- Going on, everybody.
Welcome to the anos.
This is your non monolithic look
- At the Latina community at our rasa.
And, uh, we're coming at you every couple of weeks
to share stories where I just a little chito from the east
side, uh, comes in here
and has conversations with folks from munida
and folks connected to the work that we do.
Um, and to the stories that need to be uplifted.
We're always uplifting quintos.
And in the spirit of uplifting these quintos,
you're gonna really like our, our guests that we have today.
And I'll introduce her in just one second.
Um, but if you're hearing us for the first time, um,
the Chicano Logs is a two dope production.
You can, uh, subscribe to us on social media
by following at two dope teachers on Instagram, on Twitter,
on where else are we?
We're on Facebook. We've got a TikTok
that we never upload anything to, but, um,
but we're responsive to things there.
Um, if you have show ideas, if you have feedback,
if you would like to just get connect connected
with Tudo Nation, you can hit us up,
tudo teachers@gmail.com.
And if you're excited about supporting an uplifting people
of color created independent media, um,
you can support us on Patreon,
patreon.com/two dope teachers.
Um, and then at the break we'll tell you a little bit about
our sponsor, satter in Investors.
So, I'm here on an unseasonably warm day
in, uh, Denver, Colorado.
Although my guest probably wouldn't consider this warm
given that she's in California.
Um, we have an amazing guest today, journalist,
publisher award-winning author, Leticia Oras.
Welcome to the Chica Monologues.
- Thank you. It's so great to be here with you, ardal.
You're an amazing person, and thank you
for sharing my story.
- Uh, no. You okay, .
Um, so we, we met at the, uh, conference for the Association
of Latino Administrators and superintendents in San Antonio,
and just really enjoyed the conversation that we had,
and just getting to know the work that,
that you've been doing, that you've been hustling towards.
I, I don't think you understand how much it inspired me
to just, you know, continue
to do the stuff that matters to me.
So it was a really fun, um, you know, conversation
and just super honored that you're here on the show.
Um, so I wanna start off
with just a little bit of your story.
We're all about just kind of knowing who people are, who,
who are the folks that show up into, um,
into our lives and our spaces.
Um, so how did your life experiences lead you into this
world of storytelling?
It seems like that's kind of the,
that's the umbrella over the work
that you do is telling stories.
So as a journalist, as an author, as a publisher,
- Absolutely.
Or I'm an immigrant child. My parents are immigrants.
I grew up in a small town in Northern California
and growing up I never saw books that reflected me.
And I think that's all how I got started
with my publishing world
and my desire to publish books, just not feeling
represented like something was missing in my life.
I really enjoyed books,
but boy would I have loved to have seen someone
who looked like me on the cover of a book
as characters in books.
So that's where it all began.
There was a huge void in my life growing up
because of that, you know, a lack of literacy
and culturally relevant books.
And then when I became a mother, I continued
to search for those stories.
And sadly, a lot of those stories still weren't there
and weren't being authentically told.
So that's when I decided to write my own stories.
And that's how I created Alito Lindo books specifically
because when I began submitting my story to publishers,
one specific giant publisher said, we love your idea.
We love your concept for Mr.
Maca, but does it have to be in Spanish?
Because I write bilingual books.
So that kind of hit me hard
because this publisher also said,
why do you wanna market to this community?
Because Latinos don't read?
And I'm like, what are you talking about? Yeah.
So that, that's when we have to create change.
If we don't see the books out there that we want,
then it's our responsibility to write them.
- Let's, let's dig into that a little bit.
'cause there are a couple of pieces I think are really
important for the audience to hear right now.
Um, the first is the power of representation.
Like, I think that this is a term that
that gets used a lot in, in public discourse,
and yet we haven't seen significant changes in
how our communities are represented.
So talk a little bit about what that, what,
what representation means in our community
and in communities of color in general.
- When I started writing books, I wanted
to do it for my children.
I said, how important would it be for them
to grow up knowing that their culture is beautiful,
that the color of their skin is beautiful,
that everything about them is perfect.
