" this book was a disappointment. i LOVED julia alvaerz's books for adults (well, some of them...such as in the time of the butterflies, one of my all-time favorites). so i was curious about her move into young adult literature & picked up this book to see what there was to see. i don't remember it so well. something about the protaganist being a teenage girl with some issues with her family & feeling isolated & weird because she is latina in a majority white community (i think the book is set in vermont, where alvarez is now a teacher), etc. i guess as far as young adult literature goes, it's pretty solid, but not being the target audience, i wasn't really swept away. the book lacked a lot of the historical drama of some of alvarez's other books, & the teenage voice tends to grate on me. i'm a terrible person because i find people between the ages of eleven & 24 absolutely insufferable, as a general rule. even fictional ones. with a few notable exceptions. but not this protag. what i learned from this book is that i should devote myself to re-reading the alvarez books i already know i love & leave her YA stuff to actual young adults. "
— Ciara, 2/20/2014