. >> richard blanco, what is a los cocuyos? >> it's a firefly. technically it's a deal but it's a kind of firefly that is very, it's very mythical as well as even south florida where i grew up. they're sort of a folktale or sort of folklore that the women just to pin them on addresses and their love and air, sort of the kind of mating ritual. a courting ritual really. so that's part of the title but it's also the name of my uncles osha star in the book which is kind of where i grew up in a way, kind of where i came to really connect with my culture and my heritage by working in the cuban grow sugar in miami. so the book takes its title from that store and also sort of the idea of prince of los cocuyos, the idea of a village. the old adage it takes a village. it was going up the book centers a lot about growing up being sort of ushered and connected to my heritage, my cuban american heritage through all the various people in the village, in my team unity. so the star plays a central role in that with all the customers and all the regulars that i w

. >> why does "the prince of los cocuyos" and when you about 16 and a half years old? >> i think i want to take the book -- i did want it to be a quite coming out story. i didn't want it, i wanted to be sort of a cultural coming of age story to a certain degree, and it seemed like a natural pause. 16, 16 and have. there's a big, big break in one's life and after that i hold a set of experiences and emotional growth happens. if i turned that page into that phase, i would've been another 300 pages. so there was a practical reason for it. the book is sort of a dawning, and awakening come at i think the cover will reflect that. taking you right from that moment forward you can't infer what's going to happen to little ricky, so to speak. plus is set up for my second part to be but really it just seemed like a natural pause. at first as of the many authors, a first i thought i was going to write up to my first trip to cuba. then when moved to connecticut, and moved back to miami. and by the time i was eight hours had about 70,000 words and i thought, this is not going to hap