And so I began writing books with them as characters,
my two little boys as characters, Maxton and Bronx.
And it, it really exploded
because, uh, when I finally published my books my Way
and took them out to schools kids on Zoom,
because we had to first do it through the virtual world,
it was 2020, uh, March of 2020 when my first book came out.
So all these plans, I had to,
to do a nationwide book tour kind of got stomped,
but it didn't stop my mission.
I was able to, to reach out through social media,
and so many people got behind my mission,
and all of a sudden I was reading to kids nationally
and nationwide schools were opening their doors to me,
and I was doing zooms with them
and doing assemblies, uh, virtually.
And after I would present the book, I would have q and a
and a lot of the kids would be crying like tears in their
eyes during q and a,
and I would ask them what, you know,
impacted them about the book book.
And they said that the characters looked like them.
It said, those kids in that book look like me.
And they were just so proud of that.
It wasn't, it was happy tears.
It was like finally, oh yeah, yeah, I'm being seen.
And even them being so little, sometimes people think, oh,
they don't notice, they notice. Right,
- Right.
Yeah, I know they noticed. I was just gonna say that, right?
Because I think like there is this notion that
young children are just kind of like
wandering cluelessly throughout the world,
and they don't think about things like racial identity
or like cultural identity
consciousness and that kind of thing.
But what you're seeing is that
that is absolutely the opposite.
That that matters to them.
- It matters to them. It matters to their parents.
Uh, we were doing like nighttime assemblies as well,
because I really like to get the families involved.
So I worked with schools and I said,
can we do a literacy night?
Can we present to the entire family?
I want the Atos, anyone who lives in the home
to experience the magic of reading
and to just generate a culture of reading in our community,
uh, to break those stereotypes.
I don't think that Latinos don't read, it's just that a lot
of times families don't have these culturally relevant
books in their home.
I work with a lot of communities to get books into the hands
of kids, and what we're finding is
that sometimes this is the very first book that
that family would've owned.
Yeah. So it's very important to like,
provide access to those books.
Yeah. And even the parents
and the grandparents will be in tears saying, you know,
I wish I had these books growing up.
So it's very powerful.
- Yeah. I think as you kind of speak about that as,
as you say that, um, for a lot of families is the first book
that maybe the family is zoned.
I think about my, my spouse who came here, um,
in the late 1970s.
They were undocumented until she was in middle school.
And, um, and just the differences as we were getting
to know each other between her home and my home.
I have a white mother, very educated from
the United States of America.
And so, um, we always had books around,
and for her it was good.
And she would have these kind of like
frustrating trigger moments in professional settings when
it'd be like, and share
what your favorite book was growing up.
And if you didn't grow up with books, um,
that's a very loaded situation to be in.
You, you started to touch on this a little bit,
but I'd like you to, um, kind of expand on it a little bit.
Why do you think there's this perception
that Latino families and children don't read?
- I think it's because it starts with organizations
that donate books to families.
And I see it every day now
that I've been in this literacy work,
I've been in situations where it's a literacy event
and we have say a public library handing out books,
and then I'm there in my line handing out books.
And oftentimes the the library line, there's not one.
They all come to my line.
And that's what I'm seeing is
that organizations are not bringing
culturally relevant books to these events.
And sometimes they're bringing old books
and nobody wants a torn old book.
That's right. When you go into a community, you really have
- Some kid colored in it, and it's, you know,
- Yeah.
You have to bring books that reflect that community.
And I think oftentimes these groups that bring books
to organizations like that
and events they leave saying, did we really need to do this
because nobody picked up a book,
but they're not really looking at what they brought.
And should they have brought those books,
those weren't the right books Exactly.
To bring to a black and brown community. Yeah.
And when I see 200 people deep in line waiting to talk
to me, waiting for my signature, waiting for a book, uh,
that tells me that they do want these books.
They just want the right books in their house.
- Yeah. It's so, it's, so thank you for sharing that.
