[Music] s to you Mommy please e good evening my name is David quick I'm the
adult services coordinator here at DC Public Library I'm so yay everybody yay um I
am so glad to welcome here tonight and kick off another event and series with Lupita aino
and our La community dad reads Series this is such a wonderful partnership we have with
Lupita and tonight another good friend of the library politics and Pros bookstore who
who are here tonight I'm not going to go on long I'm just going to say t
hank you to all of
you and the DC Public Library Foundation who support these events with uh speaker fees but
also copies of books to give away um including we have some copies of books from previous
lack community dad reads uh events so take a look at those if there's any there take one if
they're not come back another time see what's here um I'm gonna hand it off to Elizabeth
Rodriguez from politics and pro she's going to introduce leita tonight and uh say a little
few words on behalf of
the bookstore thank you everybody hey thank you hello and welcome to
the MLK Memorial Library we are so excited to present tonight's program in partnership
with dcpl my name is Elizabeth and I'm a politics and Pros book um book seller where
we now host inperson and virtual events along with partnered and supported events trips and
classes before we get started today I'd like you to please silence your cell phones so as
to not disrupt the event when we get time for the opening of the floor
to your questions
we'll be passing her on a handheld mic so please raise your hand and someone will bring
the mic over to you please be sure to speak clearly into the microphone so we can all catch
your questions in our recording of tonight's event following the Q&A the authors will be
reciting copies of their books so so if you have not purchased your copies you may do so
with one of our book sellers so now without further Ado I'm very excited to welcome U Melissa
Rivero celebrating the r
elease of Flores and miss paa and Janine Capo cruset
um say hello to my little friend Melissa Rivero is the author of The
Affairs of the Falcons which won the 2019 new American voices award and a 2020 International
Latino book award born in Lima Peru and raised in Brooklyn she is a graduate of NYU and Brooklyn
law school she still lives in Brooklyn New York City with her family today we also have Janine
Capo cruset um the author of four books including the novel make your home among strange
rs which
won the international Latino book award and was cited as best book of the Year by NBC Latino the
guardian and the Miami Herald her writing has appeared on PBS NewsHour national public radio
and in Publications such as the Atlantic konas traveler and others she's worked as a professor
of ethnic studies and of creative writing as a college access counselor for one for one voice
Scholars Program and as a sketch comedian although not all at the same time so Melissa Rivero and
Janine C
apo cruset will be joined in conversation with Lea quino please join me in welcoming
them for another conversation with Lon that reads hi can everybody hear me okay I feel
like this feels like a family reunion like I'm so appreciative of everybody that has come
back from the beginning when the series started last year thank you so much for being here I just
also want to thank dcpl the staff at dcpl I want to thank politics and Pros there is so much that
goes on behind the scenes to make stu
ff like this happen it's wild um so I just I'm I just want to
open with gratitude for you guys' time for the authors being here traveling to us and being here
it just means so much to have you here with us truly thank you thank you thank you um and we're
back I was like we're back um and I just feel like we're back and this is the best way to kick it
off um two books that I just phenomenally loved and I'm so excited to chat about them we're going
to do a quick little um reading from each au
thor and then we'll jump into just conversations and
then you guys are open to ask questions the big thing about this is I want it to just be like a
big reunion right you're asking questions you're thinking about the works and we're engaging with
these two artists and I'm just so grateful to have everyone here so let's start with you Janine
um just to Echo that gratitude thank you all for being here it's a Monday that's like I would
not be here on a m I mean I guess I am cuz I'm here right
now but um yeah so just thank you for
coming thanks to the library U thank you Lupita for thinking of us for the series and pairing
us I'm really excited about this evening um I'm just going to read Lup just asked us to read like
a little bit from the book so I'm going to read I already spoilers just forgot where I'm just going
to read a little thing that so the Quick Pitch for this book is that it's Scarface meets Moby Dick um
that's like a publicity thing it's a little more than that but
it's also um it's also that but I
those are two really weird things to try to mash up so I thought I would just read a little section
of the moment where our main character Izzy uh his name is Ismael which that's the M be deck part
right like call me Ishmael it's call me it's smile right um where he is seeing uh the whale for the
first time in his life and it's in a flashback so this is just a little part of that so he's been in
this stadium in front of this whale before but he doesn't reme
mber this he was seven just barely
off a raft and officially a first grader again this time in English a school year loss to the
ocean he was on a field trip customary to many Miami Dade County students he doesn't remember
but he walked around the park all day wishing for a sister he thought maybe he already had one
but that she'd been left behind in Cuba it could be true this seven-year-old reasoned another
mother same father something like this already at seven he knew how fractured a fam
ily could be
a sister would mean he had a father back there too someone he'd never known on or off the island
and of course maybe a new mother though he already thought of his tiesa as this Isel some chaperon
finally yells and he's back his face sticky with his sweat salt and the Seas this is the closest
he's been to the ocean since being pulled from it months earlier he is standing by a shallow pool
