(Review in Spanish at bottom/Reseña en español abajo)
Big fan of this book!! It was absolutely enthralling and I loved every minute of my reading exper(Review in Spanish at bottom/Reseña en español abajo)
Big fan of this book!! It was absolutely enthralling and I loved every minute of my reading experience.
The book opened up with somewhat of a mystery in terms of a possible curse placed on one of the protagonists and we get to learn more about this family in the 1950s before jumping 40 years into the future to the next generation's experience in the 1990s.
There's a bit of a secret when it comes to how these people are all connected since it starts to center on a side character's family, but it's not super difficult to guess and I'm glad that didn't take away from the reading experience as a whole. While the discovery bit of the secret wasn't super shocking, there were still other parts in the book that were so that was pleasant.
I'm a big fan of books that look at multiple generations of a family to examine how life is a cycle, especially when secrets are kept, I believe that just perpetuates unfortunate occurrences to keep on happening, and so seeing all the similarities in everything that was happening again and again to these characters was very fulfilling.
I also appreciated the insight into Tejano and Chicano culture. It's easy to find books on Mexican culture, but to find one that does Mexican-American culture so tastefully, as if a love-letter, is always so nice. I learned lots about rodeos and ranch music in the process and loved every bit of it.
I had two qualms with this book, the animal abuse which is pertinent to the plot, despite what other angrier people have commented in their reviews, and that the POV went from third to first depending on the era the narrative would visit. There's third person when we're in the past which was great, but in the present we get first person when it comes to the character of Lulu. I give this switch the benefit of the doubt because Lulu is a teenager so the first person gives the reader more of an insight into her thought process and feelings, but I do just appreciate third person POVs instead- just a preference really, so not a flaw to the book as a whole.
Overall, the book had me hooked. I read the first three chapters one night then read the remaining 14 chapters in one sitting the following day and enjoyed it very much. Great book, can't recommend it enough to anyone looking for a new Latin author or book on Latin/Latin American culture in general.
Hay un secreto en lo que respecta a cómo están conectadas todas estas personas, ya que comienza centrándose en la familia de un personaje secundario, pero no es muy difÃcil de adivinar y me alegro de que eso no haya afectado la experiencia de lectura. Si bien la parte del descubrimiento del secreto no fue muy impactante, hubo otras partes en el libro que sà lo fueron, lo que fue agradable.
Me fascinan los libros que analizan varias generaciones de una familia para ver cómo la vida es un ciclo, especialmente cuando se guardan secretos. Creo que eso solo perpetúa los sucesos desafortunados para que sigan sucediendo, y por eso ver todas las similitudes en todo lo que les estaba sucediendo una y otra vez a estos personajes fue muy satisfactorio.
Tuve dos dudas con este libro, el maltrato animal que es pertinente para la trama, a pesar de lo que otras personas más enojadas han comentado en sus reseñas, y que el punto de vista pasaba de tercera a primera dependiendo de la era que visitarÃa la narrativa. Hay tercera persona cuando estamos en el pasado, lo cual fue genial, pero en el presente tenemos primera persona cuando se trata del personaje de Lulu. Le doy a este cambio el beneficio de la duda porque Lulu es una adolescente, asà que la primera persona le da al lector una mejor idea de su proceso de pensamiento y sentimientos, pero en cambio aprecio los puntos de vista en tercera persona; en realidad es solo una preferencia, no un defecto del libro por lo general.
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