'cause like, as I was going back and reading my copy of Mr.
McCaw that I got, um,
and I was kind of reflecting on my own journey.
I, I love to read, I have, I have a reading disability,
but I love to read and I've always loved to read,
but I was thinking about
what were my favorite books growing up?
I mean, it was, it was Ferdinand the Bull, right?
That was probably my favorite one.
And then I used to read Encyclopedia Brown
because I love this idea that,
that a kid like me could solve mysteries with my mind,
but there was always something
that didn't feel like a strong connection in that way.
So what you're saying is that in terms of, um, of especially
children's literacy, it's a lot of the same issues
that we run into in other aspects of our Latina existences,
whether it's, you attended my session on Neurodivergence
and how there's a perception that the cultural stigma
is the reason that Latina children don't get special
education services.
They don't get neurodivergent supports, but it's
because there's also not access to folks who are experts
and culturally adept and informed about who we are.
That all that plays an equal, if not bigger role.
So you're saying it's a similar situation in literature.
It's not that there's no interest in reading
or literacy, it's that, that the children's pub,
children's book industry has failed to connect
with our children and with their families.
- Absolutely. Then I also think that it's the school's
responsibility to, because we can't just
leave it You go on publishers.
That's right. Like a lot of the times we bring these book
fairs to our school and we keep bringing the
same book fairs to our school.
Yeah. So how about thinking outside the box?
I know a friend in Los Angeles, she has miha books,
she features my books there, as well
as other culturally relevant books.
And now schools in LA are starting
to get her to come to these schools.
And these kids are feeling so connected to the books
that they're finding someone who looks like them, they want
to read so bad.
And it's really opening up the doors
to literacy every time I visit a school
and a school does a distribution
where every kid's gonna get a book.
And it doesn't matter what your income is,
because I don't wanna go to a school and sell my books
because I would've been that one child
who didn't have any money for that book.
Yeah. So when we open up the doors
and when schools bring these culturally relevant books,
kids wanna read that book over and over again.
That is what I'm hearing from these families is like always,
now I have a reader in the home.
And it was that simple.
It's giving someone a book they could relate to,
they could see themselves in that's, and not only that,
but these kids are now thinking, Hey,
you wrote the story, you look like me.
Guess what? Now I wanna write a story too.
So it's opening up the doors for kids
who are seeing themselves as authors from early on.
Love that. I love that.
And that's so important because when I was in school,
I didn't even have a author visit me, so I didn't know
that someone that looked like me could even
be an author, could
- Even be an author.
Oh my gosh. Our our stories are so parallel in that way.
Um, I remember.
And then we'll, we'll talk a little bit about
how you're elevating these stories
and how there, there's that amazing, um,
saying we lift as we climb.
Right. And I think you really exemplify
that idea of lifting as we climb.
But just a quick story before we go to a break.
Um, I, when I was a senior in high school,
I was given an assignment.
We were gonna do a choice reading project
for advanced placement, um, literature.
And so we could read any gen, we had to,
we could read any four books.
They had to be in the same genre.
And this was kind of like our student choice things.
And so I, I also don't wanna, um, bash this teacher too much
because that was really forward thinking for the 1990s
that you would let kids read whatever
books they want to .
Right? Still a little bit of a hot take in some circles.
Um, but so I had, I had recently begun
to be very curious about my, my heritage
as a Mexican American, as a Chicano, as a, as a person
who's a descendant of the original people of the Americas,
and as a person who could be considered Latino ano.
So I was really interested, particularly in magical realism.
And so we were supposed to write this little proposal
and I wrote this proposal up and um, and I,
and I had wanted to read the death of Artemio Cruz,
like water for chocolate, a hundred years of solitude.
And bless me, Tima,
like those were the magical realist books I wanted to read.
Um, the teacher returned it to me
and said, no, you're gonna have to do something
that's a little bit more rigorous
and a little bit more, uh, relevant to, um, the AP exam.
