Illegal

May 9, 2011
Fourteen-year-old Nora clings to the hope that her father will return from America, where he's raising money for their family, in time for her quinceañera. But when he stops corresponding with them, Nora and her mother decide to go to Texas to find him. Restrepo starkly highlights the family's dire circumstancesâtheir farm is ailing, and they have no means to surviveâthat spur their decision to leave Nora's grandmother behind and take the dangerous journey across the border, crouched in back of a mango truck. Though Nora is hopefulâ"Why would so many people come this way if it weren't worth the risk?"âtheir trials don't end once they arrive in the United States. In her first novel, picture book author Restrepo (Moose and Magpie) conveys Nora and her mother's day-to-day struggles in Texas as they commission fake papers, search for employment (and for Nora's father), and fight to maintain dignity while keeping their illegal status hidden. Though a subplot involving the missing niece of Nora's employers (most likely the victim of violence) feels extraneous, it serves to further demonstrate the dehumanization, dangers, and sobering limitations that illegal immigrants face today. Ages 12âup.

February 15, 2011

When Nora's dad left their small Mexican town, Cedula, to make money for the family in the United States, he promised to be back for her 15th birthday quinceañera celebration. Now three years later, Cedula, without "even a stinking drug dealer in this town to spread the cash around," has closed its schools, families are moving away and 14-year-old Nora worries her father won't return in time. When his money stops arriving, her family risks losing its land and she hears a voice telling her to flee, Nora convinces her mother to use their savings to be smuggled across the border to look for him. With searing realism, debut author Restrepo describes Nora's anger, desperation and loss of faith when she and her mother arrive, barely alive in the back of a fruit truck, in Houston to a barrio that's characterized by racial division, gangs, violence and filthy living conditions. Giving up her dreams about her father's promise and American prosperity, Nora simply wants to find the truth and survive in her foreign surroundings. Newfound friends, struggling with their own poverty and gang threats, and community, made up of all kinds of outsiders, combine with her own indomitable spirit to give her the courage to fight to belong. This memorable coming-of-age story will awaken readers to the overlooked struggles of immigrants. (glossary) (Fiction. YA)

(COPYRIGHT (2011) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

May 1, 2011

Gr 7-10-Nora, 14, and her family own and work a grapefruit farm in Cedula, Mexico. The town is slowly dying and no one is around to buy their fruit, leaving them with many bills to pay. To help make ends meet, Nora's father illegally crosses the border into Texas and sends money back home. But one day it stops coming. Nora and her mother follow in the man's footsteps, hiding in the back of a truck to cross into Texas. As Nora searches for her father, she learns some hard lessons about life in America, being an outsider, and growing up. While the plot has relevance, the tone of the novel is too light for such an intense topic, and the characters are not fully developed, making it difficult for readers to truly relate to their problems.-Jessie Spalding, Tempe Public Library, AZ

Copyright 2011 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from March 15, 2011
Grades 7-10 *Starred Review* Noras beloved Papa has been working illegally on a construction site in Texas and sending money back home. But when the letters and money stop coming, Nora and Mama leave family behind and set out to find him. After being smuggled across the border in a stifling, packed mango truck, they struggle to survive with false papers in Houston, where they find no work. No Papa. No nothing. With depth and detail, Restrepo tells the story of contemporary illegals. Never sentimental, this debut novel is clear about the characters harsh daily struggle for shelter, food, and community, as Nora fights off violence, including an attempted gang rape; makes friends (who also need help); and questions her faith in God. Her insistent dream is to go to school, and she also longs for shoes that fit and pierced ears for her quinceaera celebration, to mark her fifteenth birthday. At times, the prose veers into docu-novel territory, but the unsparing language keeps the tension mounting as well as the heartbreak: Nothing but their broken dreams hung in the air, and they stank. The teens immediate first-person narrative will hook readers with its gritty specifics, honest anger and sorrow, and the small acts of kindness that occur throughout the harrowing journey.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2011, American Library Association.)