazing, Remarkable Trees by Lulu Delacre

Cool Green: Amazing, Remarkable Trees begins with a question.

“¿Por qué, abuelo? Why?”

A young girl asks her grandfather why he’s in awe of trees. He’s a landscaper who believes trees are astounding. He begins to share why.

There’s the General Sherman, considered the “world’s biggest clean air machine,” and the monkey puzzle—“a living fossil and cousin of trees from long ago.” And there’s the coconut palm, which author-illustrator Lulu Delacre wanted to include because it was a big part of her upbringing in Puerto Rico.

Out now by Candlewick Press, Cool Green: Amazing, Remarkable Trees is a tender and lyrical ode to the trees of the world, with a strong backbone in research. With each page, the Latino landscaper guides readers through the wonders of a select group of trees. We learn about the umbrella thorn acacia, which “dresses its branches with needles and hooks,” and we take in the baobab—“an upside-down tree with a trunk like a sponge.”

Delacre’s illustrations, like the trees she features, brim with life. For this particular book, she opted for a mixed media—embedding live specimens like seeds, fronds, and leaves, into the art. Once she was done with the pages, the publisher photographed it in such a way that readers can see shadows on the page from the specimens. The art as a whole will likely nurture greater curiosity about the world’s trees.

By the end of the book, readers are left with more knowledge about trees and the uniqueness each brings. It’s also humbling to learn that more than seventy-three thousand species of trees inhabit Earth. Cool Green: Amazing, Remarkable Trees only scratches the surface, but it’s a quality introduction for both readers of all ages.

The root of this book is a love for nature and learning. Delacre, a big nature lover herself, dedicated it to the young stewards of the Earth.

On behalf of Latinx In Publishing, I spoke with Delacre recently about the inspiration behind Cool Green, her research and illustration processes, and more.

“By the end of the book, readers are left with more knowledge about trees and the uniqueness each brings. It’s also humbling to learn that more than seventy-three thousand species of trees inhabit Earth. ”

This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

Amaris Castillo (AC): Congratulations on the publication of Cool Green: Amazing, Remarkable Trees. What inspired you to write and illustrate this story?

Lulu Delacre (LD): It goes back to 2019, when I first saw an exhibit on trees, and specifically on the symbiotic nature between fungi and trees. That, paired with the fact that I’ve loved trees all my life. It’s a place of peace for me—walking in the woods and working in the garden.

So all the love of nature, paired with that exhibit and a love of learning—because I absolutely adore to learn—gave way to what happened next. I saw this exhibit in 2019, and then in 2020 we were on lockdown. My safe place again became walking the woods of national parks, gardening, and research. I also noticed how essential workers were thanked and how, all of a sudden, they became visible. I noticed that some people who worked in essential jobs know much more than what you think they do. That’s what made me appear the Latino landscaper who knows a lot more than what you would expect somebody that comes in and does work in your lawn might know. I wanted to share with children my awe of trees, through the voice of this landscaper.

AC: In your book, this Latino landscaper teaches his granddaughter about the different kinds of trees all over the world. Can you talk about your decision to make him a landscaper? Why was that important?

LD: For me it was important that the grandfather is a landscaper, because I have always admired the work of Latinos that come (here). . . When I had this home that I needed to take care of, I did have the help of someone who worked for me. He did the basic lawn care for many years. Talking to him, I realized that he knew so much more than what was apparent. I wanted to showcase that to children, because sometimes a reader might dismiss these essential workers. They might dismiss these people, and I feel that, that is an incorrect way of seeing life, because all of us have something to contribute to society.

A landscaper may not have the degree that a professor may have, but at the same time his knowledge is in the knowledge of the land, in the knowledge of plants, in the knowledge that perhaps came in ways that are not taught in the classroom—that are taught by nature itself. And that is valid knowledge, too.

AC: Your text in Cool Green is both poetic and informative. What was it like to balance both in order to tell a compelling ode to trees?

LD: That’s a great question. First and foremost is research, which I adore. And I did tons of it. Because I wanted the young reader to fall in love with these trees, I searched for what I call the “cool facts.” I literally made a list. If I were looking at these as a young reader, what facts would I find really interesting? What is it that I find cool about this tree? And that’s what I wrote.

After I had all my facts, then I went back and tried to weave these facts in a way that was lyrical. For me, it’s a succinct way of saying a very important thing in very few words that perhaps has more of a chance to stay in the young brain because it’s short. Perhaps it has a way of telling him, or her, or they, just enough that they feel compelled to turn the pages and find more about this specific tree.

AC: In your notes at the end of the book, you write that there are more than seventy-three thousand species of trees that inhabit the Earth. How did you decide which ones you wanted to feature in Cool Green, like the monkey puzzle or the coconut palm?

LD: I’m sorry, but I found out about the coconut palm as soon as I could because I wanted to somehow feature it. It was so much part of my upbringing, and knowing that it was the second largest seed, I said ‘OK, this is the fact. I’m not going to go with the largest seed. It’s going to be the second one, because I want to feature the coconut palm.’ Besides, it has a lot of uses.

For some young children, it’s about the champion tree—the tallest tree, or the tree with the largest girth, like the Ahuehuete from Mexico. This is a champion tree that takes literally 17 adults holding hands to go around its girth. So I wanted to have the champion trees, as well as some amazing trees that I didn’t know about until I started doing the research. Like the Eucalyptus deglupta—the rainbow gum—which literally seems that it couldn’t exist. I do sessions about this book to kids and, when I show them the illustration of the rainbow gum, I ask them, “Do you think that this tree is real, or do you think I made up those colors?” Of course, many of them think that it’s all made up. So I show them photos, and the kids are amazed.

