In honor of Latinx and Hispanic Heritage Month, we asked the authors of five books for young readers about highlighting different aspects of their culture and history.
Pablo Leon
This is your solo debut for children. What made you decide to write a graphic novel inspired by historical events?
It was a little different than the usual work I do for middle grade comics and TV animation, but I’ve been carrying this one with me for a while. The initial spark came when I arrived in the United States, and I realized that not many people were even aware of the civil war that had occurred in Guatemala, which had lasted for almost 36 years, and the significant role this country had played in it. I think it’s important to preserve our historical memory of these events, to honor and remember those who were lost and those who were never found, confronting our past so we can be better for future generations.
I didn’t want to shy away from the horrors of war and what it does to the survivors, but I also didn’t want to visually shock anyone or fall into a place where the violence felt glorified; it was essential to find a good middle ground. Ultimately, I decided to follow the tales of survivors and the generational fallout, as well as how we confront the silences of the past. I went back and forth on how to best approach this, but the graphic novel format was always the top choice. Being able to depict places, feelings, and memories in such powerful ways was essential. And of course, it provides anonymity to protect someone’s identity. I believe a graphic novel is a good way to introduce or ease people into topics like these, allowing them to research more on their own time.
How did you conduct research for this project and how did you integrate it into the story?
This is a fictional story based on actual events. Much of it is based on reports, documents, and witnesses’ accounts, as well as my investigation and some of my childhood memories from living in Guatemala during the tail end of the armed conflict. There’s a large Central American community in Maryland, where I spent a lot of my teens and 20s, so I began approaching people to talk about their experiences during the war. One of the biggest sources was “Guatemala: Never Again (Nunca Mas)” [an official report by the Recovery of Historical Memory Project of the Catholic Church’s Archdiocese of Guatemala], which went over survivors’ and witness’ accounts, and detailed a lot of the atrocities committed throughout the conflict, especially in the ’80s, one of the most violent decades.
Sometime during this research, the generational angle was added. While less research-heavy, I was able to talk to a lot of first- and second-generation children of migrants, which was particularly eye-opening. The feelings of being denied, or being unaware of the pain their parents faced, not knowing what could stir up painful memories, was an interesting part that I threaded into the characters of Jose and Charlie—specifically the frustration that many feel as they try to educate themselves about their family’s country and history of conflict.
Why was it important to showcase the impact of the civil war via a multigenerational story?
I was initially hesitant and afraid about stirring up the past and bringing up all those traumatic memories that so many have tried to leave behind. But back in Guatemala, the war is barely taught in public schools. Outside of the country, there are a lot of second-, third-, and fourth-generation people who aren’t aware of the history of their parents’ or grandparents’ country, or that one of the root causes of today’s problems with Central American mass migrations can be directly connected to the decades-long U.S. interventions in Central American affairs. It’s painful but necessary that we don’t forget our histories.
Silenced Voices: Reclaiming Memories from the Guatemalan Genocide by Pablo Leon. HarperAlley, Sept. 2 $26.99; ISBN 978-0-06-322356-1
Yuyi Morales
How do you define a rebel, and why did you want to center that term for this book?
To me, a rebel is both brave and caring. The more that I explore what a rebel is, the more I see rebels summoning their courage to expand our vision of the world to care for more than just ourselves. Of course, I don’t have the only voice on the meaning of the word “rebel,” and for Little Rebels, I was inspired by movements and collectives of young people I encountered here in Mexico during the Covid pandemic. With these movements and collectives, I learned how to harness creative energy to make art that heals, and how to come together to defend the nature and life that make up our environment. We can only protect ourselves and our world from pillaging and destruction if we practice respect, care, and affection for one another. When I started working on Little Rebels, I wanted to pour into the book all of the joy I felt from my bonds with people who were exploring tender, diverse, and rebellious ways of living.
How did you want to showcase the friendship between the little rebels of this story?
While the friendship between the little rebels guides their adventures, it was important to me that their values existed outside of the context of their friendship. These rebels celebrate each other as they are, they cooperate without competing, and they share their hopes and actions. With Little Rebels, I explore the notion that care, respect, and safety are not only to be given to people we know. Can we imagine giving the same care, respect, and safety to people we don’t have a bond with? Little rebels do, because they are learning to refuse the individualistic practice of only caring for those who look, think, or act the same as us.
What do you hope readers take away from this story?
I began making Little Rebels because I wanted to explore what young people and children hear, see, and experience in a world where immigrants are persecuted, nature is exploited for economic gain, walls are built to keep certain groups of people away, and lands are stolen. In this world that children experience, both lagoons and humans can disappear. If, as adults, we feel tiny in the face of these issues, where can children find hope?
