Adrianna Cuevas – författare

From Pura Belpré Honor–winning author Adrianna Cuevas comes Mari and the Curse of El Cocodrilo, a new middle grade novel about a young Cuban American girl who must fight to break a curse of bad luck set upon her by El Cocodrilo when she rejects her family’s traditions.

If Mari Feijoo could, she would turn her family’s Peak Cubanity down a notch, just enough so that her snooping neighbor and classmate Mykenzye wouldn’t have anything to tease her about. That’s why this year, there’s no way that Mari’s joining in on one of the big-gest Feijoo family traditions—burning the New Year’s Eve effigy her abuela makes.

Only Mari never suspects that failing to toss her effigy in the fire would bring something much worse than sneering words at school: a curse of bad luck from El Cocodrilo. At first, it’s just possessed violins and grade sabotaging pencils, but once El Cocodrilo learns that he becomes more powerful with each new misery, her luck goes from bad to nightmarish as the curse spreads to her friend Keisha.

Instead of focusing on Mari’s mariachi band tryout and Keisha’s fencing tournament, the pair, along with their friend Juan Carlos, are racing against the clock to break the curse. But when Mari discovers her family’s gift to call upon their ancestors, she and her friends will have to find a way to work with the unexpected help that arrives from the far corners of Mari’s family tree. Only will it be enough to defeat El Cocodrilo before he makes their last year of elementary school the worst ever and tears their friendship apart?

2021 Pura Belpré Honor BookNYPL Best Book of 20202020 Evanston Public Library Great Books for KidsIn this magical middle-grade debut novel from Adrianna Cuevas, The Total Eclipse of Nestor Lopez, a Cuban American boy must use his secret ability to communicate with animals to save the inhabitants of his town when they are threatened by a tule vieja, a witch that transforms into animals.All Nestor Lopez wants is to live in one place for more than a few months and have dinner with his dad.When he and his mother move to a new town to live with his grandmother after his dad’s latest deployment, Nestor plans to lay low. He definitely doesn’t want to anyone find out his deepest secret: that he can talk to animals. But when the animals in his new town start disappearing, Nestor''s grandmother becomes the prime suspect after she is spotted in the woods where they were last seen. As Nestor investigates the source of the disappearances, he learns that they are being seized by a tule vieja—a witch who can absorb an animal’s powers by biting it during a solar eclipse. And the next eclipse is just around the corner…Now it’s up to Nestor’s extraordinary ability and his new friends to catch the tule vieja—and save a place he might just call home.

From Pura Belpré Honoree Adrianna Cuevas is a sweeping, emotional middle grade historical novel about a twelve-year-old boy who leaves his family in Cuba to immigrate to the U.S. by himself, based on the author''s family history.“I don’t remember. Tell me everything, Pepito. Tell me about Cuba.”When the failed Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961 solidifies Castro’s power in Cuba, twelve-year-old Cumba’s family makes the difficult decision to send him to Florida alone. Faced with the prospect of living in another country by himself, Cumba tries to remember the sound of his father’s clarinet, the smell of his mother’s lavender perfume.Life in the United States presents a whole new set of challenges. Lost in a sea of English speakers, Cumba has to navigate a new city, a new school, and new freedom all on his own. With each day, Cumba feels more confident in his new surroundings, but he continues to wonder: Will his family ever be whole again? Or will they remain just out of reach, ninety miles across the sea?A Kirkus Best Children''s Book of the Year 2024 Middle Grade Read Aloud list "...Cuevas’ latest is a triumph of the heart...A compassionate, emotionally astute portrait of a young Cuban in exile." —Kirkus, STARRED REVIEW"Cuevas’ intense and immersive account of a Cuban boy’s experience after the failed Bay of Pigs Invasion brings a specific point in history alive." —Booklist, STARRED REVIEW"Cuevas packs this sophomore novel with palpable emotions and themes of friendship, love, longing, and trauma, attentively conveying tumultuous historical events from the lens of one young refugee." — Publishers Weekly, STARRED REVIEW

An Edgar Award winning middle grade mystery by Adrianna Cuevas—author of the Pura Belpré Honor Book The Total Eclipse of Nestor Lopez—perfect for fans of Claribel Ortega''s The Ghost Squad and Louis Sachar''s Holes.''Rafa would rather live in the world of The Forgotten Age, his favorite fantasy role-playing game, than face his father’s increasing restrictions and his mother’s fading presence. But when Rafa and his friends decide to take the game out into the real world and steal their school cafeteria''s slushie machine, his dad concocts a punishment Rafa never could’ve imagined—a month working on a ranch in New Mexico, far away from his friends, their game, and his mom’s quesitos in Miami. Life at Rancho Espanto isn’t as bad as Rafa initially expected, mostly due to Jennie, a new friend with similarly strong opinions about Cuban and Korean snacks, and Marcus, the veteran barn manager who''s not as gruff as he appears. But when Rafa''s work at the ranch is inexplicably sabotaged by a man (or a ghost) who may not be what he seems, Rafa and Jennie explore what''s behind the strange events at Rancho Espanto—and discover that the greatest mystery may have been with Rafa all along.2024 Edgar Award Winner2025 Rhode Island Middle School Book Award ListVermont Golden Dome Book Award ListNew Mexico Battle of the Books selection for Elementary and Middle School

