134. We Are Not From Here by Jenny Torres Sanchez

read on my iPhone/Kindle/Book/Audible
narrated by Marisa Blake
Unabridged audio (9:31)
2020
326 pgs.
Adult/YA CRF 
Finished 10/15/2020
Goodreads rating: 4.56 - 1060 ratings
My rating: 4
Setting: contemporary migration from Guatemala to US

First line/s: "When you live in a place like this you're always planning your escape."

What I posted on Goodreads:  Horrifying story of three young people (12, 14, and 16) who make the arduous, perilous journey from their barrio in Guatemala to the U.S.

My comments: What a horrifying story!  Three young people (12, 14, 16) make the arduous journey from their barrio in Guatemala to the United States.  Their dreams are huge but reality is more than harsh.  One loses their life, the other two come very close.   Fleeing horrors like we can't imagine into different horrors that are just as fatal and terrifying.  It shows, with what I am sure is harsh accuracy, what happens to children that are caught on the border and detained in cages.  This was an extremely difficult book to read.  After living in southern Arizona for so many years, I can feel the heat of the desert and now that if I still lived there I would get up in the morning and go find an agency where I could physically actually do something to help the plight of these incredibly brave people. A hard book to get through and finish.  What a story.

Goodreads synopsis:  A ripped-from-the-headlines novel of desperation, escape, and survival across the U.S.-Mexico border.
          Pulga, Chico, and Pequeña have no false illusions about the town they've grown up in and the dangers that surround them. Though their families--both biological and found--create a warm community for them, threats lurk around every corner. And when those threats become all too real, the three teens know they have no choice but to run: for the border, for the hope of freedom, and for their very lives.
          Crossing from Guatemala through Mexico with their eyes on the U.S. border, they follow the route of La Bestia, a system of trains that promise the hope of freedom--if they are lucky enough to survive the harrowing journey. With nothing but the bags on their backs and the desperation that courses through their very veins, Pulga, Chico, and Pequeña know that there's no turning back, dangerous though the road ahead might be.
          In this powerful story inspired by real--and current--events, the plight at our southern border is brought to painful, poignant life. 

23. The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend - Katarina Bivald

Translated from Swedish by Alice Menzies
Library book - large print because all the regular prints were on a long reserve list
2013/2016 Kennebec Large Print
394  pgs.
Adult CRF
Finished 4/9/16
Goodreads rating: 3.60
My rating: 3, I liked some of it a great deal
Setting: Contemporary Broken Wheel, Iowa

First line/s: "The strange woman standing on Hope's main street was so ordinary it was almost scandalous.  A thin, plain figure dressed in an autumn coat much too gray and warm for the time of year, a backpack lying on the ground by her feet, an enormous suitcase resting against one of her legs."

My comments:  I think I'm going to have to congitate on this one a bit before I give it a "rating."  It reminds me of another book, but for the life of me I can't think of which one it might be.  The premise is terrific - a 30-something "nobody" from Sweden has come to Nowhere, Iowa to meet the much-older penpal she's been trading books - and life stories - with for two years.  The town is dying/dead, but a small group of stalwart souls still inhabit and... run....the town.  Quirky folk, to be sure.  Enchanting.  Real?  Hmmm.  And Sara, the protagonist, is from Sweden.  She must speak flawless English, but this is never EVER referred to in any way.  Of course, when she arrives, her penpal is dead, having never mentioned that she was bedridden when she invoked the invitation.  If you read this with tongue-in-cheek, never taking anything too seriously, it's a great read.  Just a little too sugar-coated for me in places, I guess.

Goodreads synopsis: Once you let a book into your life, the most unexpected things can happen...
          Broken Wheel, Iowa, has never seen anyone like Sara, who traveled all the way from Sweden just to meet her pen pal, Amy. When she arrives, however, she finds that Amy's funeral has just ended. Luckily, the townspeople are happy to look after their bewildered tourist—even if they don't understand her peculiar need for books. Marooned in a farm town that's almost beyond repair, Sara starts a bookstore in honor of her friend's memory. 
          All she wants is to share the books she loves with the citizens of Broken Wheel and to convince them that reading is one of the great joys of life. But she makes some unconventional choices that could force a lot of secrets into the open and change things for everyone in town. Reminiscent of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, this is a warm, witty book about friendship, stories, and love.

21. Digging to America - Anne Tyler

Audio read by

Audio discs/hours

2006

277 pgs.

Adult CRF

Finished 3/13/2015

Goodreads rating: 3.51

My rating:   4 - Enjoyed it very much, made me think

PBS

Contemporary rural Baltimore, MD

My comments:  Oftentimes when I take a break from my "usual" murder mystery or YA, I miss them and wonder why I strayed.  This book, however, didn't do that.  I was taken with the story right from the beginning.  Character-driven, this is the story of two families, both American, though the roots of one are Iranian. They are linked by the adoption of two baby girls from Korea, meeting at the Baltimore Airport when both were brought to the US.  This is the story of personalities; how we understand - or don't understand - each other for the simplest of reasons.  Different personalities that are not understood. Misunderstanding. Friendship. Throughout the story the "voice" comes from different characters, but it is the character of Maryam that sings out the loudest to me.  She is no more interesting than any of the others but because she is so different in personality than me but has so many similar feelings, I really related to her and enjoyed looking at the world through her focus.

