Bird of Paradise: How I Became Latina

In 2009, when journalist and documentary filmmaker Raquel Cepeda almost lost her estranged father to heart disease, she was terrified she'd never know the truth about her ancestry. Born in Harlem to Dominican parents, every time she looked in the mirror, Cepeda saw a mystery - a tapestry of races and ethnicities that came together in an ambiguous mix. With time running out, she decided to embark on an archaeological dig of sorts by using the science of ancestral DNA testing to excavate everything she could about her genetic history.

The strands of her DNA would take her further, across the globe and into history. Who were her ancestors? How did they - and she - become Latina? Her journey, as the most unforgettable ones often do, would lead her to places she hadn't expected to go. With vibrant lyrical prose and a fierce honesty, Cepeda parses concepts of race, identity, and ancestral DNA among Latinos by using her own Dominican-American story as one example, and in the process arrives at some sort of peace with her father.