My vision was not only to showcase trees that kids could relate to, but also to do it in a global fashion. I wanted to show readers that you have these amazing trees all around the globe. You have to be in awe. You may have one that is right in your backyard, and you don’t know that it’s there.

AC: I understand that, as part of creating the illustrations, you searched for live specimens of trees. Can you share more about your process?

LD: It’s a mixed media. You can go to my site and see some of the pictures of the process. I used soft acrylics for flat colors. I decided to blend graphic shapes with accurate height and girth of specimens. I represented the surrounding animal life to hint of tree size scale. In an echo of scientific observation I collected on my own, or sought from arboretums, leaves, twigs, cones, bark, and flowers of each species. I used some of the collected specimens to create textured hand printed papers. Finally, I selected a few chosen specimens to adhere to the art. It’s my own way of modeling for readers to do the same with trees they particularly like.

Then after everything was done, the publisher did a very good job of photographing it in such a way that you can see those shadows. So when I show the book to young people, I ask them, “Where is the specimen—the dry leaf that I collaged?” They can pinpoint it. That part was very well done by the publisher. It’s a whole process. Art for a book like this takes me about six months.

AC: What are you hoping young readers take away from Cool Green?

LD: My hope is that, by reading one of these poems, they feel compelled to know more about the specific tree that spoke to them. That it instills in them a little bit of awe for trees, and for what they do for us, humans and the Earth. Maybe they can also become collectors of specific leaves of their favorite trees. They might also be compelled to write their own poem based on facts about the tree that they particularly love.

Doing these books, for me, is like sowing seeds. You don’t know what is going to speak to a child and young minds are really where you want to sow these seeds. If you want to create stewards of the Earth, you must start with the youngest of children. Sometimes it’s just by picking up a book like Cool Green or Verde Fresco, reading a couple of pages and just telling your kid, “You know what? Let’s go out to the park nearby. Let’s go check the trees out there. Let’s see if we can find those leaves, and then let’s see if we can find oak leaves. And what kind of oak leaves do you see?” It’s a bridge to asking questions. And kids are just so curious. It’s really when they are young that you can, like I say, sow seeds that later on grow into amazing people.

AC: You have a new book titled Veo Veo, I See You. What can you share about this story?

LD: I am very excited about Veo Veo, I See You. It celebrates essential workers, but it does it for the youngest of children—to the point that the children that might be playing the veo veo game may not remember what the world went through in 2020. It’s a very joyful book. It’s told in the voice of Marisol, a young girl who discovers the true meaning of the word “essential” on an outing with her mother and her younger brother as they go on errands in the city. She’s playing veo veo and learns who is essential in her surrounding community.

---

Three-time Pura Belpré Award honoree Lulu Delacre has been writing and illustrating children's books since 1980. The New York Times Bestselling artist was born and raised in Puerto Rico to Argentinean parents. Delacre says her Latino heritage and her life experiences inform her work. Her many titles include Arroz con Leche: Popular Songs and Rhymes from Latin America, a Horn Book Fanfare Book in print for over 30 years. Her bilingual picture book ¡Olinguito, de la A a la Z! Descubriendo el bosque nublado; Olinguito, from A to Z! Unveiling the Cloud Forest and her story collection Us, in Progress: Short Stories About Young Latinos have received multiple starred reviews and awards. Among her latest works are the art of Turning Pages by Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor and Cool Green: Amazing, Remarkable Trees. Delacre has lectured internationally and served as a juror for the National Book Awards. She has exhibited at The Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art, The Original Art Show at the Society of Illustrators in New York, the Museum of Art of Puerto Rico, and the Zimmerli Art Museum among other venues. Reading is Fundamental honored her with a Champion of Children’s Literacy Award. For more visit her at www.luludelacre.com.

Amaris Castillo is an award-winning journalist, writer, and the creator of Bodega Stories, a series featuring real stories from the corner store. Her writing has appeared in La Galería Magazine, Aster(ix) Journal, Spanglish Voces, PALABRITAS, Dominican Moms Be Like… (part of the Dominican Writers Association’s #DWACuenticos chapbook series), and most recently Quislaona: A Dominican Fantasy Anthology and Sana, Sana: Latinx Pain and Radical Visions for Healing and Justice. Her short story, “El Don,” was a prize finalist for the 2022 Elizabeth Nunez Caribbean-American Writers’ Prize by the Brooklyn Caribbean Literary Festival. She is a proud member of Latinx in Publishing’s Writers Mentorship Class of 2023 and lives in Florida with her family and dog, Brooklyn.

Review and Author Q & A: Infested by Angel Luis Colón

“I can’t remember a time I hated my mother and my stepfather more than the summer before my senior year.”

Anger boils in the opening of Angel Luis Colón’s young adult debut novel, Infested (out now by MTV Books). Manny Rivera is seething over his parents’ decision to uproot him and his baby sister, Grace, from San Antonio to the Bronx. He’s now without friends, without a car, and to make matters worse: he’s been tasked with helping out in his family’s new home—a luxury condo building his stepfather, Al, is managing. Al’s job is to get the Blackrock Glen ready for tenants—and there’s a tight deadline.

