What do readers think of Ordinary Girls by Jaquira Díaz? Write your own review.

Sandra Cisneros says of Ordinary Girls that Jaquira Diaz "is a wondrous survivor, a woman who has claimed her own voice." Look at this example of her prose when she goes to see Paula at the Mailman Center for Child Development and Diaz describes Paula: "She wore slacks and a short-sleeved blouse, except she was barefoot, with a toe ring and tattooed forearms, her brown curls messy and frizzy" (129). Sentences like that throughout the book draw readers into the scenes. Diaz continually surprises readers with the intensity of the moments when she interacts with other people or describes those people. Another time, Diaz reflects on her mother: "I would think of my mother, adrift in that city, alone. How she descended into madness, sometimes sleeping on the steps of the Miami Beach Post Office, sometimes in the hallway of a friend's building" (138-9). Diaz continues to make readers feel as if they are seeing through her eyes and experiencing incidents as she does. As I read, I couldn't help but think of Educated by Tara Westover and an even earlier book, The Glass Castle. Ordinary Girls is its own story though regardless of the reminders of other stories. Diaz gives an honest account of her experiences. I found the last chapter particularly gratifying because Diaz says, "We're not girls anymore. We are women now." And she goes on to explain what each woman she has described is now doing. Thus, Ordinary Girls gives us hope that regardless of the horrors the girls experienced, they have risen above them.

I overall liked this book and her story. I did not like that I needed a Spanish/English dictionary. I feel I missed some of her book trying to figure out the words. She tells of her childhood of abuse, sex and crime. She was all over the place in telling her story and at times it was hard to follow. Characters were introduced randomly and several times I went who is this. Family was important yet she spent years away from them. She bared her soul in this book.

I struggled to read this book. It was tough to read than I thought it would be because there were a lot of parts that, in my opinion, could have been left out. Storytelling within the chapter was a little bit rough and it could have had a better transition. The story is non-linear, which is fine, but for me, it was really hard to care for the character as much. There are good parts that made me laugh and smile because I could imagine how her adventures and experiences happen as they were told. Overall, I still consider it as a good read.

Parts of this book read as if pieced together, combining both past and future thoughts and actions with a present storyline. I struggled to maintain the thread as I read through sections of the book. I admire the author's survival skills and ultimate triumph to become the writer she is today. However, I would have better enjoyed my reading experience had the writing style been more chronologically fluid.

Jaquira Diaz shares her wild and crazy life with hopes that other girls will relate and perhaps realize that they are not alone with their sufferings. I found this a tough read due to not being familiar with Puerto Rican culture or the Spanish that was interspersed throughout. I kept hoping for Jaquira's life to stabilize and it almost never did.