Las Musas is celebrating the release of NoNieqa Ramos’s sophomore picture book Hair Story, illustrated by Keisha Morris!
 
Lorena Germán, cofounder of the groups #disrupttexts and Multicultural Classroom and author of The Anti-Racist Teacher: Reading Instruction Workbook and Textured Teaching: A Framework for Culturally Sustaining Practices, writes: “This gorgeous book is about more than hair. Hair becomes the vehicle for a conversation about identity, beauty standards, bias, relationships, self-love, and more. Ramos has created a picture book that touches upon identity as it is intertwined with other elements of life, all by celebrating hair types and styles.”
 
This is truth is carried in NoNieqa’s words and Keisha’s art. It’s a beautiful ode to Black and brown children, celebrating their hair and their identity and encouraging “young readers to embrace themselves just the way they are."-- Charlotte Offsay, author of The Big Beach Clean Up and How to Return a Monster. As Preciosa and Rudine embrace their natural hair, readers are invited to do the same.
 
For this blog post, Alexandra Alessandri interviews NoNieqa Ramos about her inspiration and process, but first, here’s a description of this stunning book:
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With rhythmic, rhyming verse, this picture book follows two girls―one non-Black Puerto Rican, one Black―as they discover the stories their hair can tell. 

Preciosa has hair that won’t stay straight, won’t be confined. Rudine’s hair resists rollers, flat irons, and rules. Together, the girls play hair salon! They take inspiration from their moms, their neighbors, their ancestors, and cultural icons. They discover that their hair holds roots of the past and threads of the future.

With rhythmic, rhyming verse and vibrant collage art, author NoNieqa Ramos and illustrator Keisha Morris follow two girls as they discover the stories hair can tell.

Today, we're sharing an interview between Musas Ana Siqueira and Gloria Amescua, to celebrate Gloria's debut picture book, Child of the Flower-Song People: Luz Jiménez, Daughter of the Nahua. Scroll on to learn more about Gloria's inspiration, future writing plans, and more!

Ana: Gloria, thanks for allowing me to read your wonderful book. What an inspirational story about being proud of your culture and showing the same to the world! I also love the lively illustrations by Duncan Tonatiuh. 

​First of all, can you tell us what inspired you to write about Luz Jiménez?

Gloria: Thank you for loving our book, Ana. I was inspired when I happened upon a pamphlet about Luz Jiménez and realized I had never thought about the models in paintings and their lives. As I read about her, I was amazed by her life and knew I had to write about her. She was an intelligent and curious little Nahua girl, who wanted to become a teacher, and though she had many struggles throughout her life, she became a very important link between the indigenous people of Mexico and the rest of the world. She came to represent the dignity of the native people in Mexico through the famous 20thth artists who painted her and the Náhuatl language she helped preserve with scholars as it was fading, becoming a teacher after all.
I connected with Luz on a very personal level. When the Mexican government made school mandatory, the indigenous students were shamed about their native language and clothing. The same shaming of Spanish in the US and punishment for speaking Spanish in school affected how I grew up.
 
Ana: And I have a question about your author’s note, you wrote her name was Julia Jiménez, but she’s known as Luz Jiménez. Do you know the reason for that?
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To celebrate the book birthday of Alexandra Alessandri's Isabel and Her Colores Go to School, we're sharing this delightful interview between Musas Alexandra Alessandri and Terry Catasús Jennings. Scroll on to learn more about this adorable picture book!

Terry: Alexandra, I have to tell you, this brought back so many memories. I was twelve when I first came to the United States. But I was just like Isabel—drowning in the strange words that surrounded me. Can you tell us about your book?
 
Alexandra: Aw, I’m so glad it resonated with you, though I’m sorry you experienced this, too. Isabel and Her Colores Go to School is about a little girl who’s starting school, but while she’s excited about it, she’s also really nervous because she doesn’t speak English, which sounds strange to her. Isabel is also artistic and processes everything through color, and it’s this trait that ultimately allows her to bridge the language divide.
 
