New Book: Jenni Rivera: The Incredible Story of a Warrior Butterfly

Jenni Rivera was the top-selling artist within the Regional Mexican music genre. With a weekly radio show, her own reality show, a makeup and clothing line, and her own foundation, she was at the height of her career and life. Everything she had conquered, with blood, sweat, tears, and smiles, hap¬pened, as she said, with God leading her by the hand. However her life, her dreams, and the joy she shared with so many came to a tragic end just before dawn on December 9, 2012.

In Jenni Rivera: The Incredible Story of a Warrior Butterfly, Leila Cobo—pianist, TV host, and Executive Director for Latino content and programming at Billboard—brings us Jenni Rivera’s intimate and moving biography, reflecting on the party girl, the elegant woman, the great diva, the friend, the mother, and the grandmother. 


A Fulbright scholar from Cali, Colombia, Leila Cobo is a novelist, pianist, TV host  and executive Editor for Latin Content and Programming for Billboard. Under her tenure, Billboard has expanded its coverage of Latin Music and for the first time in its more than 100-year history, the magazine has a complete weekly section dedicated solely to Latin music. 

As an author Ms. Cobo’s first novel, Tell Me Something True, was published Oct. 1 to critical acclaim by Grand Central Publishing/Hatchette and is now in its third printing. Her second novel, The Second Time We Met, was published in 2012.

Prior to Billboard, Leila wrote for the Los Angeles Times and was later the pop music critic at the Miami Herald. She’s written liner notes for Ricky Martin, Shakira, Julio Iglesias and Selena among others, and collaborates closely with Grammy in the Schools and Teach for America, among other projects.

Ms. Cobo is also one of the authors of the Billboard Illustrated Encyclopedia of Music and a guest writer on the anthology Quinceañera.

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• Latino Star On Working With Jenni Rivera
• Jenni Rivera TV series, movie role and autobiography rolling out