Book of the Month
FLESH AND SPIRIT:
CONFESSIONS OF A YOUNG LORD
Author: Felipe Luciano
Publisher: Empire State Editions
ISBN-10: 1531504485 / ISBN-13: 978-1531504489
SUMMARY:
Growing up fatherless and poor, Felipe Luciano didn’t yearn for wealth or dream of becoming a famous actor or athlete. He was tired of being poor and ached to be a man, to reach that point of sagacity, courage, and independence that would signal to the world that he was now a warrior, ready to fight the battle for truth and justice, to slay the dragon of evil, whatever that might be. In Flesh and Spirit , Luciano paints a vivid portrait of his life in New York City as a member of the city’s Latino community as well as his pivotal role in the Young Lords and The Last Poets.
Luciano’s memoir begins when as a teenage Brooklyn gang member he is convicted of manslaughter. This pivotal moment changes the trajectory of his life. The American kid raised on Davy Crockett and Superman TV tales emerged from the womb of prison into a harsh, new monochromatic black/white world without the benefit of rose-colored glasses. It was a painful shattering of all his childhood beliefs and the realization that he was a poor Black Puerto Rican in white America clutching onto values that didn’t work. The only flotsam in this churning sea of ’60s social turmoil was college, poetry, revolutionary activity, and sometimes God. After getting an education, Luciano went on to become an acclaimed poet and political activist who advocates for the Latino population of New York City, for the kids growing up in the same circumstances he did.
Sparing no one―not the revolutionaries, the Revolution, nor the author himself― Flesh and Spirit is written with honesty and humility to help guide young people of color and other Americans through the labyrinths of ideology, organization, missteps, false paths, and phony societal promises.
About the Author:
Felipe Luciano is an Emmy Award–winning journalist, news anchor, and former adjunct professor at Fordham University. He is the co-founder and chairman of the Young Lords Party, a member of The Original Last Poets, an advocate for inter-ethnic communication, and the host of “Latin Roots,” a Latino music program in New York City. A talented diversity speaker, Luciano is committed to community empowerment, ethnic pride, and civil rights. He is a regular contributor to many New York–area newspapers and magazines, including The New York Times and Essence. His poetry has appeared in anthologies such as Puerto Rican Poetry: An Anthology from Aboriginal to Contemporary Time.
Website:
X / Twitter: @FelipeJLuciano
Conversations Book
FLORES AND MISS PAULA
Author: Melissa Rivero
Publisher: Ecco Press an imprint of Harper Collins
ISBN: 0063272490 / ISBN-13: 978-0063272491
SUMMARY:
Thirtysomething Flores and her mother, Paula, still live in the same Brooklyn apartment, but that may be the only thing they have in common. It’s been nearly three years since they lost beloved husband and father Martín, who had always been the bridge between them. One day, cleaning beneath his urn, Flores discovers a note written in her mother’s handwriting. Perdóname si te falle. Recuerda que siempre te quise. (“Forgive me if I failed you. Remember that I always loved you.”) But what would Paula need forgiveness for?
Now newfound doubts and old memories come flooding in, complicating each woman’s efforts to carve out a good life for herself—and to support the other in the same. Paula thinks Flores should spend her evenings meeting a future husband, not crunching numbers for a floundering aquarium startup. Flores wishes Paula would ask for a raise at her DollaBills retail job, or at least find a best friend who isn’t a married man.
When Flores and Paula learn they will be forced to move, they must finally confront their complicated past—and decide whether they share the same dreams for the future. Spirited and warm-hearted, Melissa Rivero’s new novel showcases the complexities of the mother-daughter bond with fresh insight and empathy.
About the Author:
Melissa Rivero is the author of The Affairs of the Falcóns, winner of the 2019 New American Voices Award and a 2020 International Latino Book Award. The book was also longlisted for the PEN/Hemingway Award for Debut Novel, the Center for Fiction’s First Novel Prize, and the Aspen Words Literary Prize. Her most recent novel, Flores and Miss Paula, was published in December 2023. Born in Lima, Peru and raised in Brooklyn, she is a graduate of NYU and Brooklyn Law School, where she was an editor of the Brooklyn Law Review. Melissa still lives in Brooklyn with her family.
Website:
Facebook: mriveroauthor
X / Twitter: @melissa_rivero
Instagram: @melissarivero_author
