story of immediate concern over their son just paroled advises on puerto rican and latino let the you know history for museums and the media or writes a blog for the huffington the season of rebels and roses this in gauging novels for teens follows historical figures that were instrumental in the fight for self determination in puerto rico addressing issues that remain relevant today racism women's rights and puerto rico's status as a colony the season of rebels and roses also shifts lights and women's involvement in the nation's liberation and really that's really very very heartwarming to hear i can't believe it i've started and then i said i can't i have to do something else then i went back and then i'm looking forward to it and i'm really living  or you describe what's going on in history so well you paint a picture a clear picture and that's so difficult to achieve and for our audience we're speaking about the season of rebels and roses by the junior scientists karole and as you heard in my presentation she a professor emeritus at brooklyn college city university of new york here as many books but i am so impressed with her work because of the research all this happens in puerto rico cuba and the united states and i guess she meant that for teens ought to follow historical figures that were instrumental in the fight for self determination in puerto rico but i think virginia professor dr that you will reach everybody everyone everywhere well that's also heart warming to hear you know when you start writing a book like this here i was thinking mostly of my students i was gearing this to them because i knew that nowhere in their high school students in new york i'm talking about latino students particularly puerto rican students in the diaspora no where in their high school education or in their college education would they ever come across this story about their own heritage and something that actually took place here mostly in new york in the united states and this all happened before in when puerto rico was still a colony of spain so that i thought well you know at least of their something maybe not a history book with with with a greater degree of accuracy that's required but perhaps if i were to write it as i as a historical novel that they would become interested and and that might lead them to ask more questions and do more you place us in new york eighteen ninety two in cuba and puerto rico and you go back and forth with your characters we move there's not a dull moment and you  know there's a lot of suspense and surprises you never know what's going to happen down the road that's the thing that's right that's right whatever hurdles well i'll tell you one of the hardest things to do in putting this book together was  i knew that i couldn't do it as a history book because i just don't have the facility to be traveling the way i used to when i was more active and and teaching and involved with with with with growing i remember as a kid growing up in the south bronx that i was intrigued by historical novels and then i grew up to go into that profession because of the novel not because of the history that i read because of the novel set told me something about history that i wanted to know about and then going back to my point one of the hardest things for me to do with with her words but the puerto rican anthem at the voting it's time to fight home lifetime to it's she was an incredible woman and of course we have we have people have written about her all the it becomes the editor of the revolutionary newspaper about syria and they live in new york during those ten years that's that's what i call the season during those ten years of rebellion against  spanish colonial authority and i kept thinking well ok how did they live where they live why new york how it is they feel about new york and how was it to live here during that time what does they do so i did a lot of newspaper reading i read a lot of news a little read a lot of basia i read any any anecdotal material i could get my hands on to get an idea of where they are and of course finding out where they lived well that comes out in their car respond it's like a picture you're painting a picture of a realistic big sure i said how many hours  invest in this book how many years how were you able to track these people in brooklyn in manhattan in have that enough in eighty ninety two or whatever tell me about that well sometimes i did spend hours on i mean hours days sometimes weeks searching out one little bit of information so for the head of the puerto rico section of the cuban revolutionary party now i i had to find out what doctors did at that point in time oh gosh i found i found his card i did a lot of research on line on the graduates of columbia university during that time and at that point in time doctors had to write a dissertation the way professors have to do today and in the dissertation that he wrote on was on the effects of malaria the effects of tropical diseases which was interesting of course because he comes from puerto rico he would be interested in that and they had prentiss themselves to to another doctor and usually in europe because  american medical schools were really not as important as the european schools well searching and searching online i finally found his address and i got and that's where he kept his office and i saw it looked at the card actually i have this in the book and i realize that the amount of time that he spent in private practice was only two days a week and a few hours if that was so that that doesn't that doesn't make any sense well in those days doctors became mentors and teachers and instructors in the medical schools so most of their time was going to be spent  seeing patients at the hospital instructing medical school students making house calls and one day after i get all this information i go well what th office looked like i knew his office was near fifth avenue he was very wealthy on when forty street near fifth avenue and was going to doctor