These themes will vary! It could be based off of some book mail I just received, pop culture, something personal to me, a headline from the news, a trend I noticed when I was buying books for my library system, etc. I hope you stick around to see all the themes and book recs I come up with!
Today’s Theme: <Quince> Dress the Part!
So I’m not Latinx, but as it’s Latinx Heritage Month, I wanted to shine light on some books that not only highlight Latiné characters and authors, but also a part of their culture as well. I know about this part of Latiné culture because I had teens tell me about theirs and ask for books all the time at one of the branches I was at. Sometimes it was because they had one and they wanted to relive it or because they couldn’t afford one and they want to live it through the book. Both very valid reasons. So for today, I wanted to shine some light on Quinceañeras and how they’re changing now in modern day.
In this one, the main character wants to become a Fairy Godmother. Basically someone who plans events for people. She ends up planning “Very Merry Un-Quince” for a big name influencer. But she’s keeping secrets on what that means for her, like the internship she lied about having and using her Un-Quince to get the internship…. It sucked because she was so good at planning and it seemed like it was going to be so cool! But that’s what happens when you keep secrets from people. (This book looks like a rom com, but it does deal with grief and death of a parent)
In this one, the Queerceañera is basically a huge coming out party. That the MC actually didn’t want lol But his family wanted to show that he is loved and supported, so they came up with the idea to show him in this way. But when the question of who will be his chambelán comes up, he wishes it hadn’t. Until his mom’s godson becomes part of the equation. He quickly comes up with a scheme that he will be his chambelán and it seems everyone is happy. But then, their fake dating scheme gets bigger than they expected and things start to get real…..
Again, I am not Latiné, so to find out more about quinceañeras, please look at more information here. I also interviewed a coworker in 2022 about her Quince because we noticed there was a trend of books with Quinces in them then too. So please enjoy this interview (unedited version, we lost the completed one) and more books that feature quinces in some way!
Well, there you go! Here I’m just going to talk about why I grouped these two books together. I hope you enjoyed a look at this small part of the books. For a full synopsis of the book or to add it to your TBR, click the picture and it will take you to their Storygraph. The link on the caption will take you to it’s Goodreads.
What about you? Have you heard about this tradition before? Did you have one? Do you like how they’re changing? Have you read any of these books? Let me know in the comments!