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Book Reviewed by:Winner of the 2020 BookBrowse Award for Best Young Adult Novel
A poignant novel of desperation, escape, and survival across the U.S.-Mexico border, inspired by current events.
Pulga has his dreams.
Chico has his grief.
Pequeña has her pride.
And these three teens have one another. But none of them have illusions about the town they've grown up in and the dangers that surround them. Even with the love of family, threats lurk around every corner. And when those threats become all too real, the trio knows they have no choice but to run: from their country, from their families, from their beloved home.
Crossing from Guatemala through Mexico, they follow the route of La Bestia, the perilous train system that might deliver them to a better life--if they are lucky enough to survive the journey. With nothing but the bags on their backs and desperation drumming through their hearts, Pulga, Chico, and Pequeña know there is no turning back, despite the unknown that awaits them. And the darkness that seems to follow wherever they go.
In this striking portrait of lives torn apart, the plight of migrants at the U.S. southern border is brought to light through poignant, vivid storytelling. An epic journey of danger, resilience, heartache, and hope.
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BookBrowse Awards
2020
Their ride through Mexico on La Bestia is depicted as a multisensory experience, sometimes nightmarish, sometimes triumphant. And the conclusion of that journey highlights the various ways a trip like this can end in these days of unaccompanied children waiting in cages on the border. We Are Not from Here, with its young, sympathetic, genuinely desperate characters, is a heart-wrenchingly real novel to hand to any teen or adult who wonders how and why that journey can be so urgent and imperative for some...continued
Full Review
(525 words)
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(Reviewed by Catherine M Andronik).
In Jenny Torres Sanchez's young adult novel We Are Not from Here, three Guatemalan teenagers embark on a dangerous journey to the United States, part of which takes place on top of La Bestia (The Beast). This is the commonly used name for the train that spans the length of Mexico frequently boarded by migrants seeking to bypass immigration checkpoints en route to the U.S. Its other common name is perhaps less lyrical but more descriptive: El tren de la muerta, the train of death. In the novel, the characters switch from train to train, revealing that there is no single La Bestia; this is a beast made of many parts.
Migrants have been riding La Bestia for decades, though the popularity of this method of travel waned considerably in 2014 ...
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"All around me, my friends are talking, joking, laughing. Outside is the camp, the barbed wire, the guard towers, the city, the country that hates us.
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Alexandra Villasante, critically acclaimed author of The Grief Keeper
We Are Not From Here is a book that will mark your heart. Jenny Torres Sanchez challenges us to feel, empathize and understand. A searing, necessary and ultimately beautiful book.
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