One small light in this new gloomy chapter for Manny is a budding friendship with Sasha, an outspoken Afro-Latina who is protesting Blackrock Glen even as she and her family plan to move there. And he meets Mr. Mueller, an exterminator hired to rid the building of roaches, and who seems to take a liking to Manny. Mr. Mueller looks to be in his seventies, with a messy mop of hair and sunken eyes.

As Manny starts to address issues in different apartments throughout Blackrock Glen, he finds cockroaches—“creepy, crawly, little shit-born roaches with twitching antennae and creepy legs.” Then comes the nightmares, followed by more incidents with the insects. And even more sinister, Manny notices that contractors hired to do jobs in the new building are missing.

After some digging, Manny and Sasha come to the paralyzing realization that the Mr. Mueller they see around the neighborhood is no longer alive. He actually died decades ago in a fire, in the same exact location where Manny’s new building is. And it was one that Mr. Mueller himself set.

Colón’s graphic body horror descriptions paired with commentary on themes like gentrification, race and class, make Infested not only a deeply entertaining story, but an important one. Readers new to horror may also get a thrill out of the major ick factor moments in the book. And threaded throughout expertly is food for thought about the navigation of Puerto Rican identity, and one’s place in Latinx culture.

Will Manny be able to save his family from an unhinged ghost determined to repeat history?

On behalf of Latinx in Publishing, I spoke with Colón about the inspiration behind Infested, the horror subgenre of body horror, and more.

“Colón’s graphic body horror descriptions paired with commentary on themes like gentrification, race and class, make “Infested” not only a deeply entertaining story, but an important one.”

This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

Amaris Castillo (AC): Congratulations on Infested! This is your YA debut novel. What inspired you to tell this story?

Angel Luis Colón (ALC): Initially I had been thinking about YA for a little while. I was coming from the adult crime fiction scene, and I wasn’t getting a lot of fulfillment out of it. I was very hesitant to write about my experience as a Puerto Rican from New York in that space, because of a lot of the negative stigmas that are perpetuated about Puerto Ricans—especially in crime fiction. You see TV, you know, all those things.

So I thought about: How do I write about these things I want to write about, in a different space that maybe is a little safer—that’ll let me explore things? My agent came to me with the news that MTV Books was coming back, and they were looking for ideas. We were having beers, and something just kind of struck me as an idea I wanted to look into. I pitched it to him, and then we pitched it to MTV, and it kind of blew up from there.

At first, it was like an interesting idea, right? But I think YA lets you explore things a little more allegorically. You can kind of go a little crazier. When that clicked, I was like, well, wait a second. There’s a lot of things we can talk about the Puerto Rican experience, at least in New York, and also bridge my upbringing in with it. As most Nuyoricans will know, you’re blanquito growing up. There’s a level of privilege that comes with that. There’s a level of issues that come with it, as well. But I decided I wanted to write a story about that point a white Latino has where you got to decide: Are you going to embrace the privilege? Or are you going to think about your place within your culture, and what role you can play to help it?

AC: Your main character, Manny, starts off feeling like he hates his mother and stepfather for moving their family from Texas to the Bronx, in the summer before his senior year. At first I chalked this up to teen angst, but there are other dynamics at play when it comes to his relationship with his parents. What message were you hoping to send by highlighting this tension between a child and his parents?

ALC: I found an opportunity with that because I thought about my own tensions with my family coming up. It goes back to what it is to be Nuyorican, Puerto Rican. On paper, however you would describe it, I guess I’m third-generation American. Being Puerto Rican makes it funny to describe it like that, right? Because we were made American on paper, and whatever that means, too, but I digress.

But there are very stark differences between generations. And I realized a lot of my own angst came from how much more Americanized I was from my mother, versus how much more Americanized she was from her mother. You think about all these milestones we look at culturally. And, like you said, a senior in high school is so important, right? But really, is it? It’s important because we’ve been told it’s important. And there are reasons for it being important, like college and all that. But to a teen’s mind, they look at it as important because they’ve been told all of their lives. When I thought about all that (older) generation, my mom never cared. That wasn’t something that she had to care about. For her and her generation, senior (year) in high school was the end. There was no college. There was no thought beyond that. You went straight to work. So I wanted to play around with that.

I thought hard about how I had the privilege of being like, ‘Well, this is such a pivotal time in my life. I’m going to have college.’ And the people older than me are like, ‘What are you talking about? You gotta live.’ It helped me with that balance between how his mother and stepfather were just kind of like ‘We’re moving. This is an opportunity. Why are you so upset?’ They don’t grasp it, because, to them, they’re doing the right thing based on where they’re coming. In their minds, providing for family and working are the two most important things. But to Manny, he has had the privilege to be able to have a little more long-term thinking. So for him, he’s like, ‘Well, I hadn’t started yet. What are you talking about?’

AC: Your book definitely has the ick factor by way of body horror. There are moments that had me looking around to make sure there are no roaches near me. What was it like for you to bring this subgenre of horror to a younger audience?

ALC: That was really important to me. I actually thought about that a lot, and I wrote about it recently for CrimeReads. My first horror movie was the 80s remake of The Thing. I was only five years old, and my uncles thought it would be hysterical to show it to us—me and my three cousins. I ran out of the room. I was mortified and just completely traumatized.

I was not a fan of horror until maybe five or six years later, and we saw this movie called The Gate. It was awful, but it made me realize that you can find different types of horror. And then I would go back to the crazier stuff but I realized, when you’re young, that stuff is very scary. I look at my own kids and see how they react to certain things, and I’m like, ‘Oh, OK.’

