If you read and liked one of these books, you might enjoy this title as well!
Goodreads Summary:
A young girl in Harlem discovers slam poetry as a way to understand her mother’s religion and her own relationship to the world.
Xiomara Batista feels unheard and unable to hide in her Harlem neighborhood. Ever since her body grew into curves, she has learned to let her fists and her fierceness do the talking. But Xiomara has plenty she wants to say, and she pours all her frustration and passion onto the pages of a leather notebook, reciting the words to herself like prayers—especially after she catches feelings for a boy in her bio class named Aman, who her family can never know about. With Mami’s determination to force her daughter to obey the laws of the church, Xiomara understands that her thoughts are best kept to herself.
So when she is invited to join her school’s slam poetry club, she doesn’t know how she could ever attend without her mami finding out, much less speak her words out loud. But still, she can’t stop thinking about performing her poems. Because in the face of a world that may not want to hear her, Xiomara refuses to be silent.
Elizabeth Acevedo is a New York Times bestselling author and a National Poetry Slam Champion.
The Poet X won the National Book Award for Young People’s Literature, the Michael L. Printz Award, the Pura Belpré Award, the Carnegie medal, the Boston Globe–Horn Book Award, and the Walter Award.
She holds a BA in Performing Arts from The George Washington University and an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Maryland.
Other books by Elizabeth Acevedo: