Genre:
Other Award Winners/ Pura Belpre’ Award Winner
Book
Summary:
Esperanza
leads a charmed life on her family’s ranch in Mexico. Her father adores her. Her beautiful mother loves her more than anything. Then, her father is killed, and everything changes. Her uncles pressure her mother to sell the ranch and marry one of them. Her mother refuses and the uncles burn the ranch. Instead of giving in to the marriage proposal, they run to California with the help of their beloved housekeeper and her son Miguel. Esperanza and her mother are thrust into the world of migrant workers in the 1930s. It is a hard life and Esperanza struggles to find her place in the camp and later as a field worker. The hardships of being a migrant worker are too much for her mother who falls ill, forcing Esperanza to grow up and take control of the situation. With harsh working conditions and fear of strikes threatening her well-being, Esperanza finds her own strength and love in the most surprising places.
APA
Reference of Book:
Ryan, P. (2000). Esperanza Rising. New York:
Scholastic.
Impressions:
Esperanza is a full-bodied character who grows and matures before the reader's eyes. Starting as a pampered girl on her family's ranch, she turns into a strong, beautiful young woman in the migrant worker camp in California. This book not only presents this strong, female lead, but sheds light on a history that many may not fully understand. While Esperanza and her family were treated better than most camps, the pay was very little and the work was long and hard. Other camps were not so lucky and moved some, like Miguel's friend Marta, to organize protests and strikes. These hardships, coupled with the animosity toward the Mexican workers, mostly from those Americans trying to escape the depression by moving West, makes a tumultuous background for Esperanza's journey. Although many students study this historical period, they may not know that the United States government actually sent U.S. citizens to Mexico in an attempt to relieve the tension that was brewing around the Mexican migrant workers. The maturing relationship between Esperanza and Miguel provide the perfect distraction from the harshness of their surroundings. Drawing from her family's first-hand experiences, Ryan's characters, details, and historical accuracy, make Esperanza Rising a must-read and sure-to-be classic.
Esperanza is a full-bodied character who grows and matures before the reader's eyes. Starting as a pampered girl on her family's ranch, she turns into a strong, beautiful young woman in the migrant worker camp in California. This book not only presents this strong, female lead, but sheds light on a history that many may not fully understand. While Esperanza and her family were treated better than most camps, the pay was very little and the work was long and hard. Other camps were not so lucky and moved some, like Miguel's friend Marta, to organize protests and strikes. These hardships, coupled with the animosity toward the Mexican workers, mostly from those Americans trying to escape the depression by moving West, makes a tumultuous background for Esperanza's journey. Although many students study this historical period, they may not know that the United States government actually sent U.S. citizens to Mexico in an attempt to relieve the tension that was brewing around the Mexican migrant workers. The maturing relationship between Esperanza and Miguel provide the perfect distraction from the harshness of their surroundings. Drawing from her family's first-hand experiences, Ryan's characters, details, and historical accuracy, make Esperanza Rising a must-read and sure-to-be classic.
Professional
Review:
Esperanza's life as the cherished only daughter of a rich
Mexican rancher changes abruptly when her father is killed and her land-hungry
uncles begin to pressure her widowed mother. They flee to the U.S., accompanied
by their loyal housekeeper, Hortensia, and her son, Miguel. California in 1930
has little to offer penniless Mexican immigrants but hard agricultural labor,
and the four settle in a work camp. Esperanza's pragmatic mother turns to field
work while Esperanza struggles with an unpleasant learning curve, realizing
that she at thirteen lacks the most basic practical skills that her
eight-year-old campmate Isabel takes for granted. Things get worse: strikes
loom, pressing the workers to take sides; Esperanza's mother falls ill, forcing
Esperanza to become la patrons of the family; and Esperanza's dear friend
Miguel disappears with the money she's saved. Based on Ryan's grandmother's
experiences, this is an unusual story that steers clear of some romantic
pitfalls. Though the piquant riches-to-rags element will draw readers, there's
no authorial condescension towards Esperanza's campesino fellow workers, and
Esperanza's gradual shedding of her own prejudices towards them is perceptively
delineated. The discussion of the strike isn't one-sided, though the book does
support Esperanza's decision to keep working, and there's some edifying
information about the heterogeneousness of the Latino population in the
workforce and their forced repatriation and even migration (some U.S. citizens
were sent to Mexico as well). Wide-eyed but thoughtful Esperanza makes an
attractive agent for these discussions, and her inevitable pairing with Miguel
(who took her saved money in order to bring her beloved grandmother from Mexico
to join the family) provides both a touch of romance and an illustration of
what Esperanza has gained by coming north.
APA Reference
of Professional Review:
Stevenson, D. (2000). Esperanza rising. Bulletin of
the Center for Children's Books, 54(4), 160.
Library Uses:
This could be used as part of a diverse books display, highlighting books of different cultures and ethnicities, or as an extension of study of the depression era.
This could be used as part of a diverse books display, highlighting books of different cultures and ethnicities, or as an extension of study of the depression era.
Readalikes:
Witch of Blackbird Pond, by Elizabeth George Speare - Just like Esperanza, fiercely independent Katherine Tyler is forced from her home and into a new world with the Puritan family she has never met. She rejects the rigidity of the Puritan society but along the way finds a balance and, eventually, the love she longs for, in both her family and with the one who holds her heart.
Before We Were Free, by Julia Alvarez - In 1960 Dominican Republic, 12-year-old Anita de la Torre begins a journey to freedom.Alvarez creates another strong, female character, like Esperanza, who must leave her home to escape danger and who finds freedom and her inner-strength along the way.
Enchanted Air: Two Cultures, Two Wings: A Memoir, by Margarita Engle - Engle's poetic memoir, tells of the "Two countries. / Two families. / Two sets of words." that split her heart. Her American father and Cuban mother bring her back to Cuba in the summers until the Revolution begins. Now she worries about her Cuban family and faces discrimination because of her Cuban heritage.
Witch of Blackbird Pond, by Elizabeth George Speare - Just like Esperanza, fiercely independent Katherine Tyler is forced from her home and into a new world with the Puritan family she has never met. She rejects the rigidity of the Puritan society but along the way finds a balance and, eventually, the love she longs for, in both her family and with the one who holds her heart.
Before We Were Free, by Julia Alvarez - In 1960 Dominican Republic, 12-year-old Anita de la Torre begins a journey to freedom.Alvarez creates another strong, female character, like Esperanza, who must leave her home to escape danger and who finds freedom and her inner-strength along the way.
Enchanted Air: Two Cultures, Two Wings: A Memoir, by Margarita Engle - Engle's poetic memoir, tells of the "Two countries. / Two families. / Two sets of words." that split her heart. Her American father and Cuban mother bring her back to Cuba in the summers until the Revolution begins. Now she worries about her Cuban family and faces discrimination because of her Cuban heritage.
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