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Melissa Coss Aquino

Biography

Melissa Coss Aquino

Melissa Coss Aquino is a Puerto Rican writer from the Bronx. She received her MFA from the City College of New York, CUNY and her Ph.D. from the Graduate Center, CUNY in English. She currently works as an Associate Professor in the English department at Bronx Community College, CUNY. She is a proud VONA, AROHO and Hedgebrook alumna. CARMEN AND GRACE is her first novel.

Melissa Coss Aquino

Books by Melissa Coss Aquino

by Melissa Coss Aquino - Fiction, Women's Fiction

Carmen and Grace have been inseparable since they were little girls --- more like sisters than cousins, survivors of a childhood marked by neglect and addiction and a system that never valued them. For too long, all they had was each other. That is, until Doña Durka swept into their lives and changed everything, taking Grace into her home, providing stability and support, and playing an outsize role in Carmen’s upbringing. Durka is more than a beneficent force in their Bronx neighborhood, though. She’s also the leader of an underground drug empire, a larger-than-life matriarch who understands the vital importance of taking what power she can in a world too often ruled by violent men. So, when Durka dies suddenly under mysterious circumstances, Carmen and Grace’s lives are thrown into chaos.