I wanted to think about it that way—what can I write for somebody who is kind of like a gateway? Isn’t too extreme, but isn’t too nice either. Something that one reader out there will be like, ‘I want to check out some other stuff.’ I got a kick out of that.

AC: When Manny meets Mr. Mueller, the building’s exterminator seems friendly. Manny and his new friend, Sasha, later discovers that Mr. Mueller is a specter who espouses certain beliefs about their Bronx neighborhood. Can you share how you landed on this paranormal aspect while writing the novel?

ALC: Initially I wasn’t going to, but then I felt like that was a little too real. I grew up in the Bronx. I was actually born in Texas—where I pulled the Texas thing for Manny from—but I was only there for a couple years. My parents divorced, and I kind of grew up solo and I was raised by my grandparents and different men throughout my life. A lot of them served as mentors, but also were very entrenched in their way of thinking. So I pulled a lot of that into Mr. Mueller—it’s having this person that you can bond with that is problematic. That was very common when I was growing up in the Bronx, because you have this very weird melting pot of folks. And a lot of the older folks would have incredibly antiquated views, and they were very stuck in their ways.

There was one guy I grew up with, the father of my mother’s best friend. He was an incredibly racist old man. It was a very complicated relationship with him, because he had a charm about him. You can get along with him and he would make you laugh, but then he would say something that was just insane. It was easy for him. It wasn't even awkward. So I wanted to channel into how that hate becomes like an infestation. It’s something that you can’t just scrub out.

At first, we were gonna keep Mueller pretty grounded, but I felt like that was just way too real. And I really wanted to go into the paranormal things. So we decided: How do you create a character that’s allegorical to that, and is kind of like this physical manifestation of that grime that grows on people’s souls? It clicked: We’ll make him make him a ghost, and we can loop in Bronx history into that.

AC: In Infested there’s an added storyline about gentrification, class, and this question of who belongs where. Can you talk about your decision to anchor your book in these themes?

ALC: If you’re not from the Bronx, there’s always a stigma around the Bronx. Growing up, when people would meet me, they’d be like ‘You’re tough. You’ve seen people explode or die.’ Lots of nonsense. And that all stems out of the 70s, when the Bronx was on fire and you had the influx of lots of Latino and Black people that were leaving the island when Harlem was being gentrified, actually. I grew up with that stigma, and at the tail end of the worst times that the Bronx had.

Yeah, I saw some things, but there’s still humanity to the neighborhood. There’s still a very proud culture to it. I think the Bronx had this distinction of having that stigma working for them, in a way that gentrifiers avoided the Bronx. So when Brooklyn was really getting built up, people just ignored the Bronx. Then that changed, and when I’d visit I started seeing new buildings, things were shifting, and rents were going up. And for a while, I kind of deluded myself into thinking ‘Well, we’ll never let this happen. We’re too in here. We’re too strong.’ You can tell yourself that, but money at the end of the day is always going to beat you if you don’t have it to fight back. And I began to see real changes in the neighborhoods I grew up around.

At first you’re like, ‘A new building can’t be a bad thing. New businesses can’t be a bad thing, right?’ But you begin to realize these businesses aren’t meant for the people there. And that’s where the real problem starts. I thought a lot about that, and realizing that the Bronx is changing now. And it’s a bummer to me. Growing up in the neighborhood I grew up in, you don’t want to see what made that neighborhood so special to you change. I always felt like I was a very fortunate person growing up in the Bronx. I was able to be around Latino people, I was able to be around Black folk, Asian folk. It was really cool. And it’s such a bummer to think about that going away. I wanted to really get into that, and I thought it would be an interesting thing to have the main character of the story be part of the problem. Maybe not by choice, but he’s there and he’s living in this building.

AC: What are you hoping young readers take away from Infested?

ALC: When I really got into things, I realized I was putting a book together that I wanted to read at that age. I wanted to write a book for a blanquito who is out there, maybe in the same situation I was at that age and other white Latinos are—where you’re at that impasse. You can embrace your privilege and be the token of a white group, and continue on some weird path. Or you can sit back and begin to think about your culture and what you can do for it, and how you can be a better ally to the Black folks in the Latine culture. They’re consistently written-off people who are part of you as well. And that first step to decolonization. I really was invested in that.

I didn’t want to be another Latin writer who was just playing around in the marginalized space to make white people feel comfortable. That was a big concern of mine, especially thinking about my own privileges. Because, very often, white Latine writers, white Latine performers, and other creators are used, to be tokens—to make that check, where it’s like, ‘We got the representation.’ So I very much wanted to call that out. And I wanted the book to be about colorism and gentrification because of that.

I wanted to push back against those two pieces. The two pieces that I always see are either using us for our pain, or using us as a filler to provide safe stories. It’s tough to navigate, and you never know if you get it quite right. That’s the hard part about it, because it’s complex. But my hope is that readers take that, and that readers like that. I want everyone to be able to see maybe a little of themselves in the story through Sasha, or through someone else like Manny. And see the things that they grew up around, at least represented somehow.

---

Angel Luis Colón is a Derringer Award and Anthony Award-nominated author writer of HELL CHOSE ME, the Blacky Jaguar novella series, NO HAPPY ENDINGS, and the short story collection MEAT CITY ON FIRE AND OTHER ASSORTED DEBACLES. His fiction has appeared in multiple web and print publications including Thuglit, Literary Orphans, and Great Jones Street. His debut YA novel, INFESTED, comes out in July 2023. Keep up with him on Twitter via @GoshDarnMyLife.

