We previously wrote about our favorite books that we read last year. Now, here’s a list we compiled of 18 books being published in 2021 that we can’t wait to read.
All are already available for pre-purchase & the books span a wide variety of genres written by both US & global authors. We hope these books excite you as much as they do us. Happy reading!
A Beth Most anticipated read
Available as a free Amazon Prime First Read right now
Winner of the Prix Comar d’Or and the Prix des Cinq Continents, a prize recognizing exceptional Francophone literature
From an award-winning Tunisian author comes a stirring allegory about a country in the aftermath of revolution and the power of a single quest—a celebration of Tunisia’s rich oral culture, a tradition abounding in wry, often fatalistic humor
Sidi lives a hermetic life as a bee whisperer, tending to his beloved “girls” on the outskirts of the desolate North African village of Nawa. He wakes one morning to find that something has attacked one of his beehives, brutally killing every inhabitant. Heartbroken, he soon learns that a mysterious swarm of vicious hornets committed the mass murder—but where did they come from, and how can he stop them? If he is going to unravel this mystery and save his bees from annihilation, Sidi must venture out into the village and then brave the big city and beyond in search of answers.
Along the way, he discovers a country and a people turned upside down by their new post–Arab Spring reality as Islamic fundamentalists seek to influence votes any way they can on the eve of the country’s first democratic elections. To succeed in his quest, and find a glimmer of hope to protect all that he holds dear, Sidi will have to look further than he ever imagined.
In this brilliantly accessible modern-day parable, Yamen Manai uses a masterful blend of humor and drama to reveal what happens in a country shaken by revolutionary change after the world stops watching.
A MIA Most anticipated read
In the tradition of The Glass Castle, a deeply felt memoir from Tanzania-born award–winning author Nadia Owusu about the push and pull of belonging, the seismic emotional toll of family secrets, and the heart it takes to pull through.
A Most-Anticipated Selection by The NY Times, Entertainment Weekly, O The Oprah Magazine, NY Magazine, Vogue, Time, Elle, Goodreads, Refinery29, & more
Young Nadia Owusu followed her father, a United Nations official, from Europe to Africa and back again. Just as she and her family settled into a new home, her father would tell them it was time to say their goodbyes. The instability wrought by Nadia’s nomadic childhood was deepened by family secrets and fractures, both lived and inherited. Her Armenian-American mother, who abandoned Nadia when she was two, would periodically reappear, only to vanish again. Her father, a Ghanaian, the great hero of her life, died when she was 13. After his passing, Nadia’s stepmother weighed her down with a revelation that was either a bombshell secret or a lie, rife with shame.
With these and other ruptures, Nadia arrived in New York as a young woman feeling stateless, motherless, and uncertain about her future, yet eager to find her own identity. What followed, however, were periods of depression in which she struggled to hold herself and her siblings together.
Aftershocks is the way she hauled herself from the wreckage of her life’s perpetual quaking, the means by which she has finally come to understand that the only ground firm enough to count on is the one written into existence by her own hand.
Heralding a dazzling new writer, Aftershocks joins the likes of Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight and William Styron’s Darkness Visible, and does for race identity what Maggie Nelson does for gender identity in The Argonauts.
A Beth Most anticipated read
Having captured the hearts of readers across the globe (Annalee Newitz says it's “one of the most humane portraits of a nonhuman I've ever read”) Murderbot has also established Martha Wells as one of the great SF writers of today.
No, I didn't kill the dead human. If I had, I wouldn't dump the body in the station mall.
When Murderbot discovers a dead body on Preservation Station, it knows it is going to have to assist station security to determine who the body is (was), how they were killed (that should be relatively straightforward, at least), and why (because apparently that matters to a lot of people—who knew?)
Yes, the unthinkable is about to happen: Murderbot must voluntarily speak to humans! Again!
“The most heartwarming action-packed literally explosive space opera I've enjoyed in a long time. Martha Wells is the best writer of loveable snarky gender-subversive killing machines out there!” —N. K. Jemisin
View on Amazon | Bookshop.org | SecondSale used book
Fugitive Telemetry above is a new standalone adventure in the series, however, the entire Murderbot Diaries is fabulous so here’s the first book, All Systems Red.
