In order to write her 2020 novel “The Taste of Sugar,” writer and Humboldt Park native Marisel Vera had researched the political and colonial history of Puerto Rico. It’s a history that she says even her parents, who migrated to Chicago from Puerto Rico in the 1950s, didn’t know.

Vera says what she learned about the island’s past still resonates today.

Here, Vera gives la ultima palabra — the last word — on what she believes must happen to give Puerto Rico a brighter future.