Amaris Castillo is a journalist, writer, and the creator of Bodega Stories, a series featuring real stories from the corner store. Her writing has appeared in La Galería Magazine, Aster(ix) Journal, Spanglish Voces, PALABRITAS, Dominican Moms Be Like… (part of the Dominican Writers Association’s #DWACuenticos chapbook series), and most recently Quislaona: A Dominican Fantasy Anthology and Sana, Sana: Latinx Pain and Radical Visions for Healing and Justice. Her short story, “El Don,” was a prize finalist for the 2022 Elizabeth Nunez Caribbean-American Writers’ Prize by the Brooklyn Caribbean Literary Festival. She is a proud member of Latinx in Publishing’s Writers Mentorship Class of 2023 and lives in Florida with her family and dog, Brooklyn.

Q & A: Elizabeth Santiago, author of The Moonlit Vine

The Moonlit Vine follows Taina Perez, a young girl who begins a journey of self-discovery when her abuela tells her that she is a direct descendant of Anacaona, a beloved Taino leader. Spurred by a history class project, trouble at school, and unrest in her local community, Taina is lead down a path to find her strength and the magic of her ancestors.

I was given the opportunity to read The Moonlit Vine from debut author Elizabeth Santiago and as someone who is Puerto Rican, I was drawn to this book because of its focus on Puerto rican history and ancestry. This young adult novel touches on many themes like family, culture and feminine power. It was a heart warming story that made my inner child feel seen.

On behalf of Latinx in Publishing, I had the lovely opportunity to ask Elizabeth Santiago some questions about her story. I hope that her answers move you as much as they moved me, and that you find yourself reaching for this incredible book.

“This young adult novel touches on many themes, like family, culture and feminine power. It was a heart warming story that made my inner child feel seen.”

Tereza Lopez (TL): Where did you get the inspiration to write this book? Could you talk a bit about your writing process for your debut novel?

Elizabeth Santiago (ES): I wrote The Moonlit Vine when I was in a doctoral program at Lesley University in Cambridge, MA. I wrote it because after a number of years of researching educational outcomes of Latinx students, I ran up against symptoms and not root causes. Why were some of us struggling in school? For me, it was not a question I could answer without going back to colonialization. I wanted to write about how the past still affects us in present day, yet the doctoral research and dissertation process didn’t give me the freedom I needed to present a more sweeping narrative. The creative part of my soul urged me to write The Moonlit Vine and that story allowed me to present a more complete picture of the challenges some of us have faced in present-day educational systems. Writing this novel awakened a deep desire to tell stories and diminished my desire to be an academic researcher to be honest. While I completed the doctoral program and am proud of what I accomplished, I will always look to storytelling as a way to present a complete picture of reality.

(TL): Mourning, grief, and community are large themes throughout this book for many different characters. Could you touch on what it was like writing those themes? What does community mean for you and how it relates to your book, especially for Juana?

(ES): With The Moonlit Vine, I wanted to represent generational trauma, colonialism, fighting for survival, and how all of those things mix to create a person, a family, a community, and a culture. For me, my story begins with the native people of Haiti, Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico because that’s when certain seeds got planted that have grown into the messy weeds we have today. That’s what The Moonlit Vine is about. The artifacts depicted in the book are symbols of the knowledge they had that got handed down generation after generation. Instead of perpetuating this narrative that the Taíno did not survive, I wanted to present that we are, in fact, still here. Our ancestors knew what they were up against and ensured their survival through the tools they had in their possession.

Much of our culture, traditions and history get passed down from our elders, in particular our abuelas. I have always had a strong connection to the women in my family – the ones I know and the ones that have passed on. It’s hard to explain, but I feel their presence. I feel women, in particular, walking with me through life. I have always felt that and writing The Moonlit Vine gave me the opportunity to express the appreciation, love and awe I have for our ancestors.

I’m so glad you asked about Juana because she was one of my favorite characters to write! She is a compilation of all my Puerto Rican aunties who always showed up ready to act and help. Juana loves her family and her community, and she is much beloved in Puerto Rico where she lives. I have written a complete backstory for Juana and one day I’m going to write a story from her perspective. There’s a bit of Juana in all of us Boricuas!

(TL): Who do you think the ideal reader for this book is? What can readers expect to gain from reading The Moonlit Vine?

(ES): As I wrote this book, parts of me began to heal. I had a better handle on the historical forces and situations that made me, me. I can’t say whether others will walk away feeling the same, but I sincerely hope readers will take away the message of love – love of our ancestors and hope for the future. That communities are better together, and that young people can change the world for the better. I wrote the book as a love letter to Puerto Rico and Puerto Ricans, but I think anyone who is interested in the universal themes of the book will enjoy it.

(TL): I have family from Puerto Rico but was raised in the States, so I did not have access to a lot of Puerto Rican culture growing up. Reading this book was a very magical experience for me and I feel like I learned a lot about Puerto Rico and its ancestral culture. Could you talk about research you did on the generations of strong female ancestors that are mentioned throughout this book?

(ES): Thank you for sharing your experience! A lot of our history hasn’t been documented, so I listened to my mother’s stories and tales from my family who lived on the island. A common thing people say is that Puerto Ricans are made up of Taíno, African, and Spanish ancestry. Growing up I knew a lot about the Spanish and a little less about my African ancestors, but very little to nothing about my Taíno ancestors. And I looked for many years! What is documented comes from early journal writings, letters, and stories shared by Spanish (and other) colonizers—stories that have created the dominant narrative that the Taíno did not survive.

