Esperanza+Rising

//Esperanza Rising// is about a Mexican family. Esperanza is the main character, and many problems happen. She was very rich. Her father dies and she has to move to the U.S. because her uncle set the house on fire. Since her father died, her uncle wanted to marry her mother, and if she didn't he would take the house anyway. Esperanza and her family secretly left their uncle and went to the U.S. Abuelita stayed in Mexico. They had all the right papers though, so they got into the U.S. pretty easily. Esperanza and her family lived with her servant's relatives, pretending to be their cousins. She learned to clean and take care of many things. She used to have servants do these things for her, but she had to learn to do them for herself. There was a dust storm and her mother got very ill. She had to go to the hospital for a long time and she did end up getting better. Esperanza worked very hard to help her mother and get her grandmother, Abuelita, to the U.S. Her mother got better so she could get out of the hospital. Miguel secretly got Abuelita to the U.S. by taking the money Esperanza has been raising.

//Esperanza Rising// is about the Mexican culture. They eat a lot of different foods like tortillas, dips, soups, and many fruits. Family is important and they take care of each other, even it that means marrying a family widow. They also had to work very hard to survive. If they didn't work, they wouldn't have much, and it would be very hard to survive. When they got to the U.S., each family had to live in different villages. Some were better than others but all of them weren't that great.-Chanda Z. I learned that being an immigrant is actually a pretty hard life. There is always the constant fear of being deported back to Mexico. It doesn't seem fair that those who never lived in Mexico would get sent to live in Mexico if they cause problems for the government. Every culture is different and that means different foods, religions, cultures, and languages. Many people lived in poverty in this book and had unhealthy living conditions. The workers weren't paid fairly for all their hard work, so they rebelled and were often punished for speaking their minds and opinions.-Jordin A. I learned that a while back, Mexicans were separated from the whites just like the segregation with the blacks. They mostly eat tortillas, soup, and a lot of fruits. The fruits they mainly ate were plums and peaches. Mostly the Mexicans go to California for jobs and only get paid about seven dollars a month. A lot of immigrants had good living conditions, but some companies didn't even give their workers warm water for baths or cleaning laundry. -Leah B. //Esperanza Rising// takes place in Mexico. They eat a lot of different kinds of foods like salsa, tortillas, papayas, plums, and many others. They also wear different things that people in the U.S. When they moved to the U.S., they were looked down upon and were paid very poorly even if they worked harder than others. It was nearly impossible to get a high paid job for them. -Kendra W.

I would recommend this book. A lot of stuff happens, and you learn a lot about this culture. It tells interesting stuff about immigration and getting to the U.S. It is very good, and it also goes really fast. This book never really gets boring. New things always happen that make you want to keep reading.-Chanda Z. I kind of liked this book, but it was not my favorite. It was a little boring and it felt like it took a while for me to read. I did learn a lot about what life was like through the eyes of an immigrant. -Jordin A. I would recommend this book to almost all the girls out there. It was a quick read and I learned a lot of the Mexican culture and what the conditions for immigration were back then. It was a very good book and I loved it. If I wrote it, I would have made Miguel and Esperanza fall in love. That probably would have made it more exciting, but I still liked it. -Leah B.

I would recommend this book to a lot of people. It never gets boring and you learn a lot about their culture and about immigration. There is a lot of dialogue which makes it go really fast. -Kendra W.