Sofía Acosta Makes a Scene, Hardcover

It's a good thing Sofía Acosta loves dreaming up costumes, because otherwise she's a ballet disaster--unlike her parents, who danced under prima ballerina Alicia Alonso before immigrating to the suburbs of New York. Luckily, when the Acostas host their dancer friends from Cuba for a special performance with the American Ballet Theatre, Sofía learns there's more than dance holding her family together. Between swapping stories about Cuba and sharing holiday celebrations, the Acostas have never been more of a team.
Then Sofía finds out about the dancers' secret plans to defect to the United States, and makes a serious mistake--she confides in her best friend, only to discover that Tricia doesn't want outsiders moving to their community. Now Sofía wonders what the other neighbors in her tight-knit suburban town really think of immigrant families like hers. Sofía doesn't want to make a scene, but if she doesn't speak up, how will she figure out if her family really belongs?

About author(s):Emma Otheguy is the author of the middle-grade novel Silver Meadows Summer (Knopf, 2019) and the bilingual picture book Martí's Song for Freedom (Lee & Low, 2017) which received five starred reviews, was named a Best Book of the Year by Kirkus Reviews, School Library Journal, and the New York Public Library. She co-authored The Unicorn Rescue Society: The Madre de Aguas of Cuba with Adam Gidwitz (Dutton 2020), and her most recent publication is her contribution to the new Carmen Sandiego universe, Secrets of the Silver Lion (HMH 2020).

Emma holds a Ph.D. in History from New York University, where she focused on colonial Latin America, and graduated from Swarthmore College, sold books at an independent bookstore, and taught elementary-school Spanish. She lives in New York City with her family. Visit her online at emmaotheguy.com.