brimming with stingrays all circling in the same direction signs he can't yet read encourag
e him
to touch gently the other children are arms in up to their elbows but he'd taken one look at the
pool and thought pancakes then no thanks words he never thought he'd know go stick your hand
in the pool Isel the same chaperon yells he is still much better at Spanish than English and so
misunderstands her he steps to the pool's Edge to do as he thinks he's been told not wanting to get
in trouble his head just above its Rim then leans over the foot thick wall wiggling across it on his
b
elly obediently dipping in his head the chaperon of course stops this how many Miami kids would be
dead if not for some classmates's overtaxed parent during some field trip slapping your hand away
from a baby Gator's mouth or prying your fingers from a parrot's beak but not before the very tips
of his hair soak through with Ray water he thought my sister's down there as a way to make himself do
it somehow it felt more possible less devastating thinking sister instead of mother and now that
he's been stopped he feels the loss of both one imagined one real as something itching in his
bones the backs of his knees feel cold as his legs Bend and unbend he is flailing screaming the
chapon's arms around his waist pulling him away and away as she thinks what the [ __ ] is wrong
with this kid his mother's name Alina though he'd never known her as that until she was gone
what is this imagined sister's name if he could remember for her a name that would convince him
she was real what wa
s her name what was her name he heard someone near him scream it Lolita no that
wasn't it but again insisting Lolita Lolita a girl to his left with a streak of snot snailing
across her forearm has that forearm extended out the hand at the end of it pointing one of the
smarter girls she's in the advanced reading group on everything a girl who can be trusted whose
report card states she has leadership skills meaning maybe Lolita was it if this girl says so
at school snot or no snot she tended
to be right about things with the pointing she indicates a
whole looming structure Lolita's Stadium home to the killer whale and dolphin show the tank
in which they keep their captive Orca the first graders even the smart girl aren't aware that the
adults responsible for them have been hurting this them in this Direction all morning the plan is to
catch the early afternoon show and then unpack the bag lunches once a chaperon retrieves them from
the bus this poor chaperon missing missing th
at sorry missing Lolita's Grand Finale Splash to head
out to the parking lot Lolita is a sister only to a few in a pot of whales thousands of miles
away but this classmate saying Lolita's name as an answer to Izzy's unspoken question lodges
the name in his mind a literal spot in his brain that remained dark and unbothered until just over
a decade later when he peels off his sunglass es and the sun's glare flashes off Lolita's body
and stuns him and lights it back up I'll stop there uh and n
ow we're gonna have
you do a little reading willisa sound good can you hear me oh yes okay um I just want
to reiterate uh what Janine said we're so grateful to to have you all here with us tonight thank
you very much uh for coming so I'm just going to read uh the first couple of pages of FLOTUS
and Miss Paula the novel is about a mother and a daughter it's been three years since um the
father and husband who they loved very much has passed away and they uh need to kind of figure out
what t
hey're going to do now that they find out that they're lease is not going to get renewed
um Flores the daughter's chapters are told in first person um Miss Paula her mother's chapters
are told in second and I'm just going to read um from the first chapter which is told From flores's
perspective I find the note under my father's ear on the morning that marks what would have been
his 60th 63rd birthday it has been rolled like a scroll and flattened under the weight of the
wooden box that hous
es his ashes the paper is white and unlined its Corners sharp enough to
slice the skin on my hardened fingers the ink is black and faded but I recognize my mother's
elongated Loops descending towards the edge of the paper my stomach drops I reread the words
my thumb going over each one as I mouth them just to make sure my eyes got them right for
nearly 3 years my mother and I have tended to this Altar and my father's earn but this is the
first time I've seen this note my mother asking for f
orgiveness now when he is no longer here
it's almost appalling except that she's not one to recognize her failings she has never
once acknowledged when she's wronged me and I can only recall my father ever asking her for
forgiveness so what had she done that needed forgiving and did it really take death for her to
admit a wrong better late than never I guess but to do so here on this Sacred Space seems almost
sacrilegious when my father was alive my mother had devoted this shelf in the livi
ng room to La
Fatima her statute stood at the center a pirate cluster glittered at her feet my mother offered
her fresh flowers weekly and water in the wine glass daily sometimes she she burned Palos Santo
from Peru or candles affixed with images of Christ that she bought at seat Town occasionally she
held folded pieces of paper to her mouth and with her eyes shut tightly whisper to or even
kiss them before tucking them under the pyite cluster prayers and petitions I assumed spells
certain
ly confessions perhaps maybe even desires I always knew better than to look and never dare
to ask now my father's earn is the AL Center the items that were once at his bedside reside here
too his Rosary with its Silver Cross and red glass beads the Bell he rang to call us over when
his voice became small prayer cards for St Jude and Sarita Colonia his statute of San Martin and a
seashell he had brought home from a beach long ago his favorite picture however one of him my mother
and my grand
mother on a boat in yarin coocha is in my bedroom my mother superstitious as she is
is forbade the image of any living person on an altar especially her own over the last 3 years new
additions have appeared an amethyst has joined the pyite so has a glass rose I found at the Salvation
Army and which my mother insisted be kept in the hallway until she was able to cleanse it right
