Reviews

Soaring Earth: A Companion Memoir to Enchanted Air by Margarita Engle

luzbella's review

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medium-paced

4.0

this is a companion book to another book she has written. I love the way that she describes things and how she relies each memory.

brokebybooks's review

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2.0

Read for free on RivetedLit.com.

I'm sorry, I couldn't get into this one. Maybe written too young for me at this time. Could tell this was written as an older person looking backwards and rather forced, while Enchanted Air didn't.

parkyparkpark's review

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emotional informative inspiring reflective fast-paced

4.25

tabby2920's review against another edition

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3.0

A young teen going through the trials and struggles of adolescent is a common theme that I believe most teens will find engaging. Her story felt realistic and compelling and there were times I felt I was there with her. Her poetry also gave insight into a tumolotous time period, a rarirty during the Vietnam War period.

tashrow's review against another edition

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5.0

The award-winning author returns with a companion book to her memoir Enchanted Air. In this book, Engle writes in verse about her time in high school. Margarita thinks often of her time in her childhood spent in Cuba, but now that world is entire inaccessible to her and her family. As she attends high school in Los Angeles, Margarita dreams of traveling the world. She is also involved in the unrest of the 1960s as the issues of war, peace, civil rights, and freedom cause protests. Engle finishes high school and goes on to find her own winding path through college on her own terms. It is a memoir filled with hope, longing for peace, and a discovery of personal identity.

Engle is the national Young People’s Poet Laureate, a well-deserved honor given her body of work for children and teens. This second memoir takes a long look at the 1960s in America and the tensions between war and peace. She doesn’t shrink away from topics such as drug use. Her own path to a college degree will also help young people who may be wondering whether they have to go to Ivy League schools to succeed. The joy of finding teachers who are passionate and supportive eclipses the need for the school to be acclaimed.

As always Engle’s writing is exceptional. Here with the personal lens, it is all the more powerful and moving. There are poems that are intensely personal and others that take a less immediate and more philosophical view. The play of the two together allows the book to give a real look at her time growing up and the times of her youth.

Another amazing read by Engle, a poet to be celebrated. Appropriate for ages 13-17.
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