Boundless: Twenty Voices Celebrating Multicultural and Multiracial Identities

by Ism e Williams, Rebecca Balc rcel

Overview

With twenty stories that center and celebrate the multiracial and multicultural experience from your favorite award-winning and bestselling authors, this is a groundbreaking anthology perfect for fans of COME ON IN and BLACK ENOUGH.

When identities cross boundaries, with love that knows no bounds.
From platonic and romantic love to grief and heartbreak, these stories explore navigating life at the intersection of identities, and what it means to grow up surrounded by a multitude of traditions, languages, cultures, and interpersonal dynamics.
Returning to a father’s homeland. Trying to fit in at chaotic weddings and lavish birthday parties where not all are welcome. Processing grief at family gatherings. Figuring out how to share the news of a new relationship with loved ones. This collection celebrates multicultural and multiracial characters at the helm of their own narratives, as they approach life with a renewed sense of hope and acceptance.

Featuring original stories from:

• Adi Alsaid
• Rebecca Balcárcel
• Akemi Dawn Bowman
• Anika Fajardo
• Shannon Gibney
• I.W. Gregorio
• Veera Hiranandani
• Nasugraq Rainey Hopson
• Emiko Jean
• Erin Entrada Kelly
• Torrey Maldonado
• Mélina Mangal
• Goldy Moldavsky
• Randy Ribay
• Loriel Ryon
• Tara Sim
• Eric Smith
• Jasmine Warga
• Ismée Williams
• Karen Yin

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781335428615
Publisher:	Inkyard Press
Publication date:	06/13/2023
Edition description:	Original
Pages:	368
Sales rank:	295,099
Product dimensions:	6.20(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.20(d)
Age Range:	13 - 17 Years

About the Author

Ismée Williams is the award-winning author of Water in May and This Train Is Being Held, a JLG Gold Standard Selection and winner of the ILBA Gold Medal for Best YA Romance. Ismée is a cofounder of the Latinx Kidlit Book Festival as well as a pediatric cardiologist in New York City, where she lives with her family. She is the daughter of a Cuban immigrant and grew up listening to her abuelo's bedtime stories. Follow her on Twitter and Instagram @ismeewilliams.

Rebecca Balcárcel serves the students of Tarrant County College as associate professor of English. She authored Shine On, Luz Véliz! and The Other Half of Happy, a Pura Belpré Honor Book, an ALSC Notable Book, and a silver medalist in the ILBA. Rebecca is a recipient of Bennington Writing Seminar's Jane Kenyon Poetry Prize. Find her on YouTube as the SixMinuteScholar.

Editorial Reviews

Reflects the painful awkwardness of a bifurcated existence while celebrating a boundless self… A worthwhile and sprawling compilation.” —Kirkus Reviews

From the Publisher

2023-03-29
The agonies and ecstasies of adolescence are relayed through the lens of multicultural identities.

Exclusively featuring multiracial and/or multicultural authors, this anthology reflects the painful awkwardness of a bifurcated existence while celebrating a boundless self. Pubescent agonies are in abundance here, from the humiliation of an unrequited crush to the challenges of wrestling with menstrual products. Overlaying them all is the added feeling of isolation from never quite fitting in, sometimes not even in one’s own family. A few stories offer a lighter touch—Goldy Moldavsky’s “Hispanic Jewish Bingo” has Jewish Latino characters debating the ethics of cheating at the synagogue’s charity casino night, and Karen Yin’s “My Kinda Sorta Badass Move” finds a queer Chinese American coming to a new understanding with her tough-as-nails grandmother. While the anthology is packed with acclaimed authors, including Erin Entrada Kelly, Jasmine Warga, Torrey Maldonado, and Randy Ribay, emergent authors like Nasuġraq Rainey Hopson hold their own. Hopson’s “The Perils of Beige” astutely captures smarmy, condescending faux collegiality at a speech and debate competition from the perspective of an African American Inupiaq novice. Vastly different voices show the breadth of multicultural identities, but the collection doesn’t always feel cohesive. There is also a broad range in maturity among the teens depicted: Some are younger-sounding middle school students while other protagonists feel significantly older, making this a collection readers may dip into rather than reading cover to cover.

A worthwhile and sprawling compilation. (author bios) (Anthology. 12-18)

Kirkus Reviews