now there are the pink flowers which I bring my father regularly especially on important days
like today he favore
d peonies for their Rosy sense and fullness it is spring are in bloom for only a
little while longer this period the three months that stretched from his birthday to his death
day is the heaviest of the year my mother says it is because he comes around during this time
I say it is because the memories do these days I mostly tend to the altar wiping the area with
the mixture of my mother's AWA Florida and T in New York City water growing up she had filled our
Brooklyn apartment with its smel
l setting water in the glass jar and the fire escaped whenever
the full moon Rose waking up before the sun to make sure its light never touched it then she'd
stuffed the jar with orange and lemon peels clove sticks cloves sticks of cinnamon rummer vodka
whatever was cheaper and let it sit until the next full moon when she'd squeeze out the ochre
extract pour it into spray bottles and jars and use the Elixir to cleanse herself us our home
it's also what Ma used to wiped down this Altar and a
ll the bodies she cared for over the years
it's what I used on my father's body during the six weeks he was home from the hospital before
death called a kind of role reversal how often had he rubbed an egg on my body as a child
to take away susto or Malo but there was no escaping the Unseen force that lingered during his
final days when I cleaned the altar now I repeat the same ritual and prayer I whispered then a
version of what I had seen both my parents do whenever they needed a reset I
rubbed the mixture
behind my eyes to open them pressed my fingers on the bone beneath my eyes that I may always see
with Clarity and dab the spot between my nose and lips inhaling the Tang of orange peels and
cloves a reminder to breathe but I never touched my father's ear not until a moment ago when I
replaced the old the old doily it sits on with a new one my mother brought home from work it's
not un usual for my mother to leave notes under her crystals often with a distinct offering one
red rose sometimes she'll even include incense or a splash of wine too there's a note now visible
under the pyate once the Saints have done their work she takes the petition to the fire escape
where she Burns it and scatters The Remains the single red rose is discarded replaced with the
bouquet and all the colors imaginable but the petitions are always out in the open never hidden
like this one had I not wiped the space clean and moved the ear itself I might never have seen it I
read it ag
ain forgive me if I failed you remember that I always loved you what does she mean by
putting it under my father's remains how long has this not been here what is it she wants him
to forgive even in death I rolled the piece of paper back up and tuck it under the ear just
as I found it I wondered if she'll ever burn it so I feel like you all read from the perfect
parts of each of your novels only because when I think of your novels and I know that they Visibly
Even look so different right we
talked about this you were like they look so different but there
are so much there's themes in there that you guys share and that you approach writing in such
a unique way and we're going to get into it but I really want to start with just that Launchpad it
seems like you know you have Izzy and his journey as a failed pit buto impersonator and then you
have Paula and this note that she finds so I'm curious about the inspiration where did it where
did it come from for your novels where did
it start what was the the little seed of thought and
um we'll start with Janine yeah that's interesting I did notice that both books start with someone
finding a note or getting a piece of paper this starts with the impetus for the action of the
novel begins with is he receiving a cease and deis letter from Pitbull's legal team because
he's like an unauthorized pull impersonator and he mostly does it at like the mall um and then
he gets a letter he can't do that anymore so he decides okay t
ime to go for my real life plan
which is Tony Montana um but he tries to do it practically in Miami which leads to like there's
not like parking right so it's hard to do deals when you can't find a spot to put your car so
it's like a little bit of a comedy of errors and it's starts that way um I would say this the
it felt like until that scene materialized the one that I read um I didn't know how I really
just wanted to write about a whale um you know I think all writers have a Fascination
that we're
like oh this is just for me and I'm never going to share this with the world um and for me that was
this sort of like borderline obsession with this not whales in general but like Lolita the Orca
who was held captive in the miam aquarium um she died last October um but up until that point she
was the marine mamal and longest in captivity ever and I'd seen her as a child and always just sort
of was like up until the pandemic didn't really think a lot about what it would be like to
be so
isolated for so long when you're a creature or a being that needs family and communication and
um so weirdly the impetus for this is like the Izzy storyline sort of came about when um my very
first novel my second book was on submission and I kept getting sort of the publishing industrial
complex being like we like the story but it's not like the kind of latinx story we we think we want
that that we've seen before it's a little like more aggressive it's a little more uh I don't know
there was something that Publishers kept pushing back on and then I was like oh you want aggressive
I'm going to give you Scarface and I started writing it as a joke for myself um and that
started in 2013 and then like anything that begins from a place of spite it sort of petered out um
over time and then I knew I I was just writing about the whe for myself in my own weird places of
like in journals and things like that and knowing I could never figure out a way to put her in a
book and th
en when the pandemic hit and we were all in deep isolation in the beginning something
just sort of clicked about like how do you keep from going crazy when you're all alone because I
began my pandemic experience completely alone um in a house in the middle of Nebraska um so I was
