WVPL 2023 READING CHALLENGE
READ WITH US!
Each month, we'll suggest reading genres and book suggestions.
Because this is a year-long year-long reading challenge we will not have a separate adult summer reading program.
September Challenge
READ A BOOK ON HISPANIC HERITAGE
Share with us what you read #wvplreads2023
Not sure what to read? Here are some suggestions!
See below for a printable list.
Suggested Reads
Family Lore by Elizabeth Acevedo
Follows the lives of several generations of women in the Marte family after gathering to honor Flor, who can predict the day someone will die, decides to throw herself a huge party as a living wake.
A Long Petal of the Sea by Isabel Allende
Sponsored by the poet Pablo Neruda to flee the violence of the Spanish Civil War, a pregnant widow and an army doctor unite in an arranged marriage only to be swept up by the early days of World War II.
Afterlife by Julia Alvarez
A literature professor tries to rediscover who she is after the sudden death of her husband, even as a series of family and political jolts force her to ask what we owe those in crisis in our families, biological or otherwise.
The Hacienda by Isabel Canas
Mexican Gothic meets Rebecca in this debut supernatural suspense novel, set in the aftermath of the Mexican War of Independence, about a remote house, dark secrets, and the woman pulled into their clutches.
The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros (YA)
This book tells the story of Esperanza Cordero, a young girl growing up in the Hispanic quarter of Chicago, whose neighborhood is one of harsh realities and harsh beauty.
Our Last Days in Barcelona by Chanel Cleeton
An NPR Best Book of 2022
When Isabel Perez travels to Barcelona to save her sister Beatriz, she discovers a shocking family secret.
Trust by Hernan Diaz
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Told from the perspective of one woman bent on disentangling fact from fiction, this unrivaled novel about money, power, intimacy and perception is centered around the mystery of how the Rask family acquired their immense fortune in 1920s-1930’s New York City.
Our Share of Night by Mariana Enriquez
United in grief after the death of the wife and mother they both loved, a young father and son travel to confront the terrifying legacy she bequeathed—a family called the Order that commits unspeakable acts in search of immortality.
A Ballad of Love and Glory by Reyna Grande
A Long Petal of the Sea meets Luis Alberto Urrea's The House of Broken Angels in this epic historical romance about a Mexican woman and an Irish-American soldier who fall in love in the thick of the Mexican-American War.
My Broken Language by Quiara Alegría Hudes
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.
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
The internationally bestselling and critically acclaimed novel offers a rich and brilliant chronicle celebrating the endless variety of life in the mythical Latin America town of Macondo.
Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
A reimagining of the classic gothic suspense novel follows the experiences of a courageous socialite in 1950s Mexico who is drawn into the treacherous secrets of an isolated mansion.
Conquistadora by Esmeralda Santiago
Drawn to the exotic island of Puerto Rico by the diaries of an ancestor who traveled there with Ponce de León, Ana Cubillas becomes involved with enamored twin brothers Ramón and Inocente before convincing them to claim a sugar plantation they have inherited.
The House of Broken Angels by Luis Alberto Urrea
Across one bittersweet weekend in their San Diego neighborhood, revelers mingle among the palm trees and cacti, celebrating the lives of family patriarch Miguel "Big Angel" De La Cruz and his mother, and recounting the many tales that have passed into family lore. By the Pulitzer Prize-finalist author of The Hummingbird's Daughter.