In this article, Alvarez discusses her career as a Latino writer.

In 1991, Julia Alvarez made a resounding splash on the literary scene with her first novel, How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents, whose narrators, the four vibrant and distinctive Garcia siblings, captivated readers and critics. Like their author, the characters emigrated to middle-class Queens, N.Y., from the Dominican Republic, and the novel provided a keen look at the island social structure they wistfully remember and the political turmoil they escaped.

The second-oldest sister, Yolanda, now a well known author, is the protagonist of Alvarez's third novel, 'Yo', out next month from Algonquin. Alvarez brings to Yo's portrait an empathy of shared experiences, anxieties and hopes.

In 1960 at the age of 10, Alvarez fled the Dominican Republic with her parents and three sisters (her father was involved in the underground against the dictator Raphael Trujillo). She has...