Caravan to the North

September 15, 2019
In October 2018, hundreds of people gathered in the capital city of El Salvador to form a caravan heading to the United States. Through the voice of one of these asylum seekers Argueta chronicles the unimaginable walk to the Tijuana border. Misael Martínez, his brother, and their parents have joined the caravan "because you can't really live / in my village anymore. / There's no work. / There's no way to get by. / What there is, / is violence, gangs." As the caravan undertakes the staggering walk of over 2,500 miles--most individuals with no more than a backpack "full of hopes"--crossing through El Salvador, Guatemala, and Mexico, they are met mostly with kindness along the way. Finally, after much hardship, they reach the U.S. border only to be met with tear gas, "police with shields / and soldiers everywhere. / I'm really, really, really scared." That night he dreams "the sweetest dream of all. / Instead of going to the North, / I went back to El Salvador." Deceptively simple black-and-white line drawings accompany this wrenching account of the humanitarian crisis taking place in Central America and at the U.S. border. Read this along with Argueta's Somos como las nubes/We Are Like the Clouds, illustrated by Alfonso Ruano and translated by Elisa Amado (2016). Argueta's original Spanish text, Caravana al norte, publishes simultaneously. This moving work should help children understand the current national discussion. (afterword, map) (Verse fiction. 9-adult)

COPYRIGHT(2019) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Starred review from October 15, 2019
Grades 4-7 *Starred Review* The award-winning Salvadoran writer Argueta offers a brief but powerful novel in verse. Misael and his family have made the difficult decision to leave their beloved home in El Salvador to head north. Like many of their compatriots, who have grown weary of the lack of employment and threats of violence, they choose to travel by joining the caravan, a large group of migrants and refugees who travel en masse through Central America towards the U.S. border. Together, they reason, the journey is not as dangerous, but it is still full of uncertainty. Argueta's spare text is given emotional potency through Misael's observations of the members of the caravan, whose stories mirror his own fears of undertaking the arduous journey, as well as the hopes that drive them. His sensory-filled memories of farming, mara�ones, and snow cones emphasize the sorrow of leaving the country he loves so, so much. Monroy's line illustrations throughout the book complement the sobering narrative, at once capturing the huddled passages and small moments of family comfort and camaraderie that sustain them. Includes an afterword by Argueta, who also migrated north from El Salvador as a young man, and a map depicting the caravan's path.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)