This week, San Antonio children had the unique opportunity to ask a question to Sonia Sotomayor, the first Latina to become a Supreme Court Justice, and have her answer face to face.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHow do you deal with your feelings,\u201d read one of the questions submitted and signed by Oliver.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIs that your question?\u201d she asked the child as she approached him. \u201cThat\u2019s a really good question.\u201d<\/p>\n
Never miss San Antonio Report’s biggest stories.<\/p>\n
Sign up for The Recap, a newsletter rundown of the most important news, delivered every Monday and Thursday.<\/p>\n
\u201cI try to show it but not at other people,\u201d she replied. \u201cMeaning when you\u2019re mad, a lot of time you take it out on other people. And that\u2019s wrong because most of the time they\u2019re not at fault. And sometimes when they make us mad, they don\u2019t mean to.\u201d<\/p>\n
Attendees filled the Carver Community Cultural Center Theater on Tuesday for the event, held by the local bookstore Nowhere with help from the San Antonio Book Festival, to promote Sotomayor\u2019s new children\u2019s book \u201cJust Shine!\u201d and \u201c\u00a1Solo Brilla!,\u201d which was published last September. <\/p>\n
Inspired by her mother, Cecilia, \u201cJust Shine!\u201d tells the story of a little girl who had a special power to bring out the best in people. In it, she pays tribute to her mother as the best teacher she ever had, but didn\u2019t realize it until she was gone.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cOften, it takes a long time to appreciate who the best teacher is in our lives,\u201d Sotomayor said. \u201cI bet if I asked you before I started reading the book, who was your favorite teacher or who was your best teacher? Every single person said, \u2018A school teacher.\u2019 Nobody says, \u201cMy parents.\u2019\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
That evening Sotomayor was joined on stage by Carmen Tafolla, an acclaimed San Antonio writer who represented the city as the local Poet Laureate in 2012 and 2014, and at the state level in 2015.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Tafolla conducted a brief interview onstage before losing Sotomayor to the audience she was itching to embrace.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat I enjoy most about writing books for kids I\u2019m going to get when I go down to the audience in a few minutes, okay?\u201d warned Sotomayor during the interview. \u201cI get hugs from kids. And those hugs become my fuel to survive the work I do. Especially now.\u201d<\/p>\n
The new book is a continuation of \u201cJust Ask!\u201d and \u201cJust Help!\u201d all of which she has written in both English and Spanish, the first language Sotomayor spoke and one she continues to champion with her personal translations.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI spend a lot of time on the translations and I have wonderful friends who work with me to make sure that they are exact translations,\u201d Sotomayor said. \u201cNot just in terms of the words, but in terms of the feelings of the world.\u201d<\/p>\n
Growing up in the Bronx neighborhood of New York City, she didn\u2019t find many books for her in Spanish, at least not in her neighborhood or in her school she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a whole lot of kids out there like me who speak Spanish first,\u201d Sotomayor said. \u201cI want to make sure they have those books. And I\u2019m using the power that I have as a famous person to negotiate in every contract with my publisher that my books will be published in both languages on the same day.\u201d<\/p>\n
As reported by the New York Times<\/a>, over the years book deals have become one of the most lucrative sources of added income for serving Supreme Court Justices. For Sotomayor, her memoir titled \u201cMy Beloved World\u201d and her children\u2019s books have yielded her about $3.7 million.\u00a0<\/p>\n Her Tuesday visit was the first publicly advertised visit to San Antonio since she visited the Texas A&M-San Antonio campus on Jan. 29, 2025. The appearance was part of the university\u2019s Distinguished Lecture Series and closed to the media, including student media<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n