A Place at the Nayarit: How a Mexican Restaurant Nourished a Community

Happy Wednesday, bibliophiles!

Here in the U.S., September 15th-October 15th is Latine Heritage Month! If there’s one thing that living under two rounds of the Trump administration has made abundantly clear, is that the government does not want any marginalized group—especially BIPOC—to feel any sort of pride in themselves or their cultures. Being a part of the Latine community has made that blatantly evident to me. Day after day, Latine people continue to be unjustly detained by ICE and shot in broad daylight. To the people in power, our cultures are not worth celebrating, nor are they worth acknowledging at all, not when we supposedly “don’t belong” here.

That argument obviously doesn’t hold up to anybody with even the most basic knowledge of U.S. history. While the government disparages Latine laborers, they stand on structures that have been built by generations of our labor. ICE agents indulge in cuisine from Latine immigrants, and then detain those same immigrants in the same breath. Our vastly diverse cultures have been embedded in the fabric of this country, and the refusal of the country at large to acknowledge this has led to the thoughtless dehumanization of Latine people of all kinds, simply for the color of their skin or the language that they speak. Even I, with my mixed-race heritage and my decidedly very white-passing skin (and privilege), find it hard not to feel like a squashed bug on the daily having to see the casual disparagement of our rich communities. But what brings me back to earth is to have that pride: to read books from my heritage, to try and cook food from my culture, and to have any sense of pride. To love your heritage—heck, to put any effort into looking into it at all—is to be the very thing that your government wants to suppress. What my queerness has taught me is that being loud and proud isn’t the safest option, and the same logic applies here; all that matters is to foster that pride and curiosity wherever you can.

More than ever, Latine people of all walks of life could use your help in this country. This is a non-exhaustive list, but here are some excellent charities that you can support.

CHARITIES YOU CAN SUPPORT:

This is a non-exhaustive list! I encourage you to look for other options, and let me know of any other great charities supporting the Hispanic/Latine community in the comments.

For my past lists for Latine Heritage Month, click here:

THE BOOKISH MUTANT’S BOOKS FOR LATINE HERITAGE MONTH (2026 EDITION)

FANTASY AND MAGICAL REALISM:

Beasts of Carnaval – Rosália Rodrigo | Adult | historical fiction, epic fantasy | ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Gods of Jade and Shadow – Silvia Moreno-Garcia | Adult | historical fiction, romance | ⭐️⭐️⭐️.75
A Tall Dark Trouble – Vanessa Montalban | YA | historical fiction, mystery, urban fantasy | ⭐️⭐️⭐️.5
One Hundred Years of Solitude – Gabriel García Márquez | Adult | historical fiction, magical realism, classics | ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️.25
The Volcano Daughters – Gina María Balibrera | Adult | historical fiction | ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Summer in the City of Roses – Michelle Ruiz Keil | YA | historical fiction, magical realism, LGBTQ+, disability | ⭐️⭐️⭐️.75

SCIENCE FICTION:

The Q – Amy Tintera | YA | dystopia, action, romance | ⭐️⭐️⭐️.5
Scout’s Honor – Lily Anderson | YA | disability, sci-fi/fantasy, paranormal | ⭐️⭐️⭐️.75

REALISTIC/HISTORICAL FICTION:

The Golden Boy’s Guide to Bipolar – Sonido Reyes | YA | LGBTQ+, disability, coming-of-age | ⭐️⭐️⭐️.5
The First Rule of Punk – Celia C. Pérez | MG | contemporary, coming-of-age | ⭐️⭐️⭐️.5
If We Were a Movie – Zakiya N. Jamal | YA | LGBTQ+, romance | ⭐️⭐️⭐️.5
Brownstone – Samuel Teer and Mar Julia | YA | graphic novels, historical fiction, LGBTQ+, coming-of-age | ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

NONFICTION:

Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza – Gloria Anzaldúa | Adult | LGBTQ+, memoir, feminism | ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Wild Tongues Can’t Be Tamed: 15 Voices from the Latinx Diaspora – edited by Saraciea J. Fennell | YA | anthologies, feminism, poetry | ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
¡Ay, Mija!: My Bilingual Summer in Mexico – Christine Suggs | YA | LGBTQ+, graphic memoir | ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
So Many Stars: An Oral History of Trans, Nonbinary, Genderqueer, and Two-Spirit People of Color – Caro de Robertis | Adult | LGBTQ+, anthologies | ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️.25
A Place at the Nayarit: How a Mexican Restaurant Nourished a Community – Natalia Molina | Adult | history, feminism | ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

TELL ME WHAT YOU THINK! Have you read any of these books, and if so, did you like them? What are some of your favorite books by Latine/x authors? Let me know in the comments!

Today’s song:

That’s it for this recommendations post! Have a wonderful rest of your day, and take care of yourselves!

Happy Thursday, bibliophiles!

This is a scheduled post, so I’ll be going back into my gopher hole for at least another week (or thereabouts), but one thing about me is that I love to categorize and wrap things up, in spite of it all…

Let’s begin, shall we?

GENERAL THOUGHTS:

I’ve been in the weeds of finals for the past few weeks, and I only just submitted my last final. Which also happened to be my last final…and the last assignment I’ll ever submit for undergrad. Jesus. I graduate college tomorrow (!!!), and I’ll continue to be busy, so expect that I’ll be radio silent for at least another week, with the exception of one other scheduled post aside from this one.

As you could probably gather from the amount of times I randomly dropped off the face of ~~the Earth~~ this blog, March and April have been very busy for me. It’s been a time. In late March, I defended my honors thesis, which was nothing short of nerve-wracking. But it was worth it—guess who’s graduating summa cum laude?? After that, I barely even considered that there would even be a semester after my honors thesis, since working on it swallowed up most of my semester. Of course, I only had a week or two before finals swallowed everything, but such is life. And college.

