14 New Books by Latinx Authors to Read for Latinx Heritage Month
Latinx Heritage Month is almost here! This is a special time to celebrate our contributions to world culture and this has never been more true in publishing
Photos: Zando Young Readers; Kokila; Knopf
Latinx Heritage Month is almost here! This is a special time to celebrate our contributions to world culture and this has never been more true in publishing. Despite the industry remaining white-dominated and racism and xenophobia being a regular occurrence BIPOC writers face, the Latinx community is still making our stories and voices heard across the country. But it’s still important to support every Latinx book release across genres. In the past few months, there have been powerful new books published by Latinx authors telling stories about la cultura and comunidad while also centering Latinx characters. This is by no means an exhaustive list but a starting place as you curate your reading list for Latinx Heritage Month. We’ve rounded up new releases in poetry, adult fiction, children’s fiction, and nonfiction, so there should be something for everyone! Read on to learn more about 14 new books by Latinx authors to add to your TBR list in honor of Latinx Heritage Month.
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Silver Nitrate by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
Photo: Del Rey
Release Date: July 18, 2023
Silvia Moreno-Garcia, the author of beloved books The Daughter of Doctor Moreau and Mexican Gothic, returns with yet another thriller, Silver Nitrate. Taking place in the ’90s, the novel follows Montserrat, a sound editor employed by Mexico City’s film industry, who’s overlooked even by her best friend Tristán, a struggling soap opera star she’s been in love with for years. When he finds out film director Abel Urueta is his new neighbor, the pair are drawn into a mysterious world of ghosts, sorcerers, cult horror, Nazi occultism, and a cursed film that may just cost them more than they bargained for.
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Vanishing Maps by Cristina García
Photo: Knopf
Release Date: July 18, 2023
Cristina García is best known for her novel Dreaming in Cuban and is returning with its sequel Vanishing Maps, set 20 years after the original. The story follows four generations of the del Pino family: Celia, the matriarch who watches her descendants settle across the globe and struggle with their transnational identities; Ivanito, a drag queen in Berlin who is haunted by the ghost of his mother; Pilar, a sculptor and single mother in Los Angeles; Irina, the successful owner of a lingerie company in Moscow who feels deep loneliness and grief; and Celia, who prepares to reunite with her lover Gustavo in Havana. Estranged from their Cuban roots, the family nonetheless feels the pull to their island and, over the course of a year, each must reconcile with their pasts as they all prepare to reunite in Berlin.
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Family Lore by Elizabeth Acevedo
Photo: Ecco
Release Date: August 1, 2023
Family Lore is Elizabeth Acevedo‘s first adult fiction novel, known for her YA books including the novel-in-verse The Poet X and Clap When You Land. In this debut, we follow Flor Marte, the daughter of a Dominican American family who has the gift of predicting the day when someone will die. When she invites the family for a living wake to celebrate her life, no one, not even her sisters, knows what it means. Over the course of the three days before the wake, secrets are revealed, pasts remembered, and histories relived of all the lives of the Marte women spanning decades, generations, cities, and borders. This is a stunning, unforgettable portrait of a family across two countries.
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Las Madres by Esmeralda Santiago
Photo: Knopf
Release Date: August 1, 2023
Esmeralda Santiago rose to fame with her 1993 memoir When I Was Puerto Rican and now she’s once again telling the story of Puerto Rican women. Las Madres follows a group of women (las madres and las hijas) over the span of decades in both New York and Puerto Rico. We initially meet 15-year-old Luz, the only Black girl in her dance academy in Puerto Rico in 1975, who suffers a tragic loss after an accident that leaves her with a life-long brain injury. As she must navigate her new life with cognitive impairment and memory loss, she meets Ada and Shirley who become her life-long friends. Fast forward to 2017 in the Bronx and Luz’s adult daughter Marysol along with Ada and Shirley’s daughter Graciela come together to plan a trip to Puerto Rico to help them all connect/reconnect with their beloved isla. As they find themselves in the midst of Hurricane Maria, their own storm brews when family secrets are revealed.
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Still Born by Guadalupe Nettel
Photo: Bloomsbury Publishing
Release Date: August 8, 2023
Still Born by Guadalupe Nettel follows Alina and Laura, two independent and career-driven women in their 30s without the prospect of starting a family anytime soon. After Laura confesses to her friend that she had her tubes tied, Alina shares a secret of her own: that she’s preparing to have a child. They weather the storm of Alina’s pregnancy together and Laura soon becomes attached to her neighbor’s son. As their lives begin to change, they must face the complexity of their decisions, as well as their feelings, needs, and needs of the people who love them. Exploring motherhood, friendship, and community, this is a powerful read about the interior lives of women. Upon its publication, the book was shortlisted for the 2023 International Booker Prize.
