Scan barcode
A review by literarycrushes
The Undocumented Americans by Karla Cornejo Villavicencio
4.0
Karla Cornejo Villavicencio’s striking collection of vignettes follows the lives of undocumented immigrants who make up the backbone of a country that does not care for them. Karla herself is an undocumented American – one of the first to graduate from Harvard – and the book is a work of very personal, creative non-fiction. She weaves a beautiful narrative of her own turbulent experience growing up in Queens, the child of two Ecuadorian immigrants, with many heart wrenching stories of immigrant lives in Staten Island, Flint, Miami and more.
The most striking segment of the book was her interviews with immigrants who worked as part of the 9/11 clean-up crew. Many of them did so without pay or benefits and have been denied health care for the illnesses they suffered as a direct result, ten and twenty years later. Or the undocumented delivery boys (Karla’s father becomes a delivery boy as a result of losing his job as a taxi driver post-9/11 when the country put a ban on giving drivers licenses to undocumented people) who perished without a trace in the towers because restaurant owners would not claim them as employees for fear of being fined by the government. My only minor issue with the book was the author’s insertion of self at odd times that felt disjointed and detracted from the stories she was telling.
This book gave power to the stories of a group who has been continually dehumanized by the government, especially in the last four years. I recommend this book to everyone as well as looking further into supporting the non-profits she mentions that work to help undocumented immigrants get legal and medical aide.
The most striking segment of the book was her interviews with immigrants who worked as part of the 9/11 clean-up crew. Many of them did so without pay or benefits and have been denied health care for the illnesses they suffered as a direct result, ten and twenty years later. Or the undocumented delivery boys (Karla’s father becomes a delivery boy as a result of losing his job as a taxi driver post-9/11 when the country put a ban on giving drivers licenses to undocumented people) who perished without a trace in the towers because restaurant owners would not claim them as employees for fear of being fined by the government. My only minor issue with the book was the author’s insertion of self at odd times that felt disjointed and detracted from the stories she was telling.
This book gave power to the stories of a group who has been continually dehumanized by the government, especially in the last four years. I recommend this book to everyone as well as looking further into supporting the non-profits she mentions that work to help undocumented immigrants get legal and medical aide.