That false narrative has been debunked through the prevalence of DNA testing. (Well, our elders already knew the narrative was false, but science finally caught up). With renewed excitement, I continued to research and learn. I read all I could on the Taíno, and I continued to listen to stories from family members. When I was writing the historical vignettes, I let my imagination fill in the blanks. I was determined to present the Taíno as strategic—a people who understood that genocide was happening and fought in ways that ensured their survival even if not necessarily on their own terms. I thought about all of the wonderful women in my life and how the past is connected to the present. I searched for books that described all these connections, but I couldn’t find a work of fiction or nonfiction that shared what I hoped to understand or express.

At a 1981 speech to the Ohio Arts Council, the late amazing literary genius Toni Morrison said, “If there’s a book that you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.” I took those words seriously, which is what set me on the journey to write The Moonlit Vine. A book to name how vital the Taíno were to not only my survival, but also the survival of my family and many, many others. How much their joy, intelligence, and love continue to shape me and others to the present day. This novel is my way of sharing my deep gratitude and respect for them.

---

Elizabeth Santiago grew up in Boston, MA with parents who migrated from San Sebastián, Puerto Rico in the 1960s. The youngest of nine, Elizabeth was entranced by the stories her mother, father, aunts and uncles, and community elders told her. Later, she sought to capture and honor those narratives and share them with the world. She earned a BFA in creative writing from Emerson College, a master’s in education from Harvard University, and a PhD in education studies from Lesley University. She still lives in Boston with her husband Kevin and son Ezekiel, but travels to Puerto Rico as often as she can to feel even closer to her ancestors, culture, and heritage. Find her @liznarratives

Tereza Lopez (she/her) is a recent graduate from Clark University with a double major in English and history. She attended Clark University again in Fall 2021 and obtained a Master’s in communication. When she is not studying, you can find her obsessively reading or taking care of her new kitten.

Review and Author Q & A: Plátanos Are Love by Alyssa Reynoso Morris; Illustrated by Mariyah Rahman

I grew up eating platanos: mangú, tostones and maduros (or fritos as we like to call them in our household,) so you can imagine how excited I was when I learned of a children’s book dedicated to one of my first loves!

Plátanos Are Love by Alyssa Reynoso Morris is a beautiful homage to culture, history, traditions and family. The story starts with a young girl who goes produce shopping with her grandmother. This introduction sets the foundation for the journey in which the little girl takes the reader. As she learns from her grandmother how to cook plátanos, in a variety of ways, she also learns about the importance that they hold in her ancestral history. Ultimately, we find the young girl passing on the knowledge of what her grandmother has taught her, in the kitchen, to her little sister; giving us a full circle heartfelt moment.

The book is filled with wondrous attention to detail, starting with the beautiful bright illustrations by Mariyah Rahman. From the grandmothers hoop earrings, to the array of hairstyles on the characters, I felt seen. The Spanish interwoven throughout the story, welcomes us to a Spanglish filled world; one many of us can recognize. However, it’s the reader care that we see via a glossary, for those unfamiliar with the Spanish words, and the recipes for the wonderful dishes, mentioned throughout the book, that really brings the book together.

I had the opportunity to ask Alyssa Reynoso Morris a few questions about Plátanos Are Love. She spoke about the inspiration behind the book, the importance of knowing our history, what we can expect next from her and of course, how she prefers her plátanos.

““Plátanos Are Love” by Alyssa Reynoso Morris is a beautiful homage to culture, history, traditions and family. ”

Tiffany Gonzalez (TG): What or who inspired you to write this book? 

Alyssa Reynoso Morris (ARM): I wanted to be a writer since I was 7 years old because I grew up with my Abuela—the original storyteller. She had a second-grade education, but that didn’t stop her from telling the best stories that captivated EVERYONE’S attention. I remember looking up to her and wanting to be like her. I think she knew that because she would rope me into “helping” her tell her stories. These are some of my fondest memories as well as the time we spent in the kitchen together. My love of my Abuela, her stories, and the food we made together inspired Plátanos Are Love.

TG: Immediately, I was drawn in by the Spanish words and loved the strong presence that "Spanglish" had throughout the book. It reminded me of my upbringing and of my day to day, in all honesty. Was that always the intention or did that come later on in the process of bringing this book together? 

ARM: I love this question. The Spanglish was intentional. Growing up I spoke Spanish at home and English in school. Then as I got older my English proficiency outpaced my Spanish. I found myself speaking in Spanish and in Spanglish every chance I got to preserve the language. With time I learned to take pride in my Spanglish and my goal with my writing is for it to be as authentic as possible. When I started writing it I had sprinkled in Spanish and fortunately my editor asked me to lean into it more, so I did and I'm proud of what we created.

TG: The history of our ancestors played a very important role in the book. Can you speak on why this was important for you to highlight?

ARM: I'm a political science major and I'm obsessed with how our history affects our present. Growing up I learned about Trujillo and the Parsley Massacre but I didn't learn about slavery and colonization until I was in school. I think it's important for kids to learn where they come from. I think kids should know how resilient their ancestors were so they know they are also resilient and can do anything they set their mind to. 

TG: It's essential for kids to see books that reflect their cultures; that reflect who they are. The one book I read as a child that highlighted Dominican culture has stayed with me till this day. Will you be continuing this work with future projects? Can we expect other aspects of Dominican/Puerto Rican culture or even just latinidad highlighted? 