like wow I really don't belong here cuz I grew up in Miami and I was was like you know who else
doesn't belong where she is Lita the killer whales who's from like the Pacific Northwest and so they
just sort of foun
d each other uh about like eight years apart from those two ideas before they came
together um so that's yeah it's the inspiration that's amazing um yeah not yeah I did not come
to this beginning until much later in the writing process um I the first scene that I wrote for this
book was actually it's actually a scene that takes place like through almost towards the end of the
novel um and I that happened with my first book too um I don't write linearly and I really envy
people who can plot
because I don't know how to do that um and it really started to take root also in
the pandemic like I was writing well I the first thing that I wrote was actually like in in uh a
short story class um qua is the art of the short story class and uh I knew that this was a scene
that was so charged that I wanted to explore it more um and it was a Flores scene the daughter it
was a scene uh of her at her job um and then I was I was right so I figured okay this is going to be
a story about this w
oman and like she's in her 30s and she's sort of trying to figure out what's
going on in her life kind of thing um but then as I was writing her scenes like I kept hearing
her mother and like I knew her mother was going to play a role in her in the story but I didn't
realize she was going to be such a dominant voice in the story until I started writing more of Paula
um and then trying to figure out how she was going to come onto the page um was really something
that I uncovered just as I wa
s writing it but um really I started to go hard with the writing
during the pandemic because it was the only thing that kept me sane I was not alone but I was in an
apartment with two kids that I was that was they were Zoom schooling um I was working full-time
I had a legal job at a at a a a startup um it was insane and I lived in New York City where
people you know we really did feel the pandemic there like truly um and so it was uh it it was I
needed something to Anchor me because it and
this was it you know um the writing the story um and I
mostly wrote it in the 30 minutes between serving breakfast to my kids and them starting school um
and that's kind of how it came about I I mean it's so interesting to also know that you both kind of
started with this idea for the novels and writing it during the pandemic because I think a major
theme that stands out from both them both of your novels is grief you know know your characters
are navigating grief from losing a parent or no
t having ever met a parent and so I'm curious
if you could just talk to us a little bit about those characters navigating that and um how that
just felt like being isolated and also kind of writing into that yeah I probably should clarify
in that the just I had the idea and the feelings but the work of the writing for me did not happen
really until I was then pandemic with my husband and stepdaughter right and then was like in that
space um and then it as it wasn't until we were able to mov
e and actually have more space and have
some distance from each other and then I wrote it in like six and a half months like all of it but
it was still it was like 2021 was when I so it was still we were still isolating we were still you
know masking um and I had moved from Nebraska to North Carolina I was just like uh like sort of
petrified with fear in Nebraska as much as it didn't feel immediate the way it did in big cities
um it was scarier in a different way and that in where I was the
y declared the pandemic over in
May of 2020 and uh which is great for them uh but not for those of us that believed in science and
uh were waiting for a vaccine to feel safe um so it was sort of a that Terror of like not trusting
where where we were um so I don't know I maybe you should answer this question first so that I can
think of a lie um while you're I don't know I just I I just yeah you you first and then I'll just say
this I'll be uh so for me I was really grieving like not seeing
my family my mother literally
lived down the block and I just could not see her she lives you know she's in her 60s she lived
with um and still lives with my grandmother who is 104 um and she will put on her makeup to go
to Dunkin Donuts I mean she's just like that she will does not like a Facebook picture without her
makeup either she's so cute um but we couldn't I couldn't risk like you know their health um and so
I didn't see her and I I mean we all missed her um I didn't see my my my si
blings either um I I had
a niece and the nephew during the pandemic that I didn't meet for months after they were born
um and so just being in that situation really um and then the sirens and sadly we know we To
Lose Friends um and some family back in Peru and so all of that uh brought up my own you know
grief that I had put away a long time ago um and it just it it allowed me to explore some of these
feelings that I was really uh that I had grappled with but I now that I had some distance
um I was
better able to incorporate them into a story where here we have these two women that are navigating
grief very differently right the daughter I mean she's lost a parent who was really her compass
in many ways um and then we have uh you know the wife who had really identified so much with being
a wife and being a mother that now that her child didn't really need her and she was no longer
someone's wife she's trying to figure out who she truly is um and I think in some ways uh both
of them were mourning the people that they thought they were when this person was in their lives
was so important and such a such an anchor for for both of them as well yeah okay same that was
a great answer no I do I will say I was like do you want me to answer for you cuz I I mean is is
he like no I'm just kidding I bu my heart though is I think I think in it in this book the grief is
um so layered can I say that okay yeah it is um I think it's also something that even the character
himse
lf is trying to avoid and that the narration in some ways is also trying to subsume with humor
right um but you should know that if something is very funny it's about to get real sad like that's
I I'm of the ilk of the writers that like make like take you up the Cliff of laughter so that the
