This Is the Only Kingdom

A Novel

Contributors

By Jaquira Díaz

Formats and Prices

Price

$14.99

Price

$19.99 CAD

Format

ebook

Format:

ebook $14.99 $19.99 CAD

Growing up in Puerto Rico, Maricarmen worked hard, cleaning houses, getting good grades, always dreaming of becoming a singer. When she met Rey, she fell in love with his dynamism, his love of music, his band, the way he focused on her only. When she became pregnant, she didn't realize the depth of her mother Blanca's racism and that she would kick her own daughter out of the house for loving a Black man. Still, Maricarmen is strong, and she makes a home for her and Rey and Rey's young brother Tito and finally their new baby Nena. When Ray is murdered, it falls to Maricarmen to raise both Nena and Tito, holding down two jobs to take care of them.  But when Tito goes out one night and is found dead in the sugar cane fields behind their house, Nena and Maricarmen find themselves in the middle of a murder investigation while also mourning the bright spot that Tito was for both of them. Nor can they count on help from Maricarmen's' mother Blanca, and that's when Maricarmen herself gives up, leaving Nena to find her own way.

It will take a split between mother and daughter and the wisdom only gained through years that will bring these two back together and remind them of how much they'd always loved each other. 

A searing and moving portrait of a family torn apart and determined to come back together. 

  • Named a Most Recommended Book of the Year by Electric Literature
  • Praise for Ordinary Girls
    “[Ordinary Girls] belongs on your must-read lists. Díaz is a masterful writer . . . Writing with refreshing honesty, she talks about despair, depression, love, and hope with such vibrancy that her vivid portrayal will stay with you long after the final page.”
    O: The Oprah Magazine

    “A skilled writer, Díaz is meticulous in her craft, and on page after page her writing truly sings . . . This brutally honest coming-of-age story is a painful yet illuminating memoir, a testament to resilience.”
    New York Times Book Review
     
    “Incredible . . .  Beautiful . . . Gorgeous and propulsive prose.”
    —NBC / Today (Isaac Fitzgerald) 

    “Outstanding. A powerful and lyrical coming-of-age story, Ordinary Girls is a candid illustration of shame, despair and violence as well as joy and triumph. Against a Puerto Rican backdrop, this debut is compassionate, brave and forgiving.”
     —Ms. Magazine

On Sale
Oct 21, 2025
Page Count
288 pages
Publisher
Algonquin Books
ISBN-13
9781643757339

Jaquira Díaz

Jaquira Díaz

About the Author

Born in Puerto Rico, Jaquira Díaz was raised between Humacao, Fajardo, and Miami Beach. She is the author of Ordinary Girls: A Memoir, winner of a Whiting Award, a Florida Book Awards Gold Medal, a Lambda Literary Awards finalist, an American Booksellers Association Indies Introduce Selection, a Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers Selection, an Indie Next Pick, a Library Reads pick, and finalist for the B&N Discover Prize. 

The recipient of the Jeanne Córdova Prize for Lesbian/Queer Nonfiction, the Alonzo Davis Fellowship from VCCA, two Pushcart Prizes, an Elizabeth George Foundation grant, and fellowships from MacDowell, the Kenyon Review, Bread Loaf, Sewanee, the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing, and the Black Mountain Institute at UNLV, Díaz has written for The AtlanticThe GuardianTime MagazineT: The New York Times Style MagazineCondé Nast Traveler, and The Fader, and her stories, poems, and essays have been anthologized in The Best American Essays, The Breakbeat Poets Vol. 4: LatiNext, Best American Experimental Writing, and The Pushcart Prize anthology. In 2022, she held the Mina Hohenberg Darden Chair in Creative Writing at Old Dominion University’s MFA program and a Pabst Endowed Chair for Master Writers at the Atlantic Center for the Arts. She lives in New York with her spouse, the writer Lars Horn, and teaches at Columbia University.
 

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