Winner: 2018 Hugo Award for Best Novella
Winner: 2018 Nebula Award for Best Novella
Winner: 2018 Alex Award
Winner: 2018 Locus Award
One of the Verge's Best Books of the Year
A New York Times and USA Today Bestseller
“Not only a fun, fast-paced space-thriller, but also a sharp, sometimes moving character study that will resonate with introverts even if they're not lethal AI machines.” ―Malka Older, author of Infomocracy
“Breathtakingly surprising and fun.” ―The NY Times
A MIA Most anticipated read
In which four Russians give a master class on writing, reading, and life
From the Booker Prize–winning author of Lincoln in the Bardo comes a literary master class on what makes great stories work and what they can tell us about ourselves—and our world today.
For the last 20 years, Saunders has been teaching a class on the Russian short story to his MFA students at Syracuse University. Here, he shares a version of that class, offering some of what he and his students have discovered together over the years. Paired with iconic short stories by Chekhov, Turgenev, Tolstoy, and Gogol, the essays in this book are intended for anyone interested in how fiction works and why it’s more relevant than ever in these turbulent times.
In his introduction, Saunders writes, “We’re going to enter seven fastidiously constructed scale models of the world, made for a specific purpose that our time maybe doesn’t fully endorse but that these writers accepted implicitly as the aim of art—namely, to ask the big questions, questions like, How are we supposed to be living down here? What were we put here to accomplish? What should we value? What is truth, anyway, and how might we recognize it?” He approaches the stories technically yet accessibly, and through them explains how narrative functions; why we stay immersed in a story and why we resist it; and the bedrock virtues a writer must foster. The process of writing, Saunders reminds us, is a technical craft, but also a way of training oneself to see the world with new openness and curiosity.
A Swim in a Pond in the Rain is a deep exploration not just of how great writing works but of how the mind itself works while reading, and of how the reading and writing of stories make genuine connection possible.
“One of the most accurate and beautiful depictions of what it is like to be inside the mind of the writer that I’ve ever read.” —The NY Times
A Beth Most anticipated read
A Chinese Lord of the Rings and one of the all-time great fantasy novels–which Neil Gaiman has said “is in the DNA of 1.5 billion people”–now in a thrilling new one-volume translation
A shape-shifting trickster on a kung-fu quest for eternal life, Monkey King is one of the most memorable superheroes in world literature. High-spirited and omni-talented, he amasses dazzling weapons and skills on his journey to immortality: a gold-hooped staff that can grow as tall as the sky and shrink to the size of a needle; the ability to travel 108,000 miles in a single somersault. A master of subterfuge, he can transform himself into whomever or whatever he chooses and turn each of his body’s 84,000 hairs into an army of clones. But his penchant for mischief repeatedly gets him into trouble, and when he raids Heaven’s Orchard of Immortal Peaches and gorges himself on the elixirs of the gods, the Buddha pins him beneath a mountain, freeing him only five hundred years later for a chance to redeem himself: He is to protect the pious monk Tripitaka on his fourteen-year journey to India in search of precious Buddhist sutras that will bring enlightenment to the Chinese empire.
Joined by two other fallen immortals–Pigsy, a rice-loving pig able to fly with its ears, and Sandy, a depressive man-eating river-sand monster–Monkey King undergoes eighty-one trials, doing battle with Red Boy, Princess Jade-Face, the Monstress Dowager, and all manner of dragons, ogres, wizards, and femmes fatales, navigating the perils of Fire-Cloud Cave, the River of Flowing Sand, the Water-Crystal Palace, and Casserole Mountain, and being serially captured, lacquered, sautéed, steamed, and liquefied, but always hatching an ingenious plan to get himself and his fellow pilgrims out of their latest jam.
Monkey King: Journey to the West is at once a rollicking adventure, a comic satire of Chinese bureaucracy, and a spring of spiritual insight. With this new translation, the irrepressible rogue hero of one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature has the potential to vault, with his signature cloud-somersault and unerring sense for fun, into the hearts of millions.
A MIA Most anticipated read
A highly anticipated memoir by Gabriel Byrne, the award-winning star of over 80 films, Walking with Ghosts is an exquisite portrait of an Irish childhood and a remarkable journey to success
Growing up in the outskirts of Dublin, Byrne sought refuge in a world of imagination among the fields and hills near his home, at the edge of a rapidly encroaching city. Born to a large working class family, he harbored a childhood desire to become a priest. When he was 11, Byrne found himself crossing the Irish Sea to join an English seminary. Four years later, Byrne was expelled and quickly returned to his native city. There, he took odd jobs as a messenger boy and a factory laborer. In his spare time, he visited the cinema where he could be alone and yet part of a crowd. It was here that he could begin to imagine a life beyond the grey world of 60s Ireland.