have in his home office at that point in time well that meant going back and looking at a lot of pictures and doing some more reading about it in order to i guess it's like filmmaking you know when you're making it you have your doctors and so many shots in order to get the one second or the one minute that you really are going to use so that's what what i had to do with with dr hannah the type of clothing that women used to there is a there's a to do a great deal of research on women's outfits during that time where they shopped what what kind of what the outfits looked like of all women wore corsets a woman who didn't wear of course it was a you know considered a loose women you know and and there were many women who believed in the value of the corsets because they actually strengthened they felt they strengthen it an amazing you really put it together with detail and that's so important because you know what makes people see it in your mind you're creating with you creators i've been accused of too many details so i felt it was really important necessary it was necessary and i had i was thinking also about the hardest thing in the book was to tell the story from the point of view of the women i knew they created clubs that was that was very very important for the movement because those clubs did fund raising and they they they they with the funds that they raise a board ammunitions or they helped to outfit a you know contraband to taken to cuba because the fighting was actually going on in cuba started in puerto rico and the idea of the story is when is it going to start in puerto rico how do we prepare for that so so to tell the story from just their clubs isn't enough yeah they had these clubs but they weren't allowed to read then the writing that the men had they weren't allowed to sign that they're there they're almost you could call it a declaration of independence when they when they create the puerto rico section women are not there they're a fifty nine m women are not allowed at these meetings they so so how do you tell the story from their point of view when when i got up to the end which is a critical part of what actually happens with the movement i was being a historian i was prepared to go ahead and put in all the history of what happened and i said wait a minute hold it a minute i can't i can't talk about men's what the men were saying and feeling this is not their story so i had to go back and think well how did the women feel what were they doing how were they what they  take with them i mean it's so complex right right and that was to me that was that was easier than trying to figure out what they were doing and puerto rico because my experiences and your experience and and trying to you know putting together and doing the research on what life was like for the for yes for the last in the middle class and puerto rico with this time was  it that that took a bit of doing and i i kept telling myself well i only have to do this in the beginning i don't have to continue it from this point on but then as it turned out i had to follow a lot to cuba and talk about her meetings and her salons which was the other thing that women did they have these literary salons but they were constantly being watched they were a lot of fear they lived in fear y got me yeah that was that was hard and that was hard the that was the hard part i believe because how do you do over do you do it with the a leader you know  my god everybody knows about and and i i thought well you know again he he is larger than life he's he's wrapped in the flag as he's everybody knows the story i mean you know the hero of the revolution well not everybody i think you've really got on you you're going to get a lot of people interested in this unity between puerto rico and cuba yes that because they don't realize that before the united states took over puerto rico in eight hundred ninety eight that that q one of these countries were part of spain they were part of i like about monthly and i you know i kind of snuck it in but is is having this lovely affair with as you speak it was r mentioned but but here's the thing that i find fascinating you know you're going to love this because you're you're a theater person you know he well he was married in cuba he had a son her mother was cuban her father was puerto rican and she's married with children but her husband is very very ill now nobody knows what what happens there's a lot of speculation about whether the child whose picture he's carries next to his heart is his daughter oh i don't think it is his story i just say this is the woman whose child  someday no you have so much that's why i'm saying this and so them a talk of this is you have to these women are exciting passionate different they are dairymen they are they they go after what they want yeah these the heroes of today this is what girls want to look up to the gym that's why that's that's another another reason why i stuck to the women because the air the  real sarah books written about it every day you know people knew about it it was on the front pages of the journal it was it was an incredible story and he brings her to new york 're in the in if you're a historian you kind of i mean if you're i'm interested in all of these all of these connections how you can bring them all in one place you can really do it in  latino and bi lingual books in the nation and they and they also outsource to all the major bookstores so amazon has it both in kindle and in paperback and barnes and noble has it and they have it in on the new book also so there's a lot of ways to get to the book that's not that's not going to be difficult it's just a question of finding it and and right now i'm doing some i'll be doing some some talks about it october the eleventh from six to eight and the thing i'll be giving  roses you must look for it amazon is the best choice now because it's only a detail but it's going to be in i guess and in all the young bookstores and it could be gotten also by the up t