Goodreads book summary:  In what is perhaps her richest and most deeply searching novel, Anne Tyler gives us a story about what it is to be an American, and about Maryam Yazdan, who after thirty-five years in this country must finally come to terms with her "outsiderness." 
Two families, who would otherwise never have come together, meet by chance at the Baltimore airport--the Donaldsons, a very American couple, and the Yazdans, Maryam's fully assimilated son and his attractive Iranian American wife. Each couple is awaiting the arrival of an adopted infant daughter from Korea. After the babies from distant Asia are delivered, Bitsy Donaldson impulsively invites the Yazdans to celebrate with an "arrival party," an event that is repeated every year as the two families become more deeply intertwined. 
Even independent-minded Maryam is drawn in. But only up to a point. When she finds herself being courted by one of the Donaldson clan, a good-hearted man of her vintage, recently widowed and still recovering from his wife's death, suddenly all the values she cherishes--her traditions, her privacy, her otherness--are threatened. Somehow this big American takes up so much space that the orderly boundaries of her life feel invaded. 
A luminous novel brimming with subtle, funny, and tender observations that cast a penetrating light on the American way as seen from two perspectives, those who are born here and those who are still struggling to fit in.

56. A Long Walk to Water - Linda Sue Park

Based on the true story of Salva Dut
2010, Clarion Books
122 pgs.
Goodreads: 4.18
My rating:  4.5

1st sentence/s:  "Going was easy.  Going, the big plastic container held only air.  Tall for her eleven years, Nya could switch the handle from one hand to the other, swing the container by her side, or cradle it in bot arms."

Setting:  southern Sudan, between 1985 and now.

OSS:  Two different voices, one of a Dinka "lost boy" of Sudan on a many-yeared journey to find a home, and a life; and one of a contemporary Nuer girl whose entire day is spent gathering water instead of going to school.

Wow.  Salva spends from 1985 to 1996 wandering, orphaned and homeless, from Sudan to Ethiopia to Kenya and finally to the United States before he can put down any kind of roots, get an education, and even find a few - new and old - family connections.  This is an amazing and wonderful true story of one of the thousands of "lost boys of Sudan," written by an award-winning author who actually knows him.

Salva has done amazing things with his life.  After you read this book (and you must) go to Salva's website:  Water for Southern Sudan.

24. Taken - Robert Crais

#15 in Elvis Cole/Joe Pike series
Audio read by Luke Daniels (He's really good.  My only wish is that sometimes Joe Pike didn't whisper all the time....)
7 unabridged cds
(7:47)
Brilliance Audio, 2011
However, looks like it was published in 2012
$32.99 TPPL
352 pages
Rating:  4.5 Super storytelling

Setting:  some LA, but most of the action takes place in the desert near the Dalton Sea, Indio/ Coachella/Palm Desert/Palm Springs in southern California

Written in an interesting way - the point-of-view switches, as does the time.  It might go from Elvis Cole in the current time to Joe Pike six days later to the kidnapped couple in the time between.  Keep you on your toes.  I didn't think, at first, that I was going to like it but I did.  Elvis Cole's sections are always in the first person, all the rest of the characters aren't, just in descriptive mode.

This time, Cole and Pike are assisted by , a government mercenary who'll try anything and follows orders from Joe Pike really well.  I see him a tall, cute, blonde, always laughing, nothing bothering him.  His hidden military/government credentials seem to be able to get him out of any predicament.....I bet he's going to show up again.

Elvis is hired by Nita Morales, a mom whose college daughter Christa and her boyfriend, Jack Berman,  have mysteriously disappeared.  She is afraid they've eloped, but this is very far from the truth...they've been kidnapped, in the wrong place at the wrong time when a group of coyotes who were transporting people from all over the world across the border are hijacked by really bad guys called bajadores. These are bandits that steal from bandits.   Life has no meaning to them.  They're just plain mean and heartless---I hate the thought that there really are people in the world like this!

Carmen Learns English - Judy Cox

Illustrated by Angela Dominguez
Holiday House, 2010
32 pages
Rating: 3.5
Endpapers: Bright dark pink

When Carmen begins kindergarten, she's the only one who speaks Spanish - with no English at all. And she worries about her little sister, Lupita, who will start school next year and knows no English. But Carmen is blessed with a caring teacher. Mrs. Coski doesn't laugh at Carmen, and has her teach her classmates Spanish. When she goes home each day she teaches Lupita the English that she is learning.