From Pura Belpré Honoree and Edgar Award Winner Adrianna Cuevas comes an out-of-this-world middle grade adventure, based on true historical events, perfect for fans of The Goonies and Stranger Things.All Pineda Matlage wants is to get through the school year and maybe pull an epic prank or two with his friends Junior, Ernesto, and Patsy. But class is disrupted when a slew of American soldiers descends upon their rural Texan town of Soledad. They’ll be carrying out a training exercise and taking over everything, from Pineda’s school to the local government.But Pineda knows why they’re really here. For days he’s hidden the strange creature who fell from the sky in his parents’ barn. He promised her he’d find her family and help them return home. But with soldiers now on every street corner and armed checkpoints across every road, reuniting his new friend with her missing parents seems an impossible task. Especially when they realize that the army’s presence is really a coverup for capturing his alien friends—being observed in a laboratory by the US government for reasons of their own.Enlisting the help of his friends, a Black soldier adjusting to a newly integrated army, and townspeople tired of the military’s destructive presence, Pineda and all of Soledad will embark on an adventure none of them could have ever expected.

ADRIANNA CUEVAS, GANADORA DE LA MENCIÓN DE HONOR PURA BELPRÉ Y DEL PREMIO EDGAR, nos trae una nueva novela de fantasía para nivel medio sobre un niño cubanoamericano, cuyo castigo por una travesura en la escuela que terminó mal es enviarlo a trabajar a un rancho donde se enfrentará a un inquietante misterio sobrenatural.Rafa prefiere vivir en el mundo de La Era Olvidada —su juego de roles de fantasía preferido— antes que enfrentarse a las progresivas restricciones de su padre y a la presencia cada vez más deteriorada de su madre. Pero cuando Rafa y sus amigos deciden trasladar el juego al mundo real y robar la máquina de granizados de la cafetería de la escuela, su padre le impone un castigo que Rafa jamás se habría imaginado: un mes de trabajo en un rancho en Nuevo México, alejado de sus amigos, de su juego y de los quesitos de su mamá en Miami.La vida en Rancho Espanto no es tan terrible como Rafa imagina en un principio, más que nada gracias a Jennie, una nueva amiga con opiniones casi tan firmes como las de Rafa sobre los bocaditos, y a Marcus, el veterano encargado de la caballeriza que no es tan hosco como parece. Pero cuando el trabajo de Rafa en Rancho Espanto se ve inexplicablemente saboteado por un hombre que tal vez no sea lo que aparenta ser, Rafa y Jennie exploran lo que hay detrás de los acontecimientos extraños en Rancho Espanto… y descubren que el mayor misterio podría haber estado con Rafa desde un principio.

Lo único que Néstor López quiere es vivir en un mismo lugar por más de unos meses y cenar con su papá.Después de que el papá de Néstor se marcha a otra misión, el muchacho y su mamá se mudan a un nuevo pueblo a vivir con su abuela. Néstor planea pasar desapercibido, y de ninguna manera quiere que nadie sepa su secreto más profundo: que puede hablar con los animales.Pero cuando los animales del pueblo comienzan a desaparecer, la abuela de Néstor se convierte en la principal sospechosa después de ser vista en el mismo bosque donde fueron vistos los animales por última vez. A medida que Néstor investiga la fuente de las desapariciones, descubre que los animales han sido capturados por una criatura misteriosa cuyo poder crece durante los eclipses de sol. Y el próximo eclipse está a la vuelta de la esquina…Les toca a Néstor —con su extraordinaria habilidad— y a sus amigos atrapar al culpable y salvar el sitio que tal vez él podría llamar su hogar.

«No recuerdo. Cuéntamelo todo, Pepito. Cuéntame de Cuba».Cuando la fallida invasión de Bahía de Cochinos en 1961 solidifica el poder de Castro en Cuba, la familia de Cumba, de doce años, toma la difícil decisión de enviarlo solo a la Florida. Ante la idea de vivir en otro país por sí mismo, Cumba intenta recordar el sonido del clarinete de su padre, el olor del perfume de lavanda de su madre.La vida en Estados Unidos presenta toda una nueva serie de desafíos. Perdido en un mar de angloparlantes, Cumba tiene que navegar una nueva ciudad, una nueva escuela y una nueva libertad por su propia cuenta. Con cada día que pasa, Cumba se siente más confiado en su nuevo entorno, pero continúa preguntándose si su familia volverá a estar completa otra vez. ¿O acaso sus familiares se mantendrán fuera de su alcance, a 90 millas, al otro lado del mar?