It’s July! The month offers plenty of intriguing books to keep you cool during the hot summer days:
• Just released: Choke by Diana López, editor of the Huizache literary magazine, features middle school students caught in a dangerous choking game so they can become “breath sisters.” The Boy Kings of Texas: A Memoir by Domingo Martinez examines the author’s childhood in the Rio Grande Valley. In the novel The Frost on His Shoulders by Spanish author Lorenzo Mediano, a teacher in 1930s looks back on a romance that ripped a small town in the Pyrenees Mountains.
• July 10: Spanish author Carlos Ruiz Zafón’s The Prisoner of Heaven, the third in his Cemetery of Forgotten Books series, follows a newlywed couple who must go back in time to 1940s Barcelona to uncover a terrible secret.
• July 17: Joy Castro’s Hell or High Water features newspaper reporter Nola Céspedes investigating the world of violent predators in post-Hurricane Katrina New Orleans. Gwedolyn Zepeda writes about single mother facing a family crisis in Better with You Here.
Awards:
• Héctor Tobar’s The Barbarian Nurseries won the California Book Award in the Fiction category.
• Winners in the ForeWord Book of the Year, which honor independently published books, include Sergio Troncoso’s From This Wicked Patch of Dust, honorable mention, Multicultural Adult Fiction category, and Crossing Borders: Personal Essays, bronze, Essays; Lyn DiIorio’s Outside the Bones, second place, Literary Fiction; Blas Falconer and Lorraine M. López, editors of The Other Latin@, honorable mention, Adult Non-Fiction Anthologies; and Emerita Romero-Anderson, Milagro of the Spanish Bean Pot, Bronze, Juvenile Fiction.
Other news:
• The Guardian profiled Nobel Prize winner Mario Vargas Llosa, right, whose newest book is The Dream of the Celt.
• Gabriel García Marquez, 85, is reportedly suffering from dementia, according to this Huffington Post article.
• A film version of the late Carlos Fuentes’ The Death of Artemio Cruz is in the works, reports the Word and Film website.
• César Chávez’s The Words of César Chávez is the lone book by a Hispanic to make the Library of Congress exhibit, The Books That Shaped America.
• Here’s a video of Junot Díaz talking about his new book, This Is How You Lose Her, at last month’s Book Expo America. He also discussed the role of race in his writings to The Boston Review.
• Luis Alberto Urrea talked about immigration to NPR’s Talk of the Nation.
• Woo hoo! Sandra Cisneros has a new book – Have You Seen Marie? – coming out Oct. 2.
The Hispanic Reader 
Reblogged this on Vamos A Leer and commented:
Check out this recent post from The Hispanic Reader with information about some great new books–including ones for young adults!
I am a Puerto Rican author whose newest book, Traveler’s Rest, has just been released by Savant Books and Publications, an independent, royalty-based press based out of Hawaii. The book is primarily concerned with the identity crisis that the children of Puerto Rican immigrants experience. Below is the book description:
“From the political turmoil of 1920s Puerto Rico to the aftermath of a devastating hurricane in 2005, Traveler’s Rest provides a kaleidoscopic look at a family that has lost its identity and torn itself apart. The ghosts of the past and the horrors of the present follow Tony, a recovering heroin addict, as he seeks to reclaim his family’s legacy and set his own path in an increasingly chaotic world.”
Also, here is the link to my blog, where I have discussed the book at length:
http://newerawriters.blogspot.com/2012/05/travelers-rest-due-out-this-summer-by.html
Here is a link to the book’s first chapter, also featured on my blog:
http://newerawriters.blogspot.com/2012/05/travelers-rest-first-chapter-sneak-peek.html
The book is available on amazon.com at: http://www.amazon.com/Travelers-Rest-Jonathan-Marcantoni/dp/0985250615/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1341112675&sr=8-1&keywords=traveler%27s+rest+marcantoni
I am a Puerto Rican author whose newest book, Traveler’s Rest, has just been released by Savant Books and Publications, an independent, royalty-based press based out of Hawaii. The book is primarily concerned with the identity crisis that the children of Puerto Rican immigrants experience. Below is the book description:
“From the political turmoil of 1920s Puerto Rico to the aftermath of a devastating hurricane in 2005, Traveler’s Rest provides a kaleidoscopic look at a family that has lost its identity and torn itself apart. The ghosts of the past and the horrors of the present follow Tony, a recovering heroin addict, as he seeks to reclaim his family’s legacy and set his own path in an increasingly chaotic world.”
Also, here is the link to my blog, where I have discussed the book at length:
http://newerawriters.blogspot.com/2012/05/travelers-rest-due-out-this-summer-by.html
Here is a link to the book’s first chapter, also featured on my blog:
http://newerawriters.blogspot.com/2012/05/travelers-rest-first-chapter-sneak-peek.html
The book is available on amazon.com at: http://www.amazon.com/Travelers-Rest-Jonathan-Marcantoni/dp/0985250615/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1341112675&sr=8-1&keywords=traveler%27s+rest+marcantoni
I’m so glad that Sandra CIsneros’ new book is coming out and that you linked to it-was able to be the first to hit ‘like.’
A few months ago I heard her read an excerpt from this book and was touched by it’s lyrical and touching prose.
I always love this link roundups of yours. I hadn’t hear about The Boy Kings of Texas, but I’ll definitely be seeking it out since Martinez is also from the RGV. I also didn’t know about a new Gwendolyn Zepeda book! 🙂
Thanks! The new Zepeda book is awesome. I’ll post my review on Wednesday.