Terry: Your Colombian identity is very present in your writing, whether it’s your poems or your picture books.  How has your Colombian identity shaped your writing?
 
Alexandra: My Colombian identity is definitely a huge part of my writing. I was born and raised in the U.S. in a Spanish-only household and with parents who made it very clear to me that I was 100% Colombian. But growing up straddling both cultures comes with a lot of figuring out how to be both and questioning whether you’re Colombian or American enough. When my dad passed away in 2008, I felt this sudden void. I mean, my mom is blessedly still alive and I still have this connection to Colombia through her and her side, but the loss of my dad sparked this intimate desire to really know Colombia and where/how I fit into the equation. I think this led naturally to writing as a way of reflecting and understanding what it mean to be Colombian and American, and how different this experience is between my mom, myself and my son. This spilled over into my poetry and my children’s books.
 
Terry: The idea of Isabel and Her Colores reminds me of Wassili Kandinski. He connected his art to sound.  What was the inspiration for Isabel and Her Colores? When/how was the idea born?

Today, two Musas are sharing a book birthday for their spectacular books, BELLA'S RECIPE FOR SUCCESS and EL CUCUY IS SCARED, TOO! Scroll on to hear from these two talented authors — Ana Siqueira + Donna Barba Higuera — and learn more about their books!

Las Musas wishes a happy book birthday to Hilda Eunice Burgos for the release of her picture book debut The Cot in the Living Room!
 
Sometimes, what we want most isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, and the process of that discovery leads us to something better. In many ways, this is one of the themes in Hilda’s beautiful debut, but it’s more than that—it’s a story of family and community that shows that “beautifully captures the gifts we receive when we open our hearts to others.” (BookPage, starred review).

Alexandra Alessandri interviews Hilda about her inspiration and process, but first, here’s a description of this sweet book:
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A young Dominican American girl in New York City moves from jealousy to empathy as her parents babysit children whose families work overnight shifts in this honest and warm picture book debut.

Night after night, a young girl watches her mami set up a cot in the living room for guests in their Washington Heights apartment, like Raquel (who's boring) and Edgardo (who gets crumbs everywhere). She resents that they get the entire living room with a view of the George Washington Bridge, while all she gets is a tiny bedroom with a view of her sister (who snores). Until one night when no one comes, and it's finally her chance! But as it turns out, sleeping on the cot in the living room isn't all she thought it would be.

With charming text by Hilda Eunice Burgos and whimsical illustrations by Gaby D'Alessandro, The Cot in the Living Room is a celebration of the ways a Dominican American community takes care of one another while showing young readers that sometimes the best way to be a better neighbor is by imagining how it feels to spend a night sleeping on someone else's pillow.
 
Alexandra Alessandri: I adored The Cot in the Living Room so much! It reminded me a lot of my own childhood, only in my case, I was sent to sleep in the sofa and our guests would take my room. I wasn’t too keen on that. I love the sense of community and how the young protagonist’s emotional arc shifts as she goes from jealousy to finally getting what she wants, and how that becomes the catalyst for her having empathy toward her recurring guests. It’s what allows her to grow and show empathy.

I’m always curious about the book’s origin story. How did The Cot in the Living Room come to be? Who or what inspired it?
 
Hilda Eunice Burgos: When I was a child, I had a stay-at-home mom who babysat a lot of neighborhood kids. Mostly the children came during the day, but a few had to stay overnight because of their parents’ work schedules. When I was very young, I resented them encroaching on my family’s space and time together. As I got a little older, I realized how lucky I was and how difficult it must be for these children to spend the night alone in a stranger’s home.
 
AA: I love that, and the sentiment definitely comes across here. The Cot in the Living Room is written in 1st person, and we don’t actually get the main character’s name. Can you tell us a little about that choice? Was this always the case or did this come through in revision?