One of my favorite illustrations in Finding the Music/En Pos de la Música shows Reyna holding a black and white snapshot of her grandfather’s mariachi group: five men standing behind their instruments in elegant trajes de charro.

And the truth is, that image has long been the public face of mariachi. It’s an art form that has been dominated by men, often known best for music played by male musicians, and songs written from a male perspective.

But another truth is that women have played vital—if less widely celebrated—roles in mariachi for more than a century. Leonor Xochitl Perez, a scholar and founder of The Mariachi Women’s Foundation, has documented the stories of female musicians such as Rosa Quirino, who at 12-years-old (!) in 1903 began singing and playing violin with a mariachi ensemble in Mexico.

I wanted Finding the Music to honor those voices too.

So Reyna, the story’s main character, is named in honor of mariachi trailblazers like Lola Beltran, known by many as “La Reina,” the Queen, and of more recent all-female mariachi groups like Mariachi Reyna de Los Angeles who happen to be based in Southern California where I’m from.

For more information on the history of women in mariachi, check out Dra. Perez’s work, as well as the PBS Independent Lens documentary, Compañeras, which profiles Mariachi Reyna de Los Angeles.

In the meantime, I super want you to check out the young women (and young men!) of one of my favorite mariachis, Mariachi Chavez, of Cesar Chavez High School in Stockton, Calif. They are, no joke, so talented. Here they are performing “Cucurrucucu Paloma,” a song made famous by La Reina, Lola Beltran.

It’s been a couple weeks since I was able to share this exciting news.

I am still over the moon:

Oh, man. I really dig Stef. Can’t wait to introduce her to the world.

When my daughter Alice asked for a Cinderella book not too long ago, I knew without her saying so that she meant the glass-slippered Walt Disney version.

And I understand the appeal, for sure.

But I also think it’s remarkably fascinating how so many cultures across so many eras have claimed a “Cinderella,” from the Greek-Egyptian Rhodopis, to the Chinese Yeh-Shen, to the Irish Fair, Brown and Trembling. How each story speaks to a universal ache to be finally recognized as one’s true, so-much-more-than-they-took-you-for self. And, in the best versions, a will to fight for a happy ending. To get to that ball.

(The American Library Association has a very cool list of multicultural Cinderellas, and Lee & Low sells a great collection, including stories from Filipino, Hmong, Mexican, Indian and Cambodian culture).

Anyway, I found Alice a Little Golden Book edition of Disney’s Cinderella because I’m for letting her decide what she reads. She got Tomie dePaola’s Mexican-inspired Adelita too, though. Because I’m also for making her world as big a place as I can.