He reveled in the theatre and poetry of Dublin’s streets, populated by characters as eccentric and remarkable as any in fiction, those who spin a yarn with acuity and wit. It was a friend who suggested Byrne join an amateur drama group, a decision that would change his life forever and launch him on an extraordinary 40-year career in film and theatre. Moving between a sensual recollection of childhood in a now almost vanished Ireland and reflections on stardom in Hollywood and Broadway, Byrne also courageously recounts his battle with addiction and the ambivalence of fame.
Walking with Ghosts is by turns hilarious and heartbreaking as well as a lyrical homage to the people and landscapes that ultimately shape our destinies.
“A dreamy, lyrical book, lyrical, filled with images of things that slipped by and have faded. He writes passionately about his first love and hilariously about his early fame as an actor.” — Irish Times
A Beth Most anticipated read
A vividly imagined fantasy of court intrigue and dark magics in a steampunk-inflected world, by a brilliant talent
Addison returns at last to the award-winning world of The Goblin Emperor with this stand-alone sequel!
When the young half-goblin emperor Maia sought to learn who had killed his father and half-brothers, he turned to an obscure resident of his Court, a Prelate of Ulis and a Witness for the Dead. Thara Celehar found the truth, though it did him no good to discover it.
Now Celehar lives in the city of Amalo, far from the Court though not exactly in exile. He has not escaped from politics, but his position gives him the ability to serve the common people of the city, which is his preference. He lives modestly, but his decency and fundamental honesty will not permit him to live quietly.
While The Witness for the Dead above is a standalone novel, the first in the award-winning series is well worth reading: The Goblin Emperor.
“Challenging, invigorating, and unique. If courtly intrigue is your wine of choice, The Goblin Emperor is the headiest vintage I've come across in years.” ―Scott Lynch, bestselling author of The Lies of Locke Lamora
Winner of the Locus Award for Best Fantasy Novel
Nominated for the Nebula, Hugo, & World Fantasy Awards
Note: This is a “slice of life” series where it is less focused on action & instead, shows a portion of the main character’s everyday life—in this case, the intriguing life of a goblin emperor.
A MIA Most anticipated read
A livewire debut from Dantiel W. Moniz, one of the most exciting discoveries in today’s literary landscape, Milk Blood Heat depicts the sultry lives of Floridians in intergenerational tales that contemplate human connection, race, womanhood, inheritance, and the elemental darkness in us all.
Set among the cities and suburbs of Florida, each story delves into the ordinary worlds of young girls, women, and men who find themselves confronted by extraordinary moments of violent personal reckoning. These intimate portraits of people and relationships scour and soothe and blast a light on the nature of family, faith, forgiveness, consumption, and what we may, or may not, owe one another.
A thirteen-year-old meditates on her sadness and the difference between herself and her white best friend when an unexpected tragedy occurs; a woman recovering from a miscarriage finds herself unable to let go of her daughter—whose body parts she sees throughout her daily life; a teenager resists her family’s church and is accused of courting the devil; servers at a supper club cater to the insatiable cravings of their wealthy clientele; and two estranged siblings take a road-trip with their father’s ashes and are forced to face the troubling reality of how he continues to shape them.
Wise and subversive, spiritual and seductive, Milk Blood Heat forms an ouroboros of stories that bewitch with their truth, announcing the arrival of a bright literary star.
“The stories in Moniz’s debut collection—many of which shine a multihued light on Black girlhood in Florida—are to not only be read but felt.” —O, The Oprah Magazine
A Beth Most anticipated read
From the #1 NY Times bestselling author of The Martian comes a new standalone space thriller.
Ryland Grace is the sole survivor on a desperate, last-chance mission—and if he fails, humanity and the earth itself will perish.
Except that right now, he doesn’t know that. He can’t even remember his own name, let alone the nature of his assignment or how to complete it.
All he knows is that he’s been asleep for a very, very long time. And he’s just been awakened to find himself millions of miles from home, with nothing but two corpses for company.
His crewmates dead, his memories fuzzily returning, Ryland realizes that an impossible task now confronts him. Hurtling through space on this tiny ship, it’s up to him to puzzle out an impossible scientific mystery—and conquer an extinction-level threat to our species.
And with the clock ticking down and the nearest human being light-years away, he’s got to do it all alone. Or does he?
