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3.94 AVERAGE
3.94 AVERAGE
While I am not the daughter of immigrants, I was raised in a home environment where my mother was overbearing and my father was a quiet hard working man. I had a lot in common with Julia in terms of personality and mental processes. I look forward to suggesting this book to students who may feel like they're alone.
Julia is NOT her parents' perfect Mexican daughter. That was Olga's title. Now that Olga is dead, though, Julia is all her parents have left. And it is becoming increasingly difficult for them to understand that Julia wants to focus on her education, especially going away to college, instead of focusing on her family. The thing is, though, that Julia is pretty sure the "perfection" of Olga was a myth. She definitely played the part of the dutiful daughter well enough, living at home and spending her free time hanging out with extended family. But after Olga's sudden and tragic death -- she was hit by a semi while crossing the street -- Julia found a few clues that Olga might not have been exactly who she seemed to be. Because Olga's friends don't seem to know anything, or at least won't talk to Julia about what she found, though, she isn't sure she will ever learn the whole truth.
I really loved how Sánchez walked us through Julia's revelations about people and interpersonal relationships she had taken for granted all her life. Julia's awakening insight into the rationale and motives of people around her, particularly her parents, was often aided by her memories of Olga as she navigated her own grief and guilt surrounding Olga's death. And although she wasn't a particularly likable protagonist, with all her whining and complaining, I was intrigued by Julia's desire to stay true to herself while still "giving in" to her parents' desires and attempting to honor her family and her cultural traditions. (If you are not familiar with Mexican cultural traditions such as the quinceañera, by the way, this book is an excellent primer.)
Happy Reading!
I really loved how Sánchez walked us through Julia's revelations about people and interpersonal relationships she had taken for granted all her life. Julia's awakening insight into the rationale and motives of people around her, particularly her parents, was often aided by her memories of Olga as she navigated her own grief and guilt surrounding Olga's death. And although she wasn't a particularly likable protagonist, with all her whining and complaining, I was intrigued by Julia's desire to stay true to herself while still "giving in" to her parents' desires and attempting to honor her family and her cultural traditions. (If you are not familiar with Mexican cultural traditions such as the quinceañera, by the way, this book is an excellent primer.)
Happy Reading!
challenging
emotional
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Such a great story, successfully weaving in so many more elements than I expected—grief and loss, cultural challenges, immigration and dreams, mental health struggles, coming of age and self discovery, young love and friendships, living in the moments. I really enjoyed this one.
I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter by Erika L. Sanchez is the first novel I read that tells the story of a Latina girl dealing with mental health problems. I have read stories of Latina girls dealing with sexual experiences and awakenings. As well as stories of womanhood and meeting social and cultural expectations. Although, these are not common themes in YA novels. So I greatly appreciate Sanchez for this novel. Although I didn’t give it a full score because it left me a bit unsatisfied. Through the novel, Julia, the protagonist, mentions a few inappropriate moments with the men in her life. These moments were, yes, sexual. She mentions them pretty casually, but she doesn’t question it much. At most, she wondered if her sister every experience the same thing as Julia did. Sanchez doesn’t talk about it much, especially after Julia found out about her mother being raped while crossing the border. I had hoped that this would shine some light on Julia’s experiences. It may not be as “big” as being raped like her mother, at least, from what we know, but I still wished that it would have flickered a light in Julia’s mind and make her realize that what she went through was also terrible and even maybe traumatizing. Although she doesn’t often think about the events, she still remembers them nonetheless, and I say that’s enough to assume that it had some type of impact on her (even if it's subconsciously).
Aside from that, I had briefly talked about this book with my old high school librarian as I knew he had read if for the school’s book club last year. He brought up an interesting question: Is Julia a realistic character? This question came up because it seems questionable that a Latina girl from the poorest parts of the city has a deep love and passion for great literature works from Whitman and Dickenson. Is she believable? Yes. Here’s why. Aside from Connor, who is white, the only other person who recommended her stories to read was Mr. Ingman, her English teacher. Who also happens to be white. Much of the stories that Julia mentions in the story are by white people and being that she only has two people in her life who enjoy reading as much as she does, it’s easy to believe that the majority of what she reads is the “classics” (which are often white writers). She’s reading what her white-male English teacher recommends her. Even if she is from the poorest parts of the city, that doesn’t mean she lacks access to free books from the public library, the internet, or even from borrowing books from Mr. Ingman. Throughout the story we see her buying books from a used book store. So her lacking accessibility to these classics isn’t an issue. What is the issue, maybe, is that she had no real exposure to writing from people who may be more relatable to her as a Latina and a woman. But this questioning on Julia’s personality feels too close to the question of “Is she Mexican enough?” which should be avoided. Is it really bad that she doesn’t read many Latinx writers? She mentioned two but expressed dislike for one and it’s unknown for the other. I say, Julia has every write to like what she wants, but she should be aware that there is so much more than just the American classics. That’s my only concern.