Falls even harder um I think for me the grief that I was feeling as I was writing the book was about
uh the city of Miami and just our climate crisis crisis and seeing you know I didn't the last time
I
was in Miami was prior to you know the last year or so was December of 2019 I was there for the
holidays then we quickly went when we went into lockdown I was I was not going to be able to get
back to the place I had always thought of as home and it was also kind of a similar environment
where I was like that doesn't feel like a safe place and I was trying to get my parents to drive
to Nebraska but they were watching the the wrong news and so they felt like there was nothing to
really be wo
rried about and just already like a pre grief for um you know the city I grew up
in changing so much but also that it will be underwater in my lifetime and so I know part of
my mission with this book or My Hope for it was to and this is the Moby Dick part in some ways is
like Moby Dick is this like elegy and archive and this goodbye to the Wailing industry which is like
good okay that was really a bad thing that we did as a species to this other species um but I that
same impetus of like sa
ying goodbye to my miam or saying like trying to get everything I've ever
thought about a place in one place um with the idea that like a hundred years from now and people
are like what was that like down there they'll read this book and be like oh this is one version
of it right this is one it's like an archive um or a I don't know so in that way it tries to be like
Moby Dick as well um but that grief of mourning a place being gone and you know when trying
to figure out like what to read I
was like oh there's so many like just little because it also
like borrows from Mobi dick and that it has these expository chapters after chapters been a lot of
plot right so that you can just be like these are all the birds of miam County right but then I
make them all up because I don't know anything about birds and I'm trying to like not really be
I mean it there's really like an Ibis that's a real bird uh but I just wrote I got like a guide
book about birds to try to write about them an
d then I just ended up like quoting the guide book
a lot so then I started making fun of the guide book or the narrator does I guess I should say
the narrator starts making fun of the guide book so it gets very convoluted but I I'm somebody who
tries as a human being whenever there's grief have to like I feel like grief and and humor sit next
to each other and that um laughter is a kind of like rupture in the body that is preparing us for
death and so that is why that's that's sort of my wa
y in through it is thinking how do you laugh
at something that otherwise you will cry at yeah no absolutely I feel like that's so valid and I
mean also something that I do like humor for me is my deflection because feelings are hard yes
which I feel like is real and normal yeah um but you know I wanted to ask a question not a boring
research question but like a more so like what's the weirdest thing that you ended up Googling
for your novel and I'm asking this because so many good things se
riously in both like so
before this I decided I was going to come up with a little playlist and the pit bull had to
be on the playlist and then there's Bad Bunny references because Melissa and I are bad buddy
fans although questionable right questionable sometimes sometimes so again I'm just curious
what's the what's like the weirdest thing you Googled other than obviously the having the bird
book yeah I think the various facts about how the Orca brain works and orca communication there was
a lot of that um there were so many strange facts that there's a chapter in the book called does the
whale diminish I should say some of the chapter titles are taken from Moby Dick that's one some of
the chapter titles are lyrics from Pit Bull songs and some of them are made up and you get to just
depict Your Own Adventure you get to it's like a quiz you can give yourself in the book like can
you identify like out of the dozens of chapters um but there's one does the whale diminish it just
talks about all the research that's gone they're all like little small things about like whales and
captivity and how their brains uh change and some of the things they do to cope with the stress of
it uh the other weird thing you said in because you mentioned Google and like YouTube and those
kinds of like spaces is uh in factchecking some of the there's a chapter that takes place at the
day County Youth Fair and um there's a ride rides apparently change names sometimes at this fair
and
so I had to double check but there's like no way to find that except to go to YouTube and watch
people's videos of them walking around the Youth Fair and then you hoping you see the ride behind
them so I had to watch hours of footage of people at the 2017 because that's the year the book takes
place the 2017 day County Youth to try to find out was the name of a ride Whitewater ride like was
it was it Niagara Falls or was it Whitewater which one was cuz it switched at some point either in
20
16 17 or 18 and so I just was watching people named like yti set walking around their video
being like Oh my God and I'm here at the fair and you like are looking in the background to try to
see the ride that was very timec consuming uh how about you um I think probably one of the strangest
things I had to Google are like fish um yeah I so Flores works at uh at a startup it's an aquarium
and accessories startup so um you can order exotic fish on her on the app or fancy aquariums um but
I di
dn't know anything about fish except beta fish cuz that's what we have at home um that we have
successfully kept alive um I know they don't die no mine don't die mine mine are 3 to four years
is like yeah um and so I had to I had to do some some Googling to figure out what kind of fish I
could throw in there um and aside from that like I yes I do love Bad Bunny and when I was writing
a lot of this like Bad Bunny kept me going and I was like man like this song I wish we could just
go to the
club and like you know like to this song but then yeah like when he started hooking up
with somebody I was like G I'm so disappointed I don't understand this yeah this is what is going
