GOOD MORNING AMERICA BUZZ PICK - The Pulitzer Prize-winning
playwright and co-writer of In the Heights tells her lyrical story of
coming of age against the backdrop of an ailing Philadelphia barrio,
with her sprawling Puerto Rican family as a collective muse.
"Quiara Alegría Hudes is in her own league. Her sentences will take
your breath away. How lucky we are to have her telling our
stories."--Lin-Manuel Miranda, award-winning creator of Hamilton and
In the Heights
ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: NPR, New York Public Library,
BookPage, BookRiot
Quiara Alegría Hudes was the sharp-eyed girl on the stairs while her
family danced their defiance in a tight North Philly kitchen. She was
awed by her mother and aunts and cousins, but haunted by the unspoken,
untold stories of the barrio--even as she tried to find her own voice in
the sea of language around her, written and spoken, English and Spanish,
bodies and books, Western art and sacred altars. Her family became her
private pantheon, a gathering circle of powerful orisha-like women with
tragic real-world wounds, and she vowed to tell their stories--but first
she'd have to get off the stairs and join the dance. She'd have to find
her language.
Weaving together Hudes's love of music with the songs of her family, the
lessons of North Philly with those of Yale, this is a multimythic dive
into home, memory, and belonging--narrated by an obsessed girl who
fought to become an artist so she could capture the world she loved in
all its wild and delicate beauty.
LONGLISTED FOR THE ANDREW CARNEGIE MEDAL