Carmen admires her teacher and enjoys teaching her sister and her classmates. A future teacher, for sure!

Put yourself in another's shoes. How difficult it must be fore kids when they can't understand a word. A new kindergarten student at our school knows not a work of English, only Hebrew. She cries and cries and cries. At first I felt badly for her, but then I got irritated to see (and hear) her crying all the time. Her shyness was also hindering her. Shame on me! And now, three months into school, although I still see her crying, it is very much less frequent. To be so young, alone, and not able to understand what's going on around you or be able to communicate even simple needs....well.....

I picked up this book at the library and put it back down. But as I did I flipped through the pages. Its' written in a cool font, "Providence Sans." I changed my mind - because of the font - and checked it out.

My Name is Sangoel - Karen Lynn Williams & Khadra Mohammed

Illustrated by Catherine Stock
Eerdmans Books for Young Readers, 2009
$17.00
32 pages
Tells of the pride of heritage and the heartbreak of leaving your homeland
Rating: 4
Endpapers: Rust

Sangoel leaves the refugee camp for American with the words of the village wiseman ringing in his ears - to be proud of his Dinka name, which has been passed down through many generations. However, that name is not pronounced as it is written and when he arrives in America no one pronounces it correctly. He comes up with a rebus-like way to pronounce it correctly (SUN-GOAL).

Sangoel seems lucky...he is only teased a little and his new home seems accepting and friendly. He already speaks English, since he is the one translating for his mother. The illustrations by Catherine Stock are wonderful - they seem to beautifully depict Africa as well as America.

Good book.

The Color of Home - Mary Hoffman

Illustrated by Karin Littlewood
Dial Books for Young Readers, 2002
$17.99
24 pages
Lovely book, sad of course
Endpapers: Blotches of color as if painted, orange on teh left-page and aqua on the right

Hassan has traveled with his family from his much-loved home in Somalia to the grayness of the U.S. This book tells his story, but in an unusual way...through the picture he paints during his first day in an American school.

This book definitiely puts us in the shoes of an immigrant forced from his country because of war.

74. The Day of the Pelican - Katherine Paterson

for: Middle and Upper grades
Clarion (H/M), 2009
$16.00
146 pages
Rating: Incredibly mixed: I loved learning more about the plight of Albanians in Kosovo, there's so little we really know and understand. Some of the storytelling was terrific, but there were places where I know that kids will just put the book aside. And some of the storytelling was just that - a narrator telling a story. I was profoundly moved by the plight of this family. I do love Katherine Paterson's writing. This didn't seem like her extraordinary writing though. It was more....ordinary. I feel guilty and mean saying this about a powerful author. But it's the feeling I'm left with....

Meli's family goes through unbelievable cruelties in the three years between living a comfortable life in their home in Kosovo, then taking very few belongings and fleeing to a remote mountain KLA hideaway, then to live in a tiny farmhouse with uncle, aunt, elderly granny, cousin and her three kids (14 of them in all, I think), to trudge for days without food or water to be thrust into a freight car, dumped on the Macedonia border and put into a refugee camp....to traveling to Vermont to a new life. Horrible injustices. So much hate. And killing. Cruelty. Subhumanity. And this is going on in many places in the world RIGHT NOW! The story ends shortly after 9/11, which is another huge blow to this non-practicing Muslim family.

When we look around and see immigrants, we must realize how much they've left behind to be here. Huge pieces of themselves left behind. Family and friends that will never been seen again. I'm almost speechless with sadness. What can I do to help?

Here's another review, from Twenty by Jenny. It includes an interview with Katherine Paterson and her editor about the writing of the book. Quite interesting.

Brothers in Hope - Mary Williams

The Story of the Lost Boys of Sudan
Illustrator: R. Gregory Christie
For: School age children
Published: 2005
Rating: 4
Read: Jan. 3, 2009
Coretta Scott King Honor Award
Endpapers; Evergreen

Written by the founder of the Lost Boys of Sudan Foundation, this story is told from the point-of-view of 8-year-old Garang and is based on true stories. While tending cattle in the countryside, Garang's village was attacked, and all the adults and girls were killed - all the boys were out tending cattle. This happened all over southern Sudan, so that thousands of boys were left alone and homeless. They banded together, taking care of each other, and walked all the way to Ethiopia, where they had heard there were refugee camps. We follow Garang through ups and downs as the leader of a group of 35 boys, all the way to America at age 21. What kept them alive? Each other, determination, faith, a yearning for education -- it is a story of bravery and courage.

The prose is easy to understand, written in the first person, and although not what I'd consider "great" writing, it is good storytelling. The illustrations seem to be thick acrylic paintstrokes, and although not my favorites, do the job well. There are excellent AUTHOR'S NOTES and AFTERWORD as well as a map of Africa with Sudan, Ethiopia, and Kenya clearly labeled. The Lost Boys of Sudan Foundation was begun in 2000, and I wonder where the boys and the foundation stand now.