ARM: I love this question and the answer is YES you can expect more Latinidad to come in my future works. My Dominican and Puerto Rican culture and experiences are such huge parts of my identity and storytelling that I can't tell stories without incorporating it in. My second book The Bronx Is My Home is a love letter to the Bronx from the perspective of a Black Puertorican boy. There are references to Latiné heroes like Sonia Sotomayor and AOC. My third book is called Gloriana Presente: A First Day of School Book and it starts with Gloriana's Abuela soothes her first day of school nerves by telling her stories about their family home in la República Dominicana. Gloriana is uncertain about how to exist between her two homes, or how to make new friends between her two languages. This imaginative picture book celebrates the magic of existing in-between, and the transformative power of self-soothing to build confidence. I think immigrants and particularly the Latiné/x/o community will resonate with the text. 

TG: Okay, if you had to choose one: tostones, maduros or mangú? And why? 

ARM: Asking me to pick one is like asking me what my favorite book is. I just can't choose one because it really depends on my mood. When I want something sweet I go for maduros. When I want something crispy I go for tostones. Mangú is great when I want to feel full and am trying to be healthier as it's not fried. I also love mofongo, pastelon, and alcapurias but we needed to edit them out of the book because the manuscript was getting too long.

---

Alyssa Reynoso-Morris is a queer Afro-Latinx Dominican and Puerto Rican writer, wife, mother, and community organizer. During the day she is a chief of staff working with community members, nonprofit organizations, and government officials to make the world a better place. Then she puts her writer's hat on to craft heartfelt stories about home, family, food, and the fun places she has been. Alyssa was born and raised in the Bronx and currently lives in Philadelphia with her partner and daughter. Alyssa is honored to be a Musa with Las Musas Books which celebrates the diversity of voice, experience, and power of Latinx children's authors. She hopes you enjoy her stories. You can visit her website at alyssaauthor.com.

Mariyah Rahman was born and raised in Trinidad and Tobago. She spent her earliest years climbing trees, digging for fossils, and drawing on walls with crayons. Today she is an illustrator for children's books and entertainment but has still never found a fossil.

Tiffany Gonzalez is the Marketing Manager at Astra House and the Communications Co-Director for Latinx In Publishing. She previously worked in Production at HarperCollins Publishers. She has worked on the Publicity and Marketing campaign for Dreaming of You by Melissa Lozada-Oliva and on the Marketing campaigns for Becoming Abolitionists by Derecka Purnell, The Sex Lives of African Women by Nana Darkoa Sekiyamah and National Book Award Fiction Finalist The Town of Babylon by Alejandro Varela. She has earned her Bachelors and Master's degrees from Rutgers University - NB. She is Dominican-American and fluid in Spanish. She is a Publisher’s Weekly 2022 Star Watch Honoree. You can follow her on Instagram @wandering_tiff_ or visit her website at wanderingtiff.com

Interview with Rudy Ruiz author of Valley of Shadows

On belhalf of Latinx In Publishing, I had the opportunity to ask Rudy Ruiz a few questions about Valley of Shadows.

Chelsea Villareal (CV): As someone who also has Rio Grande Valley ancestral roots, I was thrilled to pick up Valley of Shadows! What made you want to write this genre-bending thriller?

Rudy Ruiz (RR): In my previous novel, The Resurrection of Fulgencio Ramirez, I applied magical realism to border life in a story that wove together love, history and a family curse. I wanted to explore the idea of that family curse further as well as delve more deeply into the conflicted and dark history of the border region and the multigenerational traumas that have haunted many families in the area, dating back to when the Rio Grande River was declared the border at the end of the US-Mexico War. Valley of Shadows provided me the opportunity to pursue that line of thinking while bringing elements of the Western, horror and mystery genres to a tale that touches on the historical atrocities and social injustices of the mid- to late-1800's. Unfortunately, many of those same issues of racism and discrimination against Latinos, Indigenous Peoples, African Americans and Asian Americans are still very real and pressing, which I feel makes the novel very relevant to readers today.

CV: One of the book’s stronger themes centers on borders, whether they be magickal, geographical, or metaphorical (or a decent mix) — could you tell us more about how you went about interweving all these nuances within the story?

RR: Borders are a motif in my writing. I was born and raised on the border, and my writing always takes me back there. They say you can take a person out of the border but you can't take the border out of a person. That saying definitely applies to me. Growing up, the border was an invisible line my family and I crossed every day. Because of that, I see borders as porous membranes through which people, animals, goods, services, and the environment must continuously traverse and transmit back and forth. In my work, I explore the idea of porous borders with respect to place, culture, language, time, and even life and death. Magical realism lends itself to that exploration in a very fluid and natural manner which also resonates culturally. When it comes to borders I see bridges instead of walls. I see beginnings instead of endings. I see an opportunity for people to come together and build something constructively and collaboratively. I try to reflect that world view and that vision for life through my characters and the situations and challenges they encounter and overcome within my stories.

CV: Tell us more about Solitario, your protagonist (anti-hero?). He exemplifies another key theme of your book; loneliness — how did you go about developing such a character?