on um and so I was actually towards the end of like edits at this point with the novel and I was
like I need to scale back the Bad Bunny a little bit because I'm really feeling this prob this
like deception almost a little bit the morning yeah yeah a little bit so I was like all right
who else do I love Nicki
Jam so so um I Googled uh and started doing some figuring out what kind
of what Nicki Jam songs were like popular when when the story happens so yeah I that's I'm sure
there's other stuff but that's what I can think of just off the top of my head oh no that's great so
we are going to I do want to leave some time for you all to ask questions so start getting ready I
just kind of have a last question I know this went B so fast I feel like yeah it really did it really
did I mean just feel lik
e no we didn't we're just having I feel like we're having a good time this
is why I liked I wanted to pair you guys because I feel like you guys are a good time um but now
I'm talking too much uh no no such thing and I'm going to laugh the whole time now I don't know why
um cuz I'm seeing you and we're thinking ging it's over well actually that's that's that's what
I was thinking about and the distance from the pandemic and and seeing that and the idea that
you had about how really history
is not behind us history is happening and we're writing into
it right and so as Latinas getting push back in Industry trying to write into our history like how
do you how do you deal with that how do you how does that how do you deal with it like how do you
navigate it I I don't not well um yeah do you go answer first I don't know I I mean I know we're
different like sort of places in our career too and I think by with my second book I was very
much like I'm just going to push as hard as I
can and then by the time the fourth one comes out
I'm like the book is the point and um it's going to find its readers it is a spell um I will say
too this is a book that sold twice it sold to a different publisher um on proposal and then when
I got the feedback from that editor uh and since I know this is being recorded the way I'll say it is
that like that was it was absolutely inappropriate feedback for the book and my agent got me out of
that contract within 24 hours and then we went ba
ck out and sold the book to an editor who was
willing to not willing but like excited about uh the vision of this book and the the way that it
as even a book there's a whole chapter um that is again because it's the structure that I've sort
of picked there's a chapter where uh the narrator is pushing back against a either a reader or an
editor and even saying like that they're like but these are the things you need to have in this
book for it to count and then they're like but this is why w
hat you're saying is ridiculous
there's like this back and forth with another voice that enters the book um and the editor that
his name is Tim O Connell he's a fantastic editor uh he really saw the vision for this book um
and he you know he was like this needs to be bigger this needs to be you don't be afraid here
like I'm going to stand behind you I'm I'm not going to tell you to cut this chapter I'm not
going to be hurt and I was like well I'm not I wasn't like worried about hurting him
but I was
worried about like making him angry right um and so he responded to that with enthusiasm and was
like this is a book that needs to be out um you know so that's how I push back it goes right back
into the work it goes right back into the next thing on the horizon yeah do you do you wan to I
think what is very hard for um what has been hard for me as a writer is p is publishing in in many
ways um and I have a great team um at eeko but it's more that you know publishing at the end of
the day is a business um and a lot of your success is really determined by your sales numbers um and
the reality is that the you know it how much you get compensated and whether or not you get the
contract is going to be based a lot on your track record um and so how do we write into our cultures
and our history and preserving that I mean we can write about it it doesn't necessarily mean that
the publishing industry is going to publish it um and that that can make it very hard at times
to
frankly like to to justify how one does it if for me at least I struggle with that um because
there's also obviously the financial aspect of it right like how can you continue to do this
work when you also have to maintain some sort of full-time job to make it happen right it's
not like they're cutting you know huge checks necessarily to folks uh to to latinate authors
um and so you see that others are getting those checks and so they do have the ability to write
and and continue producing
work um and so I try to every once in a while I will get someone send
me a very nice note to say that they were by my work or it impacted them in some way and that is
motivating for me um but I will say it is it is it is hard it's hard to keep that motivation and For
Better or For Worse like you know it I you know I have two kids who I feel like I need to show
them that they can be artists they can do work that they love art is important um and when they
tell me Mama are you working on ano
ther book and I say yes I have like a few pages written they'll be
like why only a few where's the rest you know and it's like that account I feel like okay so I have
someone that I really it's holding me accountable and if anything I'm showing at least my two kids
like the value of Art and the importance of doing something that you love and I mean I feel like
it's so important to have those two takes though because I know we have writers and off you future
authors in the room and to know t
hat that's going to happen and you have to keep fighting for your
work because you believe in it and you know that there's somebody out there for it because we're
here we're all here we're all here for both of you in your work so thank you for writing and thank
you for pushing and thank you for continuing because thank you for helping to get our work out
there and find its readers it means a lot um we do have time for audience questions um and we do have
someone that will pass around the mi
c if here we go hi this is a question for Janine um so first
of all thank you for making me watch Scarface I didn't think no the point of I tried I did
