Angie Cruz is the author of the novels Soledad, Let It Rain Coffee, y Dominicana, which was shortlisted for the Women’s Prize and a Good Morning America Book Club pick. She is the founder and editor-in-chief of Aster(ix), a literary and arts journal, and is an associate professor of English at the University of Pittsburgh. Cara Romero, the protagonist of Cruz’s How Not to Drown in a Glass of Water: A Novel (Flatiron Books), thought she would work at the factory of little lamps for the rest of her life. But when, in her mid-50s, she loses her job in the Great Recession, she is forced back into the job market for the first time in decades. Set up with a job counselor, Cara instead begins to narrate the story of her life. For 12 sessions, she recounts her turbulent love affairs; her alternately biting and loving relationships with her neighbor Lulu and her sister Angela; her struggles with debt, gentrification, and loss; and, eventually, what really happened between her and her estranged son, Fernando. As Cara confronts her darkest secrets and regrets, we see a woman buffeted by life but still full of fight.