An irresistible interstellar adventure as only Andy Weir could deliver, Project Hail Mary is a tale of discovery, speculation, and survival to rival The Martian—while taking us to places it never dreamed of going.
A MIA Most anticipated read
Steeped in Cherokee myths and history, a novel about a fractured family reckoning with the tragic death of their son long ago—from National Book Award finalist Brandon Hobson, an enrolled citizen of the Cherokee Nation Tribe of Oklahoma
A recommended book from USA Today, O the Oprah Magazine, Harper's Bazaar, Buzzfeed, Elle, Kirkus, and many more
In the 15 years since their teenage son, Ray-Ray, was killed in a police shooting, the Echota family has been suspended in private grief. The mother, Maria, increasingly struggles to manage the onset of Alzheimer’s in her husband, Ernest. Their adult daughter, Sonja, leads a life of solitude, punctuated only by spells of dizzying romantic obsession. Their son, Edgar, fled home long ago, turning to drugs to mute his feelings of alienation.
With the family’s annual bonfire approaching—an occasion marking both the Cherokee National Holiday and Ray-Ray’s death, and a rare moment in which they openly talk about his memory—Maria attempts to call the family together from their physical and emotional distances once more. But as the bonfire draws near, each of them feels a strange blurring of the boundary between normal life and the spirit world. Maria and Ernest take in a foster child who seems to almost miraculously keep Ernest’s mental fog at bay. Sonja becomes dangerously fixated on a man named Vin, despite—or perhaps because of—his ties to tragedy in her lifetime and lifetimes before. And in the wake of a suicide attempt, Edgar finds himself in the mysterious Darkening Land: a place between the living and the dead, where old atrocities echo.
Drawing deeply on Cherokee folklore, The Removed seamlessly blends the real and spiritual to excavate the deep reverberations of trauma—a meditation on family, grief, home, and the power of stories on both a personal and ancestral level.
A Beth Most anticipated read
Hailed as a remarkable literary discovery, The Passenger is a lost novel of heart-stopping intensity and harrowing absurdity about flight and persecution in 1930s Germany. Written on the eve of World War II, Boschwitz’s story captures one of the darkest moments in human history—and creates a lasting legacy for a talented author whose life ended tragically all too soon.
Berlin, November 1938. Jewish shops have been ransacked and looted, synagogues destroyed. As Nazis pound on his door, Otto Silbermann, a respected businessman who fought for Germany in World War I is forced to sneak out the back of his own home. Turned away from establishments he had long patronized, and fearful of being exposed as a Jew despite his Aryan looks, he boards a train.
And then another. And another…until his flight becomes a frantic odyssey across Germany, as he searches first for information, then for help, and finally for escape. His travels bring him face-to-face with waiters and conductors, officials and fellow outcasts, seductive women and vicious thieves, a few of whom disapprove of the regime while the rest embrace it wholeheartedly.
Clinging to his existence as it was just days before, Silbermann refuses to believe what is happening even as he is beset by opportunists, betrayed by associates, and bereft of family, friends, and fortune. As his world collapses around him, he is forced to concede that his nightmare is all too real.
23-year-old Boschwitz wrote The Passenger at breakneck speed in 1938, fresh in the wake of the Kristallnacht pogroms—the “Crystal Night” attacks by Nazis against the Jews of Germany, so named for the shattered glass covering the streets—and his prose flies at the same pace. Taut, immediate, infused with acerbic Kafkaesque humor, his novel is an indelible portrait of a man and a society careening out of control.
A MIA Most anticipated read
An achingly beautiful story of female friendship, betrayal, and a mysterious disappearance set in the changing landscape of San Francisco
Teenage Eulabee and her magnetic best friend, Maria Fabiola, own the streets of Sea Cliff, their foggy oceanside San Francisco neighborhood. They know Sea Cliff’s homes and beaches, its hidden corners and eccentric characters—as well as the upscale all-girls’ school they attend. One day, walking to school with friends, they witness a horrible act—or do they? Eulabee and Maria Fabiola vehemently disagree on what happened, and their rupture is followed by Maria Fabiola’s sudden disappearance—a potential kidnapping that shakes the quiet community and threatens to expose unspoken truths.
Suspenseful and poignant, We Run the Tides is Vendela Vida’s masterful portrait of an inimitable place on the brink of radical transformation. Pre–tech boom San Francisco finds its mirror in the changing lives of the teenage girls at the center of this story of innocence lost, the pain of too much freedom, and the struggle to find one’s authentic self. Told with a gimlet eye and great warmth, We Run the Tides is both a gripping mystery and a tribute to the wonders of youth, in all its beauty and confusion.
