Novelist Julia Alvarez on Being a Minority in America

Mexican-American writer Sandra Cisnero is credited as the first Chicana author to publish a book about Chicana women. She joins Fresh Air to read from a new story, called "La Fabulosa."

Nunez's latest novel, What Are You Going Through, is about facing the possible death of our planet from climate change — while also dealing with our mortality as individuals.

Rumaan Alam's latest novel, Leave the World Behind, centers on a white family and an older Black couple who find themselves together in a beautiful vacation house on Long Island while a power outage — and possibly something much worse — grips much of the East Coast. The novel, which is up for the National Book Award, explores class and race relations — and how we respond to crisis and fear