Raquel Vasquez Gilliland

When seventeen-year-old Star Fuentez reaches social media stardom, her polar-opposite twin, Moon, becomes "merch girl" on a tour bus full of beautiful influencers and the grumpy but attractive Santiago Philips.

How Moon Fuentez Fell in Love with the Universe

“In a world where we are so often dividing ourselves into us and them, this book feels like a kind of magic, celebrating all beliefs, ethnicities, and unknowns.” —The New York Times Book Review Aristotle & Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe meets Roswell by way of Laurie Halse Anderson in this astonishing, genre-bending novel about a Mexican American teen who discovers profound connections between immigration, folklore, and alien life. It’s been three years since ICE raids and phone calls from Mexico and an ill-fated walk across the Sonoran. Three years since Sia Martinez’s mom disappeared. Sia wants to move on, but it’s hard in her tiny Arizona town where people refer to her mom’s deportation as “an unfortunate incident.” Sia knows that her mom must be dead, but every new moon Sia drives into the desert and lights San Anthony and la Guadalupe candles to guide her mom home. Then one night, under a million stars, Sia’s life and the world as we know it cracks wide open. Because a blue-lit spacecraft crashes in front of Sia’s car…and it’s carrying her mom, who’s very much alive. As Sia races to save her mom from armed-quite-possibly-alien soldiers, she uncovers secrets as profound as they are dangerous in this stunning and inventive exploration of first love, family, immigration, and our vast, limitless universe.

Sia Martinez and the Moonlit Beginning of Everything

Legend goes that long ago a Flores woman offended the old gods, and their family was cursed as a result. Now, every woman born to the family has a touch of magic. Sage Flores has been running from her family—and their “gifts”—ever since her younger sister Sky died. Eight years later, Sage reluctantly returns to her hometown. Like slipping into an old, comforting sweater, Sage takes back her job at Cranberry Rose Company and uses her ability to communicate with plants to discover unusual heritage specimens in the surrounding lands. What should be a simple task is complicated by her partner in botany sleuthing: Tennessee Reyes. He broke her heart in high school, and she never fully recovered. Working together is reminding her of all their past tender, genuine moments—and new feelings for this mature sexy man are starting to take root in her heart. With rare plants to find, a dead sister who keeps bringing her coffee, and another sister whose anger fills the sky with lightning, Sage doesn’t have time for romance. But being with Tenn is like standing in the middle of a field on the cusp of a summer thunderstorm—supercharged and inevitable.

Witch of Wild Things

Legend goes that long ago a Flores woman offended the old gods, and their family was cursed as a result. Now, every woman born to the family has a touch of magic. Sage Flores has been running from her family—and their “gifts”—ever since her younger sister Sky died. Eight years later, Sage reluctantly returns to her hometown. Like slipping into an old, comforting sweater, Sage takes back her job at Cranberry Rose Company and uses her ability to communicate with plants to discover unusual heritage specimens in the surrounding lands. What should be a simple task is complicated by her partner in botany sleuthing: Tennessee Reyes. He broke her heart in high school, and she never fully recovered. Working together is reminding her of all their past tender, genuine moments—and new feelings for this mature sexy man are starting to take root in her heart. With rare plants to find, a dead sister who keeps bringing her coffee, and another sister whose anger fills the sky with lightning, Sage doesn’t have time for romance. But being with Tenn is like standing in the middle of a field on the cusp of summer thunderstorm—supercharged and inevitable.

Tales from the House of Vasquez

Os lo juro: yo no empecé siendo una fracasada.No recuerdo cuándo fue la última vez que alguien me miró. Que me miró y me vio a mí de verdad, no a la hermana de una famosísima influencer, a la chica rara que hace fotos en la naturaleza o a la que tiene una talla más grande de lo socialmente aceptado. Bueno, qué más da. La cuestión es que mi vida entera cambió en un único verano. En apenas dos meses dejé de ser la invisible melliza de Star Fuentez, la hija repudiada por su madre y la chica que se había acostado con más de un tío.Pero vamos, que solo soy yo, Moon Fuentez, hablando conmigo misma.Diecisiete años y ya estoy como una cabra.

Y entonces Moon Fuentez se enamoró del universo

The retelling of Mexican family folktales, feminist reclamations of ancient myths, and new motherhood: Raquel Vasquez Gilliland's debut collection, Dirt and Honey, unearths the connection of these experiences with innovative language. Gilliland writes across myth, describing a woman who grew leaves, the grandmother of God, and the story of her grandfather, who left for Texas as a refugee of the Mexican Civil War. Gilliland's work centers readers in a place all her own--one in which ancient lineages are drawn with breast milk, seduction begins with feasts of peppers, and "fisherchildren" displaced by wars are always welcomed into new lands.

Raquel Vasquez Gilliland

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