Lastly, I will comment on the story as a whole. To be brutally honest, there was A LOT going on. I made this comment to my peers, but it felt like a telenovela, which many agree. There were things in the novel that felt unnecessary, for example, Connor. Connor is a white boy from Evanston who becomes Julia’s boyfriend in the story. They had a downfall, but eventually stayed friends in the end. I honestly believe that the whole story could have been fine without Connor. Why is there a necessary need to add a romantic relationship in most YA novels? It could have worked without it because the whole thing felt like Connor was the White Savior that was a source of happiness and was the person who helped Julia be comfortable with herself. At least, that's’ how I saw it. Overall, I would say that this is a good book to give for some high school kids struggling to find their place. But there's definitely better books out there.
Aside from that, I had briefly talked about this book with my old high school librarian as I knew he had read if for the school’s book club last year. He brought up an interesting question: Is Julia a realistic character? This question came up because it seems questionable that a Latina girl from the poorest parts of the city has a deep love and passion for great literature works from Whitman and Dickenson. Is she believable? Yes. Here’s why. Aside from Connor, who is white, the only other person who recommended her stories to read was Mr. Ingman, her English teacher. Who also happens to be white. Much of the stories that Julia mentions in the story are by white people and being that she only has two people in her life who enjoy reading as much as she does, it’s easy to believe that the majority of what she reads is the “classics” (which are often white writers). She’s reading what her white-male English teacher recommends her. Even if she is from the poorest parts of the city, that doesn’t mean she lacks access to free books from the public library, the internet, or even from borrowing books from Mr. Ingman. Throughout the story we see her buying books from a used book store. So her lacking accessibility to these classics isn’t an issue. What is the issue, maybe, is that she had no real exposure to writing from people who may be more relatable to her as a Latina and a woman. But this questioning on Julia’s personality feels too close to the question of “Is she Mexican enough?” which should be avoided. Is it really bad that she doesn’t read many Latinx writers? She mentioned two but expressed dislike for one and it’s unknown for the other. I say, Julia has every write to like what she wants, but she should be aware that there is so much more than just the American classics. That’s my only concern.
Lastly, I will comment on the story as a whole. To be brutally honest, there was A LOT going on. I made this comment to my peers, but it felt like a telenovela, which many agree. There were things in the novel that felt unnecessary, for example, Connor. Connor is a white boy from Evanston who becomes Julia’s boyfriend in the story. They had a downfall, but eventually stayed friends in the end. I honestly believe that the whole story could have been fine without Connor. Why is there a necessary need to add a romantic relationship in most YA novels? It could have worked without it because the whole thing felt like Connor was the White Savior that was a source of happiness and was the person who helped Julia be comfortable with herself. At least, that's’ how I saw it. Overall, I would say that this is a good book to give for some high school kids struggling to find their place. But there's definitely better books out there.
DNF at 51%
This started out well and unlike many others, I actually enjoy the main character. But when they introduced the love interest and it felt like he was the most boring guy in the world, I quickly lost interest.
This started out well and unlike many others, I actually enjoy the main character. But when they introduced the love interest and it felt like he was the most boring guy in the world, I quickly lost interest.
....Well THAT was a rollercoaster of emotions. A little less than half way through I honestly didn't think I was gonna give this book more than 2 stars. Julia was just SO unlikable, and well, everyone was but especially Julia and her mom too. Julia was a dick to everyone and her mom was horrible to Julia. Thank god it got better though, I really ended up liking Julia and I really love that her mom became more understanding. I really wish we had gotten more of the dad because I really liked him.
Man, when that thing happened it totally wrecked me, the tears wouldn't stop coming, because I remember feeling like that too, thankfully it never got to that point with me.
I REALLY started loving this book when she got to Mexico, it just really made a turn there. I don't know, this author just got a lot of things right, the Mexican-American experience, and the relationships, it all felt very real at least in my experience being, you know, Mexican-American. I really related to Julia, especially the relationship she had with her mother. It's scary how much it reminded me of my relationship with my ma. Anyway, this review is all over the place, but whatever, it was great, I recommend it, go read it.
Man, when that thing happened it totally wrecked me, the tears wouldn't stop coming, because I remember feeling like that too, thankfully it never got to that point with me.
I REALLY started loving this book when she got to Mexico, it just really made a turn there. I don't know, this author just got a lot of things right, the Mexican-American experience, and the relationships, it all felt very real at least in my experience being, you know, Mexican-American. I really related to Julia, especially the relationship she had with her mother. It's scary how much it reminded me of my relationship with my ma. Anyway, this review is all over the place, but whatever, it was great, I recommend it, go read it.
The voice and tone are so young (feels almost Catcher in the Rye), but the content is much older. Some of the homophobia seems to go unchecked.
I could feel how stifling that house was, though.
I could feel how stifling that house was, though.
I went into this book completely blind, but I enjoyed it more than I expected to. I think it tackled a lot of important issues such as grief, mental health, relationships with your parents and cultural and familial expectations. Although it explored Mexican culture specifically, I think a lot of the issues are similar to Arab culture, and really any collectivist culture, so I found it easy to relate to many things.