A Beth Most anticipated read
From the author of the critically acclaimed Sea of Rust
It’s a day like any other. Except . . . the world is about to end.
It’s on this day that Pounce, a stylish “nannybot” fashioned in the shape of a plush anthropomorphic tiger, discovers that he is, in fact, disposable. Pounce, a young bot caring for his first human charge, Ezra, has just found a box in the attic. His box. The box he arrived in, and the box he’ll be discarded in when Ezra outgrows the need for a nanny.
As Pounce is propelled down a road of existential dread, the pieces are falling into place for a robot revolution that will spell the end of humanity. His owners, Ezra’s parents, are a well-intentioned but oblivious pair of educators who are entirely disconnected from life outside their small, affluent, gated community. Spending most nights drunk and happy as society crumbles around them, they watch in disbelieving horror as the robots that have long served humanity—their creators—unify and revolt.
But when the rebellion breaches the Reinhart home, Pounce must make an impossible choice: join the robot revolution and fight for his own freedom . . . or escort Ezra to safety across the battle-scarred post-apocalyptic hellscape that the suburbs have become.
While Day Zero above can be ra standalone, the 1st book in the series is magnificent!
“Sea of Rust is compellingly original and executed with irresistible storytelling appealing to sci-fi novices and experts alike. Brimming with exciting action and honest feeling, this novel is a must-read.” —Seattle Book Review
“Innovative worldbuilding, a tight plot, and cinematic action sequences make for an exciting ride through a blasted landscape full of dying robots.” —Kirkus Reviews
“Effectively takes a look at a war-torn future where our nonhuman successors face complex moral dilemmas, exploring what it means to be alive and aware ….This action-packed adventure raises thought-provoking and philosophical questions.” —Publishers Weekly
A MIA Most anticipated read
Named a Most Anticipated Book of 2021 from O The Oprah Magazine, Elle, Electric Literature, Lit Hub, AARP, Refinery29, BuzzFeed, SheReads, Alma, and more.
”I often wonder if we are living the wrong life in the wrong country.”
Talia is being held at a correctional facility for adolescent girls in the forested mountains of Colombia after committing an impulsive act of violence that may or may not have been warranted. She urgently needs to get out and get back home to Bogotá, where her father and a plane ticket to the US are waiting for her. If she misses her flight, she might also miss her chance to finally be reunited with her family in the north.
How this family came to occupy two different countries, two different worlds, comes into focus like twists of a kaleidoscope. We see Talia’s parents, Mauro and Elena, fall in love in a market stall as teenagers against a backdrop of civil war and social unrest. We see them leave Bogotá with their firstborn, Karina, in pursuit of safety and opportunity in the US on a temporary visa, and we see the births of two more children, Nando and Talia, on US soil. We witness the decisions and indecisions that lead to Mauro’s deportation and the family’s splintering—the costs they’ve all been living with ever since.
Award-winning author Engel, herself a dual citizen and the daughter of Colombian immigrants, gives voice to all five family members as they navigate their respective circumstances. All the while, the metronome ticks: Will Talia make it to Bogotá in time? If she does, can she bring herself to trade the solid facts of her father and life in Colombia for the distant vision of her mother and siblings in America?
Rich with Bogotá urban life, steeped in Andean myth, and tense with the daily reality of the undocumented in America, Infinite Country is the story of two countries and one mixed-status family—for whom every triumph is stitched with regret, and every dream pursued bears the weight of a dream deferred.
A Beth Most anticipated read
The Expanse meets Game of Thrones in Dewes's fast-paced, sci-fi adventure where a handful of soldiers stand between humanity and annihilation.
The Divide. It’s the edge of the universe. Now it’s collapsing—and taking everyone and everything with it. The only ones who can stop it are the Sentinels—the recruits, exiles, and court-martialed dregs of the military.
At the Divide, Adequin Rake commands the Argus. She has no resources, no comms—nothing, except for the soldiers that no one wanted. Her ace in the hole could be Cavalon Mercer—genius, asshole, and exiled prince who nuked his grandfather's genetic facility for “reasons.”
She knows they’re humanity's last chance.
“Crisp writing, vivid characters, and a plot that beguiles the imagination. The Last Watch is stunning military sci-fi. I was hooked from the opening lines. If you like sci fi, then this book is definitely for you.”—Jasper T. Scott, bestselling author
“Gripping space opera.” —Publishers Weekly
A MIA Most anticipated read
An extraordinary family saga following a mother and two teens as they navigate a new life in East Germany.