And I just remember being so frustrated and disappointed
because it was this very clear message to me,
and maybe it was under the guise of AP exams
and that kind of thing, but what I heard was the stories
of you and your people and your heritage are not relevant.
So I ended up doing existentialism, which was fine,
but it was kind of disappointing.
But from, you know, so we see how important this is even
as kids get older, you know?
- Yeah. That's a subliminal message right there
that they're sending the, our stories don't matter.
And that's what we're trying to fight. They are, yeah.
Important. They do matter.
- They absolutely matter.
Um, you know what else matters is, uh,
financial planning for the future.
Um, so see that segue. See, I'm kind of good at this.
Um, so, uh, we've got these great partners, um, out
of the Pasadena area in California, sat investors, LLC, um,
my friends Alex and Tori,
who are actually gonna come on the podcast.
They have some phenomenal stories.
Alex is a super young dude.
I know he wouldn't mind me saying that super young dude
who didn't grow up with generational wealth
and wanted to be able to set himself up
and his family up for building generational wealth.
And now that commitment has extended, um, to all people,
especially teachers.
So if you are a teacher and you're listening to this podcast
and you're a brand new teacher
and you're just trying to make ends meet, this idea
of generational wealth may seem really like outta left
field, you're probably thinking, oh yeah, sure.
Build generational wealth right
after I go to the moon, right?
May be kind of difficult for you to think about.
Well, Alex and Tori have come up with a model
that will allow folks
to build generational wealth without having to start
with generational wealth.
And so, um, listeners to two dope productions can go to
www.alexandtori.satter.com
and put in the promotional code, two dope teachers,
oh no, two dope, just two dope.
And, uh, get a discount on some their services. Hit 'em up.
Uh, we've already had some listeners go to them, uh,
particularly educators.
Alex is super familiar with pension plans
and retirement packages, and 4 0 3 BSS
and all those kinds of things.
And he can guide you into this thing. So check 'em out.
Sta investors to,
and Alex, proud supporters
of Two Dope Productions, we will be right back.
So I wanna, um, jump into this next, uh, segment,
um, with you.
And, and if, and if for some reason you're just tuning in,
this isn't live, y'all go to the beginning, listen
to the beginning of the show, what are you doing?
Um, but I'm here with Leticia journalist,
Emmy Award-winning journalist, buried the lead on that one,
um, and, um, book publisher author, uh,
founder of SLI Lindo books, uh, talking about the power
of stories.
So, um, I wanna talk specifically for many,
you have a few other books, um,
but I want to talk specifically about Mr. McCall Lost in the
Big City or El
There are some really important choices regarding language,
regarding character development,
regarding setting in every aspect of the book.
Um, and it's, and it's funny
because I've read the book multiple times since we met
because, and every time I read it, I notice something else
that is there a very subtle signal to the reader of
who this story is about and who this story senders on.
Can you talk about just that, just those choices
that you made in all those areas?
There it is. . There it is.
And the artwork is beautiful. We talked about that before,
- .
Yes, thank you. Yes.
This is, uh, one of my new favorite books.
And yeah, it's all about, uh,
following a magical bird's adventure.
And it's really all about culture and family.
And I weave in one of my favorite childhood songs, Lindo.
- Yes. They're very popular song.
And the song, yes, ,
- And it's about an A who is passed,
but these boys are remembering ATO
through their magical kite,
and then the kite gets lost in the big city,
and they have to follow clues that their grandfather had,
has left them to finally reunite with their lost bird.
But it's all about speaking how my family speaks
and speaking how our community speaks.
So often when you publish a book, uh,
with a traditional publisher, sorry, moving
- Around over here, sun is on my face language.
Okay.
- So often.
Okay, go ahead. When you publish a book, sometimes you work
with certain publishers
and they want you to use language
that we don't use here in the us.
So I really, um, embrace
that my characters are gonna speak like real people talk.
Yeah. I remember one, uh, publisher in Spain saying,
when you're ready to publish a real
Spanish book, come to me.
And I'm like, what are you talking about? I'm not, so you're
- Getting, you are getting gate kept on both ends of it.
