The Epic Fail of Arturo Zamora
Arturo lives in an apartment complex in Miami along with most of the rest of his extended, close, chaotic Cuban American family. At the center of their lives are Abuela and La Cocina de la Isla, the restaurant she began with Arturo’s late grandfather. With Abuela’s health in question, no one wants to tell her about the threat to the proposed expansion of the restaurant into the empty lot next door: a new, buffoonish developer in town has plans for an upscale high-rise. At the heart of this lively story are important questions: How do communities shape and value individuals; how do individuals shape communities? How do differing ideas of what constitutes “progress,” including gentrification, impact community, and the family that community can be? They are explored in a blithe narrative featuring a slightly lovesick middle schooler (Arturo is trying to figure out if visiting Carmen likes him the same way he likes her) trying to help his family convince the city council to vote in favor of their restaurant’s proposal. Arturo finds inspiration for both his ideals and love in the poetry of Jose Marti, the Cuban poet and activist whom, he learns, his late grandfather loved (and Carmen does, too). ©2017 Cooperative Children’s Book Center
CCBC Age Recommendation: Ages 10-13
Age Range:
Grades 3-5 (Ages 8-10)
Grades 6-8 (Ages 11-13)
Format:
Novel
Subjects:
Activism and Resistance
City Life
Community
Cubans and Cuban Americans
Economic Privilege
Families
Grandmothers
Illness and Disease
Love and Romance
Politics and Political Systems
Work and Labor
Writers and Writing
Diversity subject:
Latinx
Publisher:
Viking
Publish Year: 2017
Pages: 236
ISBN: 9781101997239
CCBC Location: Fiction, Cartaya