I do not offer an answer for how to change the world, but by writing the story of Little Rebels, I hope that readers will recognize that they can change their worlds through little, but brave and caring actions. I want readers to feel inspired to find their own rebellious ways to create change. Change can be poetry, the invention of weird-iful words, the creation of safe paths for the people and creatures in our lives, or change can come in the form of actions that make our hopes and wishes a reality. As more and more little rebels find each other, our strength will show.
I wish upon a flying tooth that the world can become more like the caring and joyful place all little rebels deserve.
Little Rebels by Yuyi Morales. Holiday House/Porter, Sept. 2 $18.99; ISBN 978-0-8234-4754-1
Victor Piñeiro
Where did the idea for this story come from?
At its core, this book is a memoir. I was born in Puerto Rico and moved to the U.S. a few years later, but I spent every childhood summer on the island. I wanted to channel everything those summers meant to me into this book: from my unforgettable Abuelas, to the epic adventures with my cousins in our small town of Quebradillas, to the kaleidoscopic magic of Viejo San Juan. But I also wanted to convey the realization that dawned on me as I came of age—that my summertime playground paradise wasn’t all coquis and rainbows. Puerto Rico has a complicated history and there’s a lot of pain behind the music and the dancing. Our island has been through a lot, especially in the past decade, and I wanted to shed some light on it.
Of course, this book is also a horror-tinged fantasy adventure full of Puerto Rico’s Taíno gods and the island’s most famous monster. That all came partway through writing the first draft, born of the frustration I felt while researching a separate project.
What made you want to blend different aspects of culture, such as the ancient Taínos and the chupacabra, for this tale?
In digging into Taíno (Indigenous Puerto Rican) mythology for my first series, Time Villains, I was shocked by the complete lack of consistent information about our gods and beliefs online. Some mythologies have libraries of books written on them, but Taíno myths have almost none. Why? It turns out there’s only one lengthy account of Taínos’ religious beliefs and culture, written before the native Boricuas were mostly terminated by the Spanish colonizers. On Columbus’s second voyage, he brought along a young friar who learned the Taínos’ language and beliefs to better evangelize to them. What remains is a bad Italian translation of a transcription of his original notes. In other words, it’s a very diluted, extremely biased glimpse into a rich culture that’s otherwise mostly forgotten.
But the little we have is still fascinating, and worth preserving. I immediately began infusing my memoir with our island’s forgotten gods. My new mission was to take some of the most powerful elements of the Taíno pantheon and creation myth, reinvigorate them by weaving them into a contemporary adventure story, and tie them in with the only Puerto Rican myth frequently associated with our island: El Chupacabra.
Why did you want to highlight the lore of the chupacabra?
As I researched the chupacabra, I was struck by how significantly most of us misunderstand the cryptid. Many folks forget that the creature was first spotted in Puerto Rico in March 1995, and it wasn’t until early 1996 that sightings were reported in the rest of Latin America. It was also described very differently outside of Puerto Rico. Boricuas generally likened it to an alien or a gargoyle, while the rest of Latin America described it as dog-like: a myth that was busted a few years later when they realized that the non-Puerto-Rican “chupacabra” was just a dog suffering from mange. The creature also lurked in Puerto Rico far longer than most realize—and also more recently. A gargoyle-like monster named El Vampiro de Moca was spotted many times in the ’70s, two decades before the chupacabra, and another one—El Gárgola de Barceloneta—was spotted in 2018.
I also stumbled on a connection between the chupacabra and the Taíno myths that I haven’t seen mentioned anywhere else. Hundreds of years ago, the ancient Taínos believed that the first people on Earth—the ones who eventually became human—were bat-like creatures who couldn’t emerge into daylight. According to the Taínos, we were all originally gargoyles until the sun melted our wings.
Why has this creature lingered in Taínos’ collective unconscious for a thousand years? And did we get the chupacabra all wrong when it resurfaced more recently? What if it wasn’t actually a monster? What if it was the ancient ancestor of Puerto Ricans? What has it been trying to tell us all this time?
What do you hope this book teaches young readers?
I hope Nico’s struggles to produce his film inspire kids to pursue their creative vision in the face of adversity, and that Nico’s conquering of his phobia teaches young readers about resilience. But more than anything, I hope this book inspires kids to learn more about Puerto Rico’s rich culture.
The title of my book isn’t just about literal forgotten gods; it’s also about the threat of Puerto Rican culture being diminished. I wrote this book to raise awareness around the major issues the island has recently faced, in the hopes that it would move kids, their parents, and educators to action. Puerto Rico feels like it’s at an inflection point—our culture is more at risk than ever as Puerto Ricans leave the island in droves and billionaires are incentivized to settle into it. The best way to preserve our culture is to remind the world of its richness.
The Island of Forgotten Gods by Victor Piñeiro. Sourcebooks, Aug. 5 $8.99; ISBN 978-1-4642-3798-0
Alyssa Reynoso-Morris
How did this anthology come together?
