Emily Goldberg Learns to Salsa

October 30, 2006
Emily Goldberg lives in New York and has always been under the impression that it was her mother who chose to distance herself from her large family in Puerto Rico. Not until Emily's grandmother Rosa dies, and Emily accompanies her mother back to her homeland, does Emily learn the truth. The family plans on staying in Puerto Rico just for the weekend but when it becomes obvious that her mother needs more time to mend, Emily agrees to stay, thus forfeiting her summer plans of a road trip with her two best friends. Emily, who narrates, finds herself unprepared for the cultural differences and her cousins' attitude towards her, but over time she learns to abide Tía Rosa's strict rules. Ostow's (Westminster Abby) story may be light-hearted, but she delves deeply into the feelings of the heroine and this newfound extended family. When Emily suspects that Lucy may be pregnant, Emily knows that her own mother is the only person they can turn to for help. In seeking her advice, Emily finally learns the real reason there has been no contact with their relatives all these years. And the two cousins realize they have more commonalities than differences. Ages 12-up.

January 1, 2007
Gr 7-10-After the death of the grandmother she has never met, Emily, a Jewish teen from a New York City suburb, spends a life-changing summer in Puerto Rico. Her mother left her homeland to attend college in New York and stayed on to earn a doctorate, marry, and, seemingly, never look back. Now, the girl must sacrifice a precollege road trip and final weeks with her boyfriend to stay in Puerto Rico while her grieving parent reconnects with her past. At first, relations are strained between Emily and her relatives; though polite and tactful, she's shy and sometimes mistaken for "stuck-up," particularly by her cousin Lucy, who treats her like a spoiled, privileged brat. As her mother comes to grips with her estranged sisters and her loss, Emily learns the truth about their severed ties as well as about life in the real Puerto Rico-not the one in "getaway brochures." When Lucy suspects that she is pregnant, only her New York family can help; old-fashioned attitudes and limited options for women are part of her decision to leave the island, just as her aunt did so many years before. Emily's honest, thoughtful narrative tells this engaging story of family and culture drawn from the author's own experience."Barbara Auerbach, New York City Public Schools"

Copyright 2007 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

December 15, 2006
When high-school senior Emily Goldberg leaves her New York suburban home to attend her grandmother's funeral in Puerto Rico, it's her first meeting with her mother's extended family. She has always wondered why Mom didn't return home after she left for college in New York, or even later, when she married her hippy Jewish boyfriend. Emily stays in Puerto Rico for the summer to help Mom reconnect with what she left behind, and discovers a new world. Her fast, funny, present-tense narrative is totally without affectation as she learns about food, music, museums, and the rain forest, gets close to a gorgeous guy, and tries to overcome the seething hostility of her cousin Lucy (who treats her as "a new strain of toenail fungus"). Without heavy messages, Ostow draws on her own half-Jewish, half-Puerto Rican roots to tell a moving story that has a solid plotline and plenty of family secrets--past and present--as it opens up issues of tradition, feminism, friendship, and loyalty.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2006, American Library Association.)