. So there's a gatekeeping in the English
children's like book publishing world,
and then there was one in the Spanish language book.
It's kind of like, it's a, it's a dual sort of, um,
there's two gates that people are trying to close to you.
- Absolutely. But they're not closing them
because they're gonna stay open.
I'm the publisher, so I That's right. Make these decisions.
That's right. But, um, ultimately, like, you know, my books,
you won't find them to be Castilian in Spanish
as you would some generic producing of books
that they just take what's written by, you know,
an American author and they just translate it
and don't really look at the authenticity,
- The language, is that right?
Google translate, edit. And we're good .
- Yeah. We can't be good
because when our families are reading these stories,
they feel disconnected
because they're like, that's not how I would say albo
or, that's not how I would say this word.
And you know, obviously it's very regional
and different parts of Latin America say things differently.
Totally. But I always focus on how we speak, um, Spanish,
how my family speaks Spanish, you know,
being a Mexican American in the US Yeah.
So true to that.
And you know, I just want people to connect with my stories
and I'm not trying to be anyone that I'm not.
So I have to speak how we talk in our community
- .
Yeah. And I noticed some things too in terms of settings.
So I think that that, that always struck me as a little bit
of an area of uncertainty for me,
because when we talk about Spanish speaking people,
we're talking about almost 30 countries, um, in the world
where some version of spoken of Spanish is spoken and,
and the, the dialects
and the various ways of speaking it can really change.
But it feels like you drop some little hints that also
situated the type of Spanish
that the children were using within a context.
So like, I look at the buildings, I look at where they are.
Can you speak a little on that?
Like how, how you kind of linked those things together?
- Absolutely. Well, this was really a love letter
to my city, Sacramento.
Uh, this is where I'm from.
This is where my children are growing up.
So I wanted to feature landmarks of my city.
I the tower bridge, very iconic,
bright yellow in your face kind of bridge.
And then we have the historic old Sacramento
where people discover it from all over the world
because that's where the original gold mining happened in
the capital city.
So I just wanted to feature, um, you know, a lot
of landmarks and,
and places that people are familiar with,
even if they're not necessarily from our city.
So that was important for me.
And the setting originally starts in Mexico
because that's where the boys are.
That's where they're a BTOs villages when they hop on a
plane, come to the capital city
and discover that their kite goes missing
in an airport fiasco.
- Yeah. So, cool.
Um, we're gonna move on to, um, this other series
that you are, are developing
and that you've developed this series around the, uh,
statement that could be me,
the girl on tv, that could be me.
And so, um, I love this because it's another, so in Mr.
McCaw, it the big, you,
you talk about it being a love letter to your community
and to your culture and to your family.
Um, talk about what, um, what that could be me
does for representation in, um, you know, in another way.
- Absolutely. Well, I teamed up
with a different publisher originally to write
that could be me, that girl on TV could be me.
Because when I pitched the story, Mr.
McCaw to them, they had read my bio
and they said, your story is really neat
and deserves to be told.
It was a time where immigrants were being attacked,
Latinos were being attacked.
And you know, they needed a shining story of an example
of immigrants who were doing good in this world.
So when I was first approached
to write a story about myself, uh, I thought, well, what's
so special about my story?
I think sometimes we undermine what we're actually doing.
But after giving it much thought, I agree
to write my own story about being in the news business,
about being this little girl
who didn't see myself represented on television
and having this dream of being that voice for my community
and kind of letting people know more about the news.
'cause I think sometimes when people see the news world,
they think of this glamorous world where, um, you know,
someone does your hair and makeup every day
and they don't focus on how hard, um, the hard work
that goes behind it, the many markets that you have to move
to, to prove yourself as a young journalist.
And that there are still not many people
of color in the business
and just encouraging more Latino voices
to join the news business, which is very challenging.
- Yeah, no doubt. Yeah, and it's funny
because I, you know, I think one of my, um,
one of my early dreams was actually to go into journalism.