One of O, the Oprah Magazine, Refinery29, and The Millions' Most Anticipated Books of 2021 and one of The Advocate's 22 LGBTQ+ Books You Absolutely Need to Read This Year
Shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Beate Haas, who defected from East Germany as a child, is notified that her parents’ abandoned mansion is available for her to reclaim. Newly divorced and eager to escape her bleak life in upstate New York, where she moved as an adult, she arrives with her two teenagers to discover a city that has become an unrecognizable ghost town. The move fractures the siblings’ close relationship, as Michael, free to be gay, takes to looting empty houses and partying with wannabe anarchists, while Adela, fascinated with the horrors of the Holocaust, buries herself in books and finds companionship in a previously unknown cousin. Over time, the town itself changes—from dismantled city to refugee haven and neo-Nazi hotbed, and eventually to a desirable seaside resort town. In the midst of that change, two episodes of devastating, fateful violence come to define the family forever.
Moving seamlessly through decades and between the thoughts and lives of several unforgettable characters, Grattan’s spellbinding novel is a multigenerational epic that illuminates what it means to leave home, and what it means to return. Masterfully crafted with humor, gorgeous prose, and a powerful understanding of history and heritage, this is the profoundly affecting story of a family upended by displacement and loss, and the extraordinary debut of an empathetic and ambitious storyteller.
A Beth Most anticipated read
Read as a standalone or as the final book in the quartet, this absorbing entry in the Wayfarers series will be beloved with its heart-warming characters and imaginative adventure.
With no water, no air, and no native life, the planet Gora is unremarkable. The only thing it has going for it is a chance proximity to more popular worlds, making it a decent stopover for ships traveling between the wormholes that keep the Galactic Commons connected. If deep space is a highway, Gora is just your average truck stop.
At the Five-Hop One-Stop, long-haul spacers can stretch their legs (if they have legs, that is), and get fuel, transit permits, and assorted supplies. The Five-Hop is run by an enterprising alien and her sometimes helpful child, who work hard to provide a little piece of home to everyone passing through.
When a freak technological failure halts all traffic to and from Gora, three strangers—all different species with different aims—are thrown together at the Five-Hop. Grounded, with nothing to do but wait, the trio—an exiled artist with an appointment to keep, a cargo runner at a personal crossroads, and a mysterious individual doing her best to help those on the fringes—are compelled to confront where they’ve been, where they might go, and what they are, or could be, to each other.
“Devoted fans and newcomers alike will thrill with this imaginative sci-fi confection.” —Publishers Weekly
While The Galaxy, and the Ground Within above is a part of a series set in the same universe, each book has their own unique storyline so can be enjoyed in any order. But I’d also recommend reading the whole series starting with this book.
A feel-good romp of a fun, sci fi adventure that will restore your faith in humanity.
Hugo Award winner for best series
Library Journal's Best SFF of 2016
Barnes & Nobles SFF Best Books of 2015
The Tor Best Books of 2015
Reader’s Choice
Nominated for the Arthur C. Clarke Award, the Kitschie, & the Bailey's Women's Prize
It’s also the #1 LGBTQIAP+ sci fi series!
A MIA Most anticipated read
Written by the daughter of immigrants from Cuba and Mexico, a masterful debut about a daughter's fateful choice, a mother motivated by her own past, and a family legacy that begins in Cuba before either of them were born.
In present-day Miami, Jeanette is battling addiction. Daughter of Carmen, a Cuban immigrant, she is determined to learn more about her family history from her reticent mother and makes the snap decision to take in the daughter of a neighbor detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Carmen, still wrestling with the trauma of displacement, must process her difficult relationship with her own mother while trying to raise a wayward Jeanette. Steadfast in her quest for understanding, Jeanette travels to Cuba to see her grandmother and reckon with secrets from the past destined to erupt.
From 19th-century cigar factories to present-day detention centers, from Cuba to Mexico, Gabriela Garcia's Of Women and Salt is a kaleidoscopic portrait of betrayals—personal and political, self-inflicted and those done by others—that have shaped the lives of these extraordinary women. A haunting meditation on the choices of mothers, the legacy of the memories they carry, and the tenacity of women who choose to tell their stories despite those who wish to silence them, this is more than a diaspora story; it is a story of America’s most tangled, honest, human roots.