try to write a book that you do not need to have seen Scarface to get the book but I was
like trying to make people hate it enough to not ever watch it kind I kind of felt compelled
I was like I don't know I I kind of I'm sorry watch it to hate it though that's true I have
to understand it so anyway um one thing that I noticed about your wor
ks is that you talk about
like marine life like I know like Lisa ends up going to like marine biology and stuff like that
yeah a good point what draws you to the ocean and like what I don't know just y May um I don't
know uh what DRS me to yeah you know um what draws me to the I you know I grew up adjacent to
the ocean in Miami I do think I was talking with somebody the other day about like I get mad about
space exploration because I'm like can we go to the ocean first it's right there um i
t's so much
more like I don't know I don't know what I I'm I just feel a fascination with it and um drawn to it
in a way that has just always been there since I was very little and that it maybe Verge is even on
the Mystic and so um I leaned into that hardcore with this book uh I with make your home among
strangers the character there is a r biologist and that was like me like like a healing fantasy I
was like that's my other life that I never did but like it was never even like a possibili
ty I think
for someone like me but um for my reasons of like how my brain works not I mean probably lots of
reasons but that's one of them um I was always going to find my way to writing in some way but
yeah I just have a I'm just pulled to the ocean in that's why like Nebraska I was like I I got
to get the out of here cuz so far you couldn't go farther from the ocean either direction um yeah
thank you for that question and for noticing that across books while we queue up our next question
Melissa have you seen Scarface yes you have okay so yes I've seen okay all right we've all seen
Scarface I will watch it again you really don't have to watch it to get the book I I mean I think
you have to watch it to understand the issues and the rage with it and how like easy it is to just
take it in as action and like why wildness but then step back and be like whoa this is what we
were pedaling and pushing and still are and still are and still TV it has not changed yeah it hasn't
chang
ed and like I'm now adapting this book for television and I sort of see how these things have
H these things happen you know the kind of notes that happen and you sort of see the creep right
like start to push yeah and in some ways I'm like that's fine because it's a different medium and
there other like TV's got its own it's its own world and its own set of things about like you
know you s of you get to do what you do in the second Ser the second season of a show but the
first season reall
y has to look a certain way like there's just it's a different culture so it's
fine but um I think with Scarface I think what's weird about it is like I always thought it was
like a a comedy because it's so absurd and then I would meet people who thought oh this is this was
this must be you grew up around this you grew up in this life I was like one I wasn't born yet when
that movie happened and two no like it's not but I mean that was a reality for some folks in Miami
but it's more the ide
a of like the casting that film um in you know something that I mentioned
in the novel and that the narrator talks about or explores at some length is that there are no
actual there's only like one actual Cuban in the movie it's the guy who plays Manolo um who would
changed his name to Steven Bower at some point before that and then married Melanie Griffith and
then there's just like a long digression about that in the novel um but yeah I think we can talk
a little bit about how different a
rt forms we like write against them or towards them and Scarface
and Moby Dick for me were two that I I just felt they were the same thing honestly like in a lot of
ways there these like this wild performance that ends in someone's death um all the time yeah it's
like yeah oh I'm sorry yeah we got carried away we got back to the questions hi um you mentioned
archive and I think I'm interested in both of you talking about how I think there is still obviously
like what is a latinx archive or
a Latina archive especially those of like Latin so I want to ask
how did this idea of an archive felt like it was limiting but also at the same time knowing that
latin's lives are just so different and this is in many ways your your books are speaking of
that difference of the many different lives how has expanding that archive because that is
what y'all are doing how is that also liberating yeah or you don't have to a beautiful question
that's a I like for you um that's a hard question bec
ause I don't I don't know if I necessarily
see myself in in the moment of writing that I'm expanding anything um except exploring
really um some human element and trying to build a connection with my characters frankly so
as expansive as it may seem on once the product is once it's done in the moment I'm really just
trying to connect deeper and in some ways unearth also things that perhaps I've put away um you
know like I'll just give you an example like with my first novel which is about y
ou know an
undocumented woman um and uh her immigration experience in New York City in early '90s you know
I wrote the whole thing and then at the end when I was talking to editors um about the novel I came
to realize that I was actually it w part of the undocumented child in me was like fearful of being
separated from her parents and from her siblings um and I think that I didn't really realize
that that's the part of that's part of what I was writing sort of to address that in some way
u
m and I don't know if I would have necessarily gotten to that point um had I not been a parent
myself um I think I would have prob you know eventually but I think that you know any writer
who tells you that their work is not iob biog autobiographical is is is is correct but there's
always little pieces of us that we leave and that we somehow weave into our work um the fact that
that maybe resonates with the larger audience um and touches on the Latin experience the Peruvian
experience the C
uban American Experience whatever the experience is is just it's it's wonderful but
