Editorial Note: The works selected for this piece represent the columnist’s choices from her own reading experiences. 

Happy Hispanic American Heritage Month! Each year, a month-long period spread between September and October marks the beginning of the United States’ month-long celebration of the contributions, history, and culture of Hispanic Americans across the centuries for Hispanic Heritage Month. This date holds a special significance, as it marks the independence of Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua. In honor of this celebratory month, here’s a list of books, new and old, by Hispanic American authors from all over the country. Packed with everything from folktales about mythical curses and coming of age stories about boisterous quinceaneras to bitingly honest stories about fractured idealism, these books are ripe with history, imagination, and culture.

Please note that not all of the books on this list may be appropriate for every age group. Books that contain mature themes that may be best suited towards high school readers will be denoted with an asterisk (*) next to the title.

	The Book of Unknown Americans (2014)* In The Book of Unknown Americans, Cristina Henriquez tells the story of the Riveras, a Mexican-American family pursuing the American dream in a Hispanic-American community in Delaware. In the wake of their daughter Maribel’s near-fatal brain injury, the Rivera’s move to Delaware offers the chance at recovery, community, and opportunity that they crave. However, even as young love begins to blossom between Maribel and the son of a Panamanian immigrant next door, the shadow of language barriers, prejudice, and unspeakable violence looms over the Riveras’ lives. Throughout the story, Cristina Henriquez examines the nature of familial love, idealism, and desperation in this gut-wrenching story about immigration and love.
	Esperanza Rising (2000) In her Pura Belpre Award-winning middle grade novel, Pam Muñoz Ryan tells the story of twelve-year-old Esperanza growing up at the height of the Great Depression. After her father is tragically killed, Esperanza is forced to leave her comfortable life on her family’s ranch in Mexico and move to a migrant labor camp in America with her ailing mother. Leaving behind her beloved Abuelita and the only life she’s ever known, Esperanza must navigate this new world filled with financial hardship, difficult labor, sickness, and prejudice. However, despite the grief and poverty Esperanza struggles to come to terms with, through love, friendship, and hard work, she and her mother begin to build a life in Los Angeles. Pam Muñoz Ryan interweaves themes of loss, hope, and community throughout this story about resilience and family love during the Great Depression.
	Miss Quinces (2022) Kat Fajardo’s debut graphic novel, Miss Quinces, tells the story of Suyapa, a teenage girl who would do anything to avoid the puffy pink dresses and boisterous celebration of the quinceanera her mother has planned for her. Stuck in the Honduras countryside with no Internet, a rambunctious extended family, and her looming quinceanera, Sue can’t wait for the trip to end, so she can go to sleepaway camp with her best friends. In this colorful, comedic graphic novel, Kat Fajardo tells a hilarious, relatable coming-of-age story about navigating identity, multi-cultural heritage, and family as Sue untangles this emotional turning point in her life.
	All The Stars Denied (2018) In her historical fiction novel, All The Stars Denied, Guadelupe Garcia McCall tells the story of fifteen-year-old Estrella growing up in Dust Bowl-era Texas. When Estrella organizes a protest against the treatment of Hispanic-Americans in her little Texas border town, her entire family becomes a target of the scapegoat repatriation efforts of her local government. Despite years of legal American citizenship, Estrella and her family are forcibly deported to Mexico as part of the first mass deportation event in American history. With half her family across the border in the United States, Estrella struggles to find her footing in Mexico, caring for her baby brother and struggling mother. In this heartbreaking story about loss, prejudice, and deportation, McCall sheds light on the hidden history of the deportation of thousands of American citizens during the Great Depression.
	Aristotle and Dante Discover The Secrets of the Universe (2012)* In this award-winning, renowned YA novel, Benjamin Alire Sáenz tells the story of two teenage boys coming of age in late twentieth-century Texas. Despite growing up in the same community, Dante and Ari inhabit vastly different worlds. Dante is self-assured and artistic, devouring poetry and harboring high-reaching aspirations. Ari, in comparison, is awkward and self-conscious, haunted by a longing to understand his distant older brother in prison on murder charges. As the two navigate their high school years in vastly different environments, they form a fast friendship that steadily blossoms into young love. In this deceptively simple story, Sáenz weaves a timeless narrative about identity, culture, belonging, and all the complexities and contradictions of growing up.
	Invisible (2022) Christina Diaz Gonzales and Gabriella Epstein’s Invisible tells the story of five kids forced into a community service group for their school. Grouped together by their principal because they all speak Spanish, the five have little in common besides their home language. Each preoccupied with their own complicated home lives, personal issues, and burgeoning identities, none of them have ever quite felt seen at home or in school. Nonetheless, as the year goes on, they begin to form a fast friendship centered around shared struggles, inside jokes, and a tentative understanding. When they discover a young girl and her mother in need of help, they channel their personal emotions towards strengthening their community and helping the greater good. Throughout the story, we are offered first-person glimpses into each characters’ lives, helping flesh out their emotions, motivations, and struggles as they navigate their newfound friendship and understanding of community service.
	Curse of the Night Witch (2021) Alex Aster’s Curse of the Night Witch tells the story of twelve-year-old Tor Luna, whose life changes forever the day he thrusts his wish into a bonfire and wishes for a power different from the one he inherited from his mother. When he wakes up the next day with skin marked by a curse, he’s forced to set off on a whirlwind adventure to find the legendary Night Witch and save his life. Alongside his friends Engle and Melda, Tor plunges into a magical world full of ancient Colombian folktales come to life. The story rockets through harrowing encounters with ancient demons, monsters, and legends immortalized in the Book of Cuentas.

	Deep Down Dark: The Untold Stories of 33 Men Buried In A Chilean Mine, And The Miracle That Set Them Free (2014) In Deep Down Dark, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Hector Tobar dives deep into the lives of thirty-three men tragically trapped in a collapsed mine. In August of 2010, the San Jose mine suddenly collapsed, burying thirty-three men inside. Despite a desperate international rescue effort, it would be well over two months before the men would be set free from the mines. In Deep Down Dark, Hector Tobar sits down with the men themselves to finally tell the story of those harrowing sixty-nine days buried alive. These stories offer a glimpse into the teamwork, resilience, and physical strength that helped them survive hundreds of feet beneath the ground for nearly seventy days.
	When I Was Puerto Rican (1993) In her acclaimed coming-of-age memoir, Esmeralda Santiago tells the chaotic story of her whirlwind childhood as the oldest of eleven siblings. When Santiago’s mother finally builds up the courage to leave her womanizing husband, the family is forced to move across the country to New York. Santiago tells her story of clashing cultures and an unstable family life with wit, humor, and relatability. Her storytelling is vivid and sharp, painting a picture of a tumultuous yet full childhood filled with conflicting emotions, shifting family dynamics, and intense cultural pride.
	The Distance Between Us (2012)* Reyna Grande’s memoir, The Distance Between Us, tells the story of Grande’s tumultuous childhood growing up as an illegal immigrant. Abandoned first by her abusive father, who struggled with violent alcoholism, and then again by her beloved mother, Grande’s memoir details the pain of childhood abandonment. Though she and her siblings lived much of their lives with their loving maternal grandmother, Grande’s longing for her parents defined her unstable childhood in Mexico. When a reunion finally comes, Grande and her siblings are thrust back into an abusive household with their remarried father. Throughout her heartbreaking memoir, Grande sheds light on the impact of family separation, illegal immigration, and abuse as she struggles to maintain a relationship with her parents and her home country as she seeks a better future than the one offered by her rocky childhood.