And maybe that's why I started a podcast
because it kind of gives a, a little bit of a taste of that.
I, I, I think about all of the barriers
and I, you know, these stories
because of the way you tell them, um, they resonate deeply
with me first and then I start looking at
where they are in the rest of the world.
It's the same reason I didn't go to theater school
because it was gonna be really expensive
and I would've had to really stretch to make it work.
And really, the deal breaker ended up being, I mean,
how many Chicano actors are there
that are gonna really be successful is gonna be worth it?
And so I didn't pursue that.
And so I think, and I think with, through your experience,
uh, what I hear you saying is that it's like you are
so focused on doing the thing
and you know, just you, yes, you overcame things,
but I think you get to this point where it's like, well,
I took care of the mundane everyday things and I did it.
Why is that a big deal? And then you start realizing
that it's really a big deal.
Um, you're doing so much cool stuff. Yeah, go ahead.
- Uh, thank you. Yeah, no, it's just a passion
and I'm glad to be able to share that story
and just to give people an inside look, um,
it's the first broadcast book for children,
so it really gives people, you know, an eye on television
and, and so great what it's all about.
It's so much more than glitz and glamor.
It's about really informing our community
and giving everyone a voice.
And so from that, from doing the tv, I thought,
how cool would it be just to create my own series
of different positions in the world that people hold
so cool in our community,
really featuring Latino characters.
Yeah. You know, and just,
and just making it, you know,
that superstar teacher could be me. Yeah. You know?
- Yeah. Yeah. - so many different things
that could, can happen with that series.
And just really giving our children a
to read an autobiography.
Yeah. Uh, someone that they can relate to
and aspire to be, uh, not a fictional story, uh,
but a real life story.
Yeah. And so I'm really passionate you're
- Making me Yeah.
You, and that's so clear.
Um, you're really making me think deeply about,
about this particular thing is particularly in, in your line
of work, the person that we see on the news
is often a symbol to the community as somebody
who reflects us a friendly face we come to.
And over the course of doing research, of course, um, I,
I wanted to check out kind of some of some of your,
how you maintain yourself professionally, like a as
as a journalist.
And it did really occur to me.
It's like, I mean, why, especially, I mean, here in Denver,
Colorado and the Denver Public schools where I work,
you know, over 50%
of our students come from Latina backgrounds,
mostly Mexican backgrounds.
Like, why wouldn't one of us
be the spokesperson for our community?
Be the friendly face that we come home to in the evening?
And so I think that's such a powerful thing.
Um, so many things you're doing. It's, it's beautiful.
Um, the, the last thing I wanna get to
before we get to, to the big important question, um, is that
we talked a little bit about this notion of lifting
as we climb, right?
The idea that one pursues success not only for themselves,
but so they can bring up other people.
Something that is very near
and dear to your heart is your commitment
to elevating the voices of other creators
and aspiring authors.
How are you enacting that really important to the work so
that you know that it doesn't end with Leticia ,
that it doesn't end with Lindo books?
That, that it's only a beginning for others.
How do you, how are you doing that?
- Oh, what's so amazing is that
I am letting youth see themselves as authors
and not just talking the talk, but walking the walk.
It was just a few months back that I published an anthology
with 88 migrant children from Los Angeles County,
the anthology, as we come from Greatness,
we all came up with the title.
I coached the kids on how to write a book.
Uh, they all had their own story.
They had one to two pages in this 128 page book
that is now on Amazon.
And all of the proceeds go back to them
so they can go to college.
But what's so cool is
that they are now gonna have this on their resume.
They can now say they are published authors.
They told their stories when I went in there, a lot
of them didn't know what to believe.
I worked with their school district
and they were thinking like, am I really gonna be an author
when this is all said and done?
And so they wrote their stories, we worked together.
And when I finally delivered the book
to them, it was so emotional.
We held a ceremony with the parents.
They got to read their stories out loud.
Uh, everybody was in tears.
Their parents could not believe
that their children were now authors.
And it was just like beaming pride for our community.
