Stories rooted in Latine families, language, and everyday joy.
This hub is family and language as they actually sound at the table. Latine kids on InclusiReads get to be poets, motel clerks, crush-havers, and kids who cannot remember the Island. They are not a heritage-month display.
We look for books that keep Spanish, English, or both attached to the life on the page. We look for joy and work in the same story. We skip titles that flatten every country into one carnival.
Islandborn is for kids born here with a somewhere-else in the family. Dreamers is arrival and a library. Front Desk is middle grade with a notebook and a fight worth having. The Poet X is YA verse that sounds like a girl talking.
Immigration stories overlap this shelf on purpose. If the journey is the point, also open immigration books. If the life after arriving is the point, stay here. The Poet X is also on the YA shelf because a notebook and a church and a girl's mouth are a life, not a heritage unit.
We use Latine as a finding aid for who appears, or what the book is about. We do not guess an author's identity from a surname. Policy: what tags mean.
Related guides: Kids' Books About Immigration and Belonging · Starting an Inclusive YA Shelf
10 books · Clear filters
Ages 8–12
The First Rule of PunkCelia C. Pérez
Twelve-year-old María Luisa O'Neill-Morales (who really prefers to be called Malú) reluctantly moves with her Mexican-American mother to Chicago and starts seventh grade with a bang--violating the dress code with her punk rock aesthetic and spurning the middle school's most popular girl in favor of starting a band with a group of like-minded weirdos.
Ages 8–12
Merci Suárez Changes GearsMeg Medina
Winner of the Newbery Medal A New York Times Bestseller Thoughtful, strong-willed sixth-grader Merci Suarez navigates difficult changes with friends, family, and everyone in between in a resonant new novel from Meg Medina.
Ages 8–12
Esperanza RisingPam Muñoz Ryan
Esperanza and her mother are forced to leave their life of wealth and privilege in Mexico to go work in the labor camps of Southern California, where they must adapt to the harsh circumstances facing Mexican farm workers on the eve of the ...
Ages 8–12
InvisibleChristina Diaz Gonzalez
This Breakfast Club--inspired story by Christina Diaz Gonzalez, award-winning author of Concealed, and Gabriela Epstein, illustrator of two Baby-Sitters Club graphic novel adaptations, is a must-have graphic novel about unexpected ...
Ages 8–12
Sal and Gabi Break the UniverseCarlos Hernandez
Best-selling author Rick Riordan presents a brilliant sci-fi romp with Cuban influence that poses this question: What would you do if you had the power to reach through time and space and retrieve anything you want, including your mother, ...
Ages 8–12
I Lived on Butterfly HillMarjorie Agosín
Celeste Marconi’s peaceful life on Butterfly Hill in Valparaíso, Chile, ends when a dictatorship takes hold. She is sent to Maine while her parents go into hiding — a Pura Belpré Medal novel about exile, waiting, and finding a way home.
Ages 8–12
Return to SenderJulia Alvarez
After Tyler’s family hires undocumented Mexican workers to save their Vermont farm, he becomes close with Mari Cruz. Letters between the two children hold a secret that could split both families apart. Pura Belpré Medal.
Ages 8–12
The Only RoadAlexandra Diaz
After a gang kills his cousin in Guatemala, twelve-year-old Jaime and his sister Ángela flee north toward the United States. A Pura Belpré Honor about the journey families should not have to make.
Ages 8–12
90 Miles to HavanaEnrique Flores-Galbis
Julian and his brothers leave Havana on Operation Pedro Pan and land in a Miami camp where bullies run the yard. Inspired by the author’s childhood. Pura Belpré Honor.
Ages 8–12
Breaking ThroughFrancisco Jiménez
Jiménez’s memoir continues after The Circuit: a migrant farmworker student in 1950s California fights to stay in school. Pura Belpré Honor.
