The Spanish Daughter

November 22, 2021
Hughes follows The Sisters of Alameda Street with an engrossing mystery/romance set in early 20th-century Ecuador and Spain. In 1920, Spanish chocolate shop proprietor María Purificación “Puri” de Lafont y Toledo learns that her father, who left when she was two, has willed his cacao plantation in Ecuador to her and, to her surprise, to children from his secret other marriage. As Puri and her husband, Cristóbal, sail to Ecuador to claim her inheritance, a stranger attempts to strangle her on the ship, and in the struggle both the assailant and Puri’s mortally wounded husband fall overboard. For her protection, Puri dons a beard and disguises herself as Cristóbal. Legalities buy Puri time to investigate who killed her husband and targeted her. Fans of historicals will appreciate the descriptions of dress, local foods and customs, social stratification, and the cacao industry, a source of an economic boom and bust in early 20th-century Ecuador. In the end, Puri predictably finds romance (as a woman, with a man) and prosperity, but Hughes shakes up the formula by showing how Puri wins out by adopting Cristóbal’s assertive traits, which help her as she figures out what to do with the plantation and navigates the business world. As addictive as chocolate, this ends on a modern and satisfying note. Agent: Rachel Brooks, BookEnds Literary Agency.

December 15, 2021
In April 1920, Mar�a Purificaci�n de Lafont y Toledo, nicknamed Puri, and her husband, Crist�bal de Balboa, leave her hometown in Spain for Vinces, Ecuador. They are heading to her recently deceased father's cacao plantation to hear the reading of his will with her three illegitimate half-siblings. But Cristobal is killed defending Puri from a murder attempt, and now, to protect herself, she decides to assume her husband's identity as she tries to figure out this new landscape filled with people who could friends, enemies, or both. Hughes portrays a small cast of characters while providing whodunit suspense and lots of background information on cacao plantations and insights into the way social classes are embodied in the production of chocolate. With an equal mix of historical fiction, dramatic family conflict, and mystery, this tale should please fans of Christina Baker Kline, Lisa Wingate, and Kate Quinn. Beginning with a map and ending with a reader's group guide, Hughes' tale of secrets, treachery, and chocolate will be appreciated by fiction readers looking for an extra level of engagement.

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