“The House on Mango Street”

 

My granddaughter is reading this book as part of her seventh grade curriculum. I had purchased the book for my classroom, but had never read it…until now.

The voice is that of Esperanza. The storyline is shown as glimpses into life on Mango Street - vignettes. Short chapters (which my granddaughter likes) are rich with detail. Family. A lot of COUSINS, sooo manny cousins. Friends. School. Boys. Life. Messy. As I read, I continually wondered how my granddaughter would react to some of the uglier sides of life on Mango Street. 

Taken as a whole you get a sense of the complexities of the neighborhood, of growing up, and of eventually coming home. My favorite vignette is that of the stolen car, and the cousins waving goodbye to the thief as he is being taken away by the police.

“The Twelve Topsy-Turvy, Very Messy Days of Christmas”

“On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me, a partridge in a pear tree…”

What if…no, no one in their right mind would do that, but…what if?

A family in mourning. A broken collection of people in survival mode. A dating app. Gifts from a stranger. Noise. Chaos. New responsibilities. A new focus. A new path to healing. Love.

Topsy-Turvy is a fitting description to what befalls this family of three. Ms. Truelove is magical.

“The Murder Before Christmas”

“…that’s what life’s like. It’s messy. It’s hard. It’s uncomfortable. You’re going to make mistakes. People around you are going to make mistakes. You’re human. And if you don’t learn to forgive, you’re going to make life that much more difficult for yourself.” (182)

How is it that a book finds you? The message jumps out and stabs you in the heart? (It was a murder mystery after all) You get to the end, sigh, and feel spent. Your emotions and thoughts are running in 50 different directions. Life is messy. Family is messy. We all make mistakes. Forgiveness. Always, forgive…