The Girls from Humboldt Park

Set in 1970s Chicago, a radiant story of personal and political revolution within a tight-knit Puerto Rican community. Over two thousand miles away from their ancestral island, Rosalinda Acevedo and her friends must adhere to their parents’ traditional expectations for Puerto Rican girls: Do not make eye contact with adults, never talk back, and build a fence so high that the boys can’t climb it. But it’s 1976, and with the United States Bicentennial approaching, radical change is in the air in Chicago—and police surveillance is only heightening tensions. When a “Free the Five” poster catches Rosalinda’s attention, the girls meet a group of Puerto Rican independentistas, who introduce them to a history their parents and community have kept hidden—one of revolution and resistance. In turn, the girls keep secrets of their own, as they navigate family obligations, predatory teachers, and sisterhood. Written in Marisel Vera’s signature vibrant prose, brimming with humor and righteous anger, The Girls from Humboldt Park excavates the heartbreak of exile and the thrill of political awakening within the Puerto Rican diaspora.