It’s that time of month again: time to report on my #BookoftheMonth. This book was a PURE JOY to read, and I recommend it to everyone. It’s a super quick read, but it has depth and light and all the feels. Rememeber when I read The House on Mango Street? This book is similar. Again, we have a series of vignettes about a members of a community, this time in Cleveland, OH. Individuals come together unexpectedly, as they are drawn to the neighborhood garden. Totally presh.
A few of my favorite lines:
“If you’re Mexican, the Cubans and Puerto Ricans hate you because they think you snuck in illegally and they didn’t. Which they would have if they could have walked. If you’re a teenager, the whole world hates you. If you’re a pregnant teenager, people think you should be burned at the stake. I’m a Mexican, pregnant sixteen-year-old. So shoot me and get it over with.”
“The older you are, the younger you get when you move to the United States. They don’t teach you that equation in school. Big Brain, Mr. Smoltz, my eighth grade math teacher, hasn’t even heard of it. It’s not in Gateway to Algebra. It’s Garcia’s Equation. I‘m the Garcia.”
“Very many people came over to ask about [my eggplants] and talk to me. I recognized a few form the neighborhood. Not one had spoken to me before – and now how friendly they turned out to be. The eggplants gave them an excuse for breaking the rules and starting a conversation . How happy they seemed to have found this excuse, to let their natural friendliness out.”
Read this book. You won’t regret it.
Those quotes are hyst!