I was actually approached by my editor, Hannah Dove, at Wide Eyed Editions. I had written a few biographies but had only sold fiction manuscripts. Hannah shared that she was looking for an own-voices author with picture book experience—the rationale being that the entries in Bold, Brilliant, and Latine should be “storified” and not too traditional/straight nonfiction. When Hannah came across my debut book, Plátanos Are Love, she felt my voice was perfect for this book. Hannah was also aware of my engagement in the Latine book community, between Las Musas, the Latinx KidLit Book Festival, and more.
How did you select the 52 figures highlighted and what did you find most interesting in your research?
I selected the 52 figures highlighted by doing a brain dump of all the Latine heroes who inspired me. Then I popped it into a spreadsheet. Next to their names, I wrote an adjective to determine how to categorize; for example, “sports legend,” or “Supreme Court Justice,” or “artist.” Then I color-coded the categories as I am a visual person. As I was writing down my list, I was mindful to have as much representation as I could because Latines are diverse. I made sure to include Indigenous, Black, LGBTQ, and disability representation.
I looked up their dates of birth and where they were from; for example, Mexico, the Dominican Republic, Peru, Colombia, and so on, because the Latine diaspora is from many countries. It was important for me that this book contained at least one figure from every country that considers itself part of the Latine diaspora. I am not going to lie; this was tricky. It is hard to know what countries are part of the Latine diaspora and which are not. For example, Brazil is in Latin America, but Brazilians do not speak Spanish, so some people do not consider Brazil part of the diaspora. The same goes for Haiti since Haitians speak Creole and not Spanish. [If you consider yourself part of the Latine diaspora and you feel I left you and your country out, I am so sorry in advance. Feel free to contact me via my website, as I am open to feedback and learning new things.
In truth, I found it interesting how little I knew about past heroes and legends; this was a blind spot for me, but these figures were also some of the most interesting to learn about. Another interesting observation was how hard it was to find figures pre-colonization. I was eager to showcase these unknown legends, but due to colonization, so much of this history was lost and/or strategically destroyed.
How do you hope this volume helps young readers?
I hope Bold, Brilliant, and Latine will help all young readers see themselves as heroes in the making. I hope they feel inspired by the legends in the book and aspire to be trailblazers for a better world. Personally, when I was a kid, I could not even name five Latine heroes because I was not taught about them in school. The only heroes I knew about were the Mirabal sisters because my Abuela told me about how they opposed Trujillo. I hope Bold, Brilliant, and Latine enables all young readers, especially Latine readers, to know that their ancestors were bold, brilliant, and resilient, and that they are and can be all of those things too.
Bold, Brilliant, Latine: Meet 52 Latine and Hispanic Heroes from Past and Present by Alyssa Reynoso-Morris, illus. by Sol Cotti. Quarto, Sept. 2 $24.99; ISBN 978-0-7112-9436-3
Laekan Zea Kemp
What started you thinking about the differentiation between a house and a home?
As a Cancer, I think a lot about the safety and comfort of my environment. I want walking into my home to feel like an embrace. Because we know what a home feels like when it’s full of love and we know what a home feels like when it isn’t. But we don’t learn to identify those things from staring at four walls. We learn what “home” means from people. For every single one of us, our first home was a person, and once we’re in the world, it makes sense that we’d want to recreate that love and safety in the external places we call home. But if you live long enough, you realize that houses come and go. The objects we use to fill those houses come and go too. But love is boundless and the love we feel for and find in others will always feel more like home than anything we could buy or build.
This picture book highlights multigenerational and multifamily households. Why was that important to you to depict?
I spent part of my childhood living in a multigenerational home and I think it’s such an abundant and joyous way to live. I wanted to write a story that honored that experience, while also highlighting some of the challenges. But ultimately, I wanted kids who live in similar circumstances to see all of the love and magic that can be found in those kinds of homes and the important role each person plays. Hopefully, that will also get them thinking about the important role they play in other communities and how we can work together to make those spaces just as loving.
What was it like collaborating with illustrator Magdalena Mora on this project? What did she bring to the story that you admire most?
I adore Magdalena’s work and even though we didn’t get to collaborate in depth on this project, as is typically the case when it comes to the picture book making process, being pleasantly surprised by an illustrator’s choices is always one of my favorite parts. In the case of Home Is a Heartbeat, the colors and details create this intense warmth that mimics that feeling of being home on a summer evening or a rainy afternoon, with the TV on low, maybe a radio humming softly in the corner, and mismatched lamps glowing in crowded corners. I think she really captured that feeling of a warm hug that we often get when coming home, regardless of how long we’ve been away. Hopefully, reading this book feels like a warm hug too.
Home Is a Heartbeat by Laekan Zea Kemp, illus. by Magdalena Mora. Little, Brown Sept. 9 $18.99; ISBN 978-0-7595-5685-0