And now I’m about to graduate. What people don’t tell you about college is that, aside from graduation, there’s no real fanfare for the end of college. I just had a single, completely uneventful class on Thursday afternoon, and then I was just…done. With undergrad. Four years, all culminating in some random class I only took for the upper-division elective credit. You expect it to end with firecrackers and confetti and not just shuffling out of class and taking the bus home, but that’s the way things go sometimes. Sometimes things just end. And that’s okay. But maybe it’s fitting, in a way. I spent so much of my life being petrified at even the thought of going to college and being away from my parents. There was so much catastrophizing in the years and months leading up to college. But it ended so quietly, so ordinarily. In the end, it was uneventful, and it was all fine. Well, more than fine, I’d say. I came away with a GPA that wasn’t too shabby, so many wonderful friends, a ton of new experiences that I’ve braved…not to mention that summa cum laude I mentioned!! Come on!

So maybe it’s for the best that things end quietly. I can look back and be at peace, knowing that everything I struggled through was worth it, and hardly anything turns out as badly as your anxieties make it out to be. About a month back, one of my best friends introduced me to Rilo Kiley’s song “A Better Son/Daughter,” which…first off, you know who you are, and that was diabolical to do that to me right before graduation. Dastardly, even. OW. But I find myself drawn to it again and again, knowing some of the lows I’ve experienced recently in college (and in life), and that I came out the other side a more independent, self-assured, and hopefully more whole person. I sure feel better, knowing that I’ve made it to this point in spite of it all. So thank you, said friend, for bringing that song into my life.

MARCH READING WRAP-UP:

I read 13 books in March! Unfortunately, I had my first DNF of the year (I gave it an extra star because there were a few good ideas in it, but overall, Pleasure Activism got on my nerves and life is short), but aside from that, I had an excellent reading month! I focused on books by women for Women’s History Month, and I had a blast with new-to-me authors, longtime favorites, and treasured re-reads.

2 – 2.75 stars:

Pleasure Activism: The Politics of Feeling Good – adrienne maree brown (anthology) (DNF – ⭐️⭐️)
The Lightest Object in the Universe – Kimi Eisele (⭐️⭐️)

3 – 3.75 stars:

Thrill of the Chase – Kathryn Nolan (⭐️⭐️⭐️.25)
Who Fears Death (Who Fears Death, #1) – Nnedi Okorafor (⭐️⭐️⭐️.5)
Greenteeth – Molly O’Neill (⭐️⭐️⭐️.5)
She and Her Cat – Makoto Shinkai and Naruki Nagakawa (translated by Ginny Tapley Takemori) (⭐️⭐️⭐️.5)
The Actual Star – Monica Byrne (⭐️⭐️⭐️.75)

4 – 4.75 stars:

Red Star Rebels – Amie Kaufman (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)
A Place at the Nayarit: How a Mexican Restaurant Nourished a Community – Natalia Molina (for school) (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)
To Ride a Rising Storm (Nampeshiweisit, #2) – Moniquill Blackgoose (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)
Black Disability Politics – Sami Schalk (for school) (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)
Five Ways to Forgiveness – Ursula K. Le Guin (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️.5)

5 stars:

The Stardust Grail – Yume Kitasei (re-read) (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)

FAVORITE BOOK OF THE MONTH (not counting re-reads): Five Ways to Forgiveness – 4.5 stars

REVIEWS:

SUNDAY SONGS:

BONUS:

The Bookish Mutant’s Feminist Books for Women’s History Month

APRIL READING WRAP-UP:

I read 13 books in April! Ratings-wise, this month was a rollercoaster—I had a 5 star read and my first DNF of the year one after the other (I kid you not), so there have been lots of ups and downs. But most of the books I read came out somewhere above average, so I can’t complain. The ones that were excellent made up for the bad and the mediocre.

1 – 1.75 stars:

Escape Velocity – Victor Manibo (DNF – ⭐️)

3 – 3.75 stars:

How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain – Lisa Feldman Barrett (⭐️⭐️⭐️)
Nightshade and Oak – Molly O’Neill (⭐️⭐️⭐️.25)
According to Plan – Christen Randall (⭐️⭐️⭐️.5)
Networks of Outrage and Hope: Social Movements in the Internet Age – Manuel Castells (for school) (⭐️⭐️⭐️.5)
You Started It – Jackie Khalilieh (⭐️⭐️⭐️.5)
Star Wars: From a Certain Point of View: Return of the Jedi – anthology (⭐️⭐️⭐️.75)
The Serpent Called Mercy – Roanne Lau (⭐️⭐️⭐️.75)

4 – 4.75 stars:

Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women That a Movement Forgot – Mikki Kendall (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)
Giovanni’s Room – James Baldwin (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)
Tall Water – SJ Sindu (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)
Slow Gods – Claire North (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️.25)

5 stars:

Tune It Out – Jamie Sumner (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)

FAVORITE BOOK OF THE MONTH: Tune It Out – 5 stars

REVIEWS:

SUNDAY SONGS:

BONUS:

The Bookish Mutant’s Books for Autism Acceptance Month (2026 Edition)

Today’s song:

holy fuck, Earthling is phenomenal…I’ve really been feeling that “music meant to be listened to on drugs at the club/me listening to it sober doing the dishes” meme while listening to it while knitting on the bed though 💀

That’s it for this wrap-up! Have a wonderful rest of your day, and take care of yourselves!

Tag: A Place at the Nayarit: How a Mexican Restaurant Nourished a Community

The Bookish Mutant’s Books for National Latine Heritage Month (2026 Edition)