RR: In Solitario, I yearned to create an imperfect person that could feel real and flawed, but also be someone worthy of rooting for, someone readers would empathize with and care for throughout the story. He's had a hard life and he's lost everyone he has loved. Whether it's because of his family curse, sheer bad luck or poorly made decisions, he has ended up a very lonely person, isolated and afraid to engage with the world. I created Solitario during the pandemic, and the heightened isolation of that time period inspired me. I think many of us felt isolated during the pandemic in a way we never had before in our lives. That sense of isolation helped me conjure up how Solitario might have felt in his self-imposed exile. Coming out of isolation has also been emotionally difficult for many people after the pandemic. That painful process, which involves taking big risks, informed my approach to how Solitario copes with opening his heart up to others. Likewise, I didn't make it through the pandemic alone. I doubt most people did. My family helped me get through it. For Solitario, the same holds true. Through the gift of "found family," vital friendships and alliances, Solitario is able to journey back into the world and fulfill his purpose as a member of his community. The dichotomous combinations of vulnerability and toughness, fear and courage, loneliness and yearning, resentment and moral compass render Solitario Cisneros a compelling character.

CV: How much historical research did you have to do for the book? There was an impressive amount of historical nods in the storyline.

RR: Thank you! I conducted extensive historical research to bring authenticity to the historical context of the novel. It started with genealogical research that my father began years back before he passed away. Through the research he did, I came to learn more about the history of the border and the families that originally settled it in the late 1700's. Our own family was one of those, the Cisneros. Through that history, I learned about the family's original Spanish land grant, Caja Pinta, which is actually a historical fact within the storyline and also the fictional Solitario's birthplace. In wanting to branch out from La Frontera, the mythical border town I created in The Resurrection of Fulgencio Ramirez, I imagined that Solitario would have wanted to flee the curse afflicting the men of his family. This leads him to join the Rurales, a paramilitary force that was part of the Mexican government and played a key role in fighting the French Imperialist invasion. And, eventually, Solitario ends up in Chihuahua and West Texas, in another mythical border town I created called Olvido. In fleshing out the details of those phases of Solitario's life, I learned a great deal about the history of Mexico and of West Texas, including the historic tragedy of the Porvenir Massacre of 1918 and the role of the Mescalero Apache people in defining the region. It was very eye-opening to do the historical research because I did not learn any of these facts in classrooms growing up. Unfortunately, the way most history text books have been written the perspectives of Mexican-Americans and Indigenous People have been largely omitted. This is one reason I'm excited to share this novel with the public. I see Valley of Shadows as a contribution towards reclaiming our rightful place in American history, redefining the Western genre, and adapting Southern Gothic to the Southwest and border regions.

CV: Any advice to readers looking to tap into their ancestral empowerment to break down oppressive borders, just like the ones you explored in your book? A lot of our community at LatinxinPub are also writers — any words of advice to those looking to take inspiration from their family’s stories and incorporate them into a book, much like you did with Valley of Shadows?

RR: Listen to your abuelitos and abuelitas, your mamá and papá. They harbor a world of wisdom and knowledge. Their stories – whether heartbreaking or funny, spiritual or painfully real, nostalgic or aspirational – are filled with a special magic that is embedded in our culture and DNA. When we retell those stories, use them as jumping out points, flesh them out with historical context, we can find ourselves inspired, either to overcome personal and professional obstacles, advocate for social justice, or engage in new ways with our own families and communities. When we understand our histories and we can process the traumas that might have been passed down through the generations, we can better face these issues and also begin to heal as individuals and families. And, if you're a writer or an artist, you might find yourself with a life-changing project on your hands that is both enlightening and empowering.

Valley of Shadows brilliantly blends magical realism, western, and horror genres into a page-turning Rio Grande Valley epic — a haunting frontera tale, perfect for folks looking for their next thrilling read.

—Chelsea Villareal

---

Rudy Ruiz is a writer of literary fiction, essays and political commentary. His earliest works were published at Harvard, where he studied literature and creative writing, and was awarded a Ford Foundation grant to support his writing endeavors.

Seven for the Revolution was Ruiz’s fiction debut. The collection of short stories won four International Latino Book Awards.

Ruiz’s short fiction has appeared in literary journals including BorderSenses, The Ninth Letter, New Texas, and the Notre Dame Review. In 2017, Rudy Ruiz was awarded the Gulf Coast Prize in Fiction. In 2020, Ruiz was a finalist for both the Texas Institute of Letters’ Best Short Story Award as well as the Texas Observer’s annual Short Story Contest.

In 2020, Blackstone Publishing released Ruiz’s novel, The Resurrection of Fulgencio Ramirez. The novel received critical acclaim and was named one of the “Top 10 Best First Novels of 2020” by the American Library Association’s Booklist. The Southern Review of Books stated: “Ruiz’s prose is buoyant and immersive…Its effusive descriptions are reminiscent of Laura Esquivel.” The novel was longlisted for the Reading the West Award and a Finalist for the Western Writers of America Silver Spur Award for Best Contemporary Novel. It also was awarded two Gold Medals at the International Latino Book Awards, including the Rudolfo Anaya Prize for Best Latino Focused Fiction and Best Audio Book.

Follow Rudy Ruiz online: Website: RudyRuiz.com | Twitter: @Rudy_Ruiz_7

Chelsea P. Villareal (she/her) is a Queer Mexican American media strategist from PDX. She holds a BUPA in Political Science & Media Studies from Portland State University and recently completed her Master’s in Communication & Education at Columbia University. Her passions focus on participatory cultures, civic imagination, speculative storytelling, and intersectional Latinx identity representation — across all media. She proudly works on the marketing team at Schell Games and at We Need Diverse Books as their Senior Program & Partnerships Manager.