The award is named after Pura Belpré, the first Latina librarian at the New York Public Library. The Pura Belpré Award, established in 1996, is presented annually to a Latino/Latina writer and illustrator whose work best portrays, affirms, and celebrates the Latino cultural experience in an outstanding work of literature for children and youth. It is co-sponsored by the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC), a division of the American Library Association (ALA), and REFORMA, the National Association to Promote Library and Information Services to Latinos and the Spanish-Speaking, an ALA affiliate.

Pura Belpre Author Award Winning Basket Includes:

• Enchanted Air: Two Cultures, Two Wings: A Memoir by Margarita Engle and Edel Rodriguez


• The Smoking Mirror by David Bowles


• Mango, Abuela and Me by Meg Medina and Angela Dominguez