And, and now we have 88 young authors out there.
And I think it's really empowering them.
And I don't wanna stop there.
You know, I want, uh, my company to be the outlet for
so many more creators.
You know, we're all writers.
Everyone says, I dunno how to write a book, but you do.
Everyone has the power to write a story.
We all have a story in us. Absolutely.
The difference is some people actually make it happen.
They put it in writing. We all have an idea in our head.
And it's just so important to, to have
that creative outlet even on scratch
paper to type that first
- Draft.
Well that, and that's the thing, right?
It's kinda like that first draft.
I think that's what holds a lot of people back.
It's kinda like, yeah, I mean,
you're not a published author the first
time you put pen to paper.
But that's why there's editors
and that's why they're great publishers
who believe in your stories like Lindo books, um,
who are going to give you the tools that you need.
I, I'm, I'm just, I'm smiling at the notion
that we have 88 human beings
who will have a publication credit
before they have a driver's license.
Isn't that cool? And I love it. It's so beautiful.
Um, Leticia so inspired by what you're doing.
And you know, I think too, I always think about
how we connect this work, the elemental spiritual substance
of the work to other areas.
Um, like why wouldn't I do a program that uplifts
and develops young podcasters?
Why wouldn't we do that? Right.
And why wouldn't is that, why wouldn't we do this in other
like areas, right.
In other areas. Because at the end of the day, the solution
to lack of re representation is to lift as we climb.
Um, really enjoy you sharing your brilliance right now.
So all of this representation, publication,
telling our stories, all of this is important.
But big question, we're gonna conclude the show with today.
I wanna hear your top five anything. So it's anything.
And have you had time to kind of think this through
and see what your top five anything is gonna be?
- Well, I haven't given it much thought,
but I do love to travel.
That's okay. And I do love to, to visit children
all over the world.
And so I would say that my top five are Puerto Rico, Mexico.
I would also say it's Paris here at home,
Northern California, Yosemite, and Lake Tahoe. My top five
- .
Yo, that was, that was good.
And I have been to most of those places.
You know, it's really funny. I've never been to Lake Tahoe.
Like I've been to Paris, but not to Lake Tahoe. That's cool.
. Um, and so are these places
where you've taken your children or where you've just gone?
- So four of the places my children
are dying to go to Paris.
We haven't done that as a family yet,
but I think they're probably old enough now nine and 12.
But they went with me to Puerto Rico
and we had, uh, a literacy mission
and we got to take our books to children impacted
by, uh, hurricane Maria.
Yeah. And, uh, we also go to Mexico every year
and it used to be just a fun beach vacation, hang out, uh,
just absorb in the culture.
But now we visit an orphanage there
that's really near and dear to our heart.
We've also partnered with the Boys
and Girls Club to bring them literacy in Mexico.
So all of these trips that just used to be to explore are,
we're really finding a purpose in literacy
and giving back to our community wherever we go.
- Love it. Expect nothing less from,
from your top five fire.
Top five, um, had a chance to be in Puerto Rico, um, for,
at the last conference.
And it was just such, I'd never been.
And in just such a beautiful, powerful, incredible community
of people in San Juan that, um, really enjoyed it.
Um, so how do, um, folks
who wanna learn more about your publications,
about your work, about sli Lindo books,
how do they find you?
How do they get connected to you?
Um, how do they get updates on everything that you're doing?
- Wonderful. Well, the easiest way would be
to follow me on social media.
Lindo Books is my handle.
You can also follow my personal account, Leticia or Daaz tv.
That one's a pretty easy if you
can type my name out, .
Yep. And also@alitolindobooks.com.
You can also send me an email if you have a story idea
or a manuscript alito lindo books.com
or lindo books@gmail.com. They connected. Awesome.
- . Yes. That's amazing.
And folks, if you have that story that you are dying
to tell, um, you have a publisher here who's willing
to hear it and willing to learn about it.
And so, um, Leticia
or thank you so much for joining the Chica Logs today.
Can't episode in
truly inspiration.