Best Fiction for Young Adults (#BFYA2022) Featured Review of A Cuban Girl’s Guide to Tea and Tomorrow by Laura Taylor Namey

Cover Art

A Cuban Girl’s Guide to Tea and Tomorrow by Laura Taylor Namey
Atheneum Books for Young Readers/Simon & Schuster
Publication Date: November 10, 2020
ISBN: 978-1534471245 

Cuban-American Lila Reyes is grief-stricken after the death of her abuela and breakups with her best friend and her boyfriend. Her parents send her from vibrant, sunny Miami to gloomy old England for a change of scenery and a chance to heal, but Lila has a plan for her life, and it involves running the family bakery with her sister after high school instead of summer at her cousins’ English inn. Determined not to enjoy herself, Lila nevertheless cannot resist the call of the inn’s kitchen, which dares her to mix Cuban spice with traditional British baking. Soon, a group of friends (including the cute, thoughtful boy whose family owns the village tea shop) makes life in England not only bearable but thoroughly enjoyable. Now Lila is doing more than falling in love with her new home — she’s questioning everything she thought she knew and everything she thought she wanted.    

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Quick Picks for Reluctant Readers (#QP2020) Nominees Round Up, April 16 Edition

Bloom by Kevin Panetta & Savanna Ganucheau
First Second/MacMillan
Publication Date: January 29, 2019
ISBN: 978-1250196910

Ari is desperate to leave his family’s Greek bakery and move to the city with his band after high school graduation. His family is reluctant to let him go, but they hire Hector, a charming Samoan cooking school student, as a trial replacement. Hector and Ari become fast friends while working in the bakery, and maybe even more–provided that Ari doesn’t mess it up. Ganucheau’s blue, black, and white art conveys the sum of Hector and Ari’s emotions gracefully and quietly, while also celebrating the detailed, precise art of baking.

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