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Daughters of Latin America: An International Anthology of Writing by Latine Women edited by Sandra Guzmán
Photo: Amistad
Release Date: August 15, 2023
Daughters of Latin America is an anthology of poems and prose from 140 Latine, Black, and Indigenous writers, poets, leaders, shamas, scholars, and activists from all over the world. Spanning time, genres, and place, the book is divided into 13 parts and themes to represent the 13 Mayan Moons and offer space for poems, lyric essays, plays, speeches, chants, and more. Contributors include historical icons and award-winners like Audre Lorde and Edwide Danticat, as well as beloved contemporary writers today like Elizabeth Acevedo, Ada Limón, Julia Alvarez, Angie Cruz, Naima Coster, U.S. Representative Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez. This isn’t just a collection of writings; it’s an ode to those elders who came before and the new voices on the rise and it’s edited by former Latina editor Sandra Guzmán.
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Vampires of El Norte by Isabel Cañas
Photo: Berkley
Release Date: August 15, 2023
If you liked Isabel Cañas’s The Hacienda, you’ll love her newest supernatural Western novel, Vampires of El Norte. The story follows Nena, a curandera and the daughter of a rancher in 1840s Mexico whose home becomes a battlefield between vampires and vaqueros. When the U.S. attacks Mexico, the war abruptly brings together Nena and Néstor, her childhood sweetheart who she thought died in a vampire attack nine years prior. But they will have to put aside the anger, confusion, and grief stewing between them if they hope to protect their country from two kinds of monsters.
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Plantains and Our Becoming by Melania Luisa Marte
Photo: Tiny Reparations Books
Release Date: August 22, 2023
Plantains and Our Becoming by Dominican American poet and musician Melania Luis Marte is a poetry collection that seeks to center the Black diaspora, specifically from the Dominican Republic and Haiti, within the identity of Latinidad. Throughout the book, she explores nationalism, colonialism, displacement, trauma, stereotypes, ancestors, and the beauty of Black personhood—all while celebrating her identity and where she comes from, and encouraging her readers to do the same.
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The Queen of the Valley by Lorena Hughes
Photo: Kensington
Release Date: August 22, 2023
Set in 1925 Colombia, Queen of the Valley by Lorena Hughes follows three strangers as they search for Martin Sabatar, a reckless and daring owner of a cacao plantation in Valle del Cauca who disappears on the night of a gala and is never seen again. As his hacienda turns into a Catholic hospital to heal victims of an emerging epidemic, it’s up to novice nun “Sor Puri,” professional photographer and Martin’s best friend Lucas Ferreira, and head nurse and Martin’s love Sor Camila to discover the truth behind his sudden disappearance. But each person carries their own secrets, lies, and hidden histories with Martin, as well as their own destinies, dreams, and passions.
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A Tall Dark Trouble by Vanessa Montalban
Photo: Zando Young Readers
Release Date: August 29, 2023
A Tall Dark Trouble by Vanessa Montalban is a young adult novel that tells the story of Cuban American twins Delfi and Lela who are haunted by a family curse that sabotages any chance of romance. When they begin receiving premonitions of a killer with a vendetta against brujas, they go against their mother’s wishes and embrace their magic powers. Along the way, readers learn about their ancestor Anita de Armas in 1980s Cuba who appeals to the spirits to free the victims of her mother’s cult, get rid of her power to speak to the dead, and change the fate of her home country. Spanning time and place, this is a fascinating look at three women battling with power, love, magic, and liberation.
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Barely Floating by Lilliam Rivera
Photo: Kokila
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Creep: Accusations and Confessions by Myriam Gurba
Photo: Avid Reader Press
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She Persisted: Pura Belpré by Meg Medina and Marilisa Jiménez García
Photo: Philomel Books
Release Date: September 5, 2023
She Persisted: Pura Belpré by Meg Medina and Marilisa Jiménez García is a chapter book about the life of Pure Belpré, a Puerto Rican woman who had the chance to work at the New York Public Library. Throughout her life, she brought Spanish and bilingual storytelling and books to her New York community and across the country. She even wrote books of her own and gave much-needed representation to Spanish and multilingual speakers in groundbreaking ways that are still felt today. The book also includes black-and-white illustrations and strategies to help young readers carve their own paths to make a difference.
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Candelaria by Melissa Lozada-Oliva
Photo: Astra House
Release Date: September 19, 2023
If you enjoyed Melissa Lozada-Oliva’s Selena-themed novel-in-verse Dreaming of You, you’ll be sure to love Candelaria. Her debut novel follows three generations of Guatemalan women and the descendants of their ancestor Candelaria: Bianca, the archeologist who is forced to give up her life’s work after her advisor seduces and deserts her; Paola, who resurfaces in Boston as a wellness cultist after being gone for over a decade; and Candy, a recovering addict who suddenly finds herself pregnant. When a cataclysmic earthquake hits Boston, Candelaria must travel to reach the Watertown Mall Old Country Buffet to battle storage entities and her own past to save her granddaughters. Exploring family, legacy, destiny, identity politics, bodily autonomy, and belonging, Candelaria is ultimately a story of love and grace.
