About this item
Quiara Alegra Hudes was the sharp-eyed girl on the stairs while her family danced in her grandmother's tight North Philly kitchen. She was awed by her aunts and uncles and cousins, but haunted by the secrets of the family and the unspoken, untold stories of the barrio - even as she tried to find her own voice in the sea of language around her, written and spoken, English and Spanish, bodies and books, Western art and sacred altars. Her family became her private pantheon, a gathering circle of powerful orisha-like women with tragic real-world wounds, and she vowed to tell their stories - but first she'd have to get off the stairs and join the dance. She'd have to find her language. Weaving together Hudes's love of books with the stories of her family, the lessons of North Philly with those of Yale, this is an inspired exploration of home, memory, and belonging - narrated by an obsessed girl who fought to become an artist so she could capture the world she loved in all its wild and delicate beauty.
About the Author
Quiara Alegría Hudes is a storyteller, wordsmith, barrio feminist and native of West Philly, U.S.A. Hailed for her work's exuberance, intellectual rigor, and rich imagination, her plays and musicals have been performed around the world. They include Water By the Spoonful, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, and In the Heights, winner of the Tony Award for Best Musical and a soon-to-be major motion picture. Hudes founded Emancipated Stories which seeks to counter the invisibility created by mass incarceration by having inmates share one page of their story with the world.(Author photo by Jon Chu) www.quiara.com