I certainly don't go into it thinking I'm going to write into like the Peruvian or the Peruvian
American experience with this book yeah I think I think it really moved around for me through the
process I think in the in the the nuts and bolts of like writing I wasn't thinking in those ways
but I will say that my sense of writing into an archive or if we're using the word archive here uh
s like is is a synony
m for Canon right um it's a little bit why I wear this t-shirt tonight right
because that's how I this is Elena vontes was my professor she's the person I credit with helping
me be a writer they just did this big thing at my moer last year and they invited writers that she's
like taught she also taught Manuel Munos and so she brought us both back to give readings which
was incredible and such a humbling experience but then they made us these t-shirts um so when
I think in terms of an archiv
e or a Canon I I do think of like Elena and making sure that
it's something that could stand next to her books um and that have not been necessarily like
commercially successful um but are sort of like critically and culturally like touchstones right
um under the feet of Jesus other dogs came with them those two novels are for me masterpieces and
they're trying to really push what a novel can do in terms of its form like how much can a novel
hold before it overflows into something else righ
t um so I know I was thinking about that as I
was I was trying to like really punch up with the book right and think how do I how do I grow as a
writer how do I if I feel like I know how to tell a certain kind of story a certain kind of way
how do I do something completely different this time around um and knowing that even just that
experiment that ambition is opening up that Canon and opening up that archive for writers that you
know are that are riding alongside me and that are going to
come after me that's beautiful I think
we have time for one more question uh who would like to close us out yeah hi um this question is
for Janine I wanted to ask I mean reading all your books they're so richly Miami they're so richly
Cuban americ how do you stay connected to home as years pass and living in Nebraska and now living
in North Carolina I mean how do you stay connect Ed other than looking at YouTube videos of the
background of the fair I would say that that those videos made me
hate it uh I was just like I
I'm glad I don't live there anymore oh is so wild all the time um how do I stay connected I think
the act of writing is probably how I'm staying connected I know with this book I was trying and
I've said this a couple times but I was trying to like get out get it out once and for all I was
like I don't want to write about Miami anymore I you know as much as my work is so firmly grounded
in that place this was for this book I was like it's not a setting it's the
it's the subject I'm
trying to actually like write about the place in a way to help me empty that well um but the
thing about a well in Miami is as soon as you get the water out it just fills up with more water
from underneath right so that's where you know in terms of the new projects or new things that are
coming um there just I thought I really would get it all out of my system and that it would but it
would it just kept me it sort of like submerged me back into it um I think also Miami
is a strange
place where it's a city that's always changing and it's a city that never changes you go back and
it it's it it feels instantly familiar so I do feel very lucky that I grew up there whenever I
meet folks out in the world that grew up in Miami there's like an immediate familiarity I think it
is just something about that place that um unless you like actively hate it you're always connected
um so I think in this book I was like oh I'm just going to pretend that that's what I'm d
oing I'm
like actively hating it to get rid of it and it just didn't work it didn't work as a stry for that
um so we'll see what's next but are you from Miami is that oh my God where did you go to high school
you went halia too you went to high high th breads yeah yeah okay so the oh yeah where didd you go
to high school then oh okay okay Miami deep we show up we show up for each other we really do
we show up for each other are you from hiia to Sir oh Kendall okay I mean okay hiah hi so the
in all my work I got this i got this note from a copy editor just to say this real quick that
they were like so in all my work it's a fake high school called halia Lakes High because I
don't want to give I don't want to give HML any credit but I also like respect halia high but
also I'm like that sounds made up like high a high to Outsiders they're like oh it sounds like
Bayside from like St by the Bell um but I went to American High the which is like up on you know
57th up like the rival
s Carol City and HML and but American High the name of it is like two on
the nose right cuz it was founded in 1976 and it was like nobody there is like American we're
all from all over the place I mean I guess maybe naturalized citizens and things but it was just a
weird it never I didn't want to put the real high school so high Lakes is I am aware that it is not
a real school everyone but it is an amalgam of HML High a high and um an American so basically you
went there it's yours no no no
I love that Miami is is is here um my brother's in Miami so my
heart's there now oh so shout out to Miami for that reason but thank you too so much for shout
out to my kids who are [Applause] watching yes we have folks joining us virtually and we will be
back here in April um we'll be announcing soon um I don't have exact yet but save the date for
I think was April 25th 24 no 25th it was the 25th I'm we'll talk later but it's the 20 25th uh
so try to save the day it will be announcing soon
thank you to for coming thank you everyone for
being here with us um everyone our two amazing authors will be signing books outside um as
David mentioned there free copies over there they also have free copies from the series
earlier this year I mean last year so feel free to grab them um and again thank you thank
you to dcpl and thank you to politics and Pro our book sellers um we really appreciate
you all thank you so much thank [Applause] you
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