The Education of Margot Sanchez

Margot Sanchez, “the great brown hope” of her family, is caught between the wealthy, white world of Somerset Prep, the private school she attends, and that of her “Rich Adjacent” Latino family, which owns two supermarkets in the Bronx. Margot changed her personal style in order to befriend the popular girls at Somerset, and she’s desperate to spend the summer with them in the Hamptons. Instead, she is stuck stocking shelves and working the deli counter at the supermarket—punishment for stealing her father’s credit card for a shopping spree—and trying to reconnect with the friends she left behind. Debut novelist Rivera doesn’t sugarcoat Margot’s conflicted life as the teenager juggles the sexist attitudes from the men in her family, the judgments from “cashieristas” at the store and her party-happy Somerset friends alike, romantic conflicts involving boys from school and the neighborhood, and family crises that arise. Margot makes mistakes, misplaces her trust, and gradually reestablishes who she is in an emotional story about class, race, hard work, and finding one’s place. Ages 14–up. Agent: Eddie Schneider, Jabberwocky Literary. (Feb.)