Quinceañeras Gone Wild

What used to be a traditional Latino "rite of passage" has turned into what one of the teenagers interviewed by Julia Álvarez for her fascinating new book, "Once Upon a Quinceañera-Coming of Age in the USA," calls, in a marvelous example of insightful misspelling, "a right of passage."
No longer a simple affair for family and a handful of friends, quinceañera parties have become as big and expensive as a keeping-up-with-the-Perezes wedding — minus the groom.

Read my Daily News column of August 8 on the subject.