When I Was Puerto Rican
Books | Biography & Autobiography / Personal Memoirs
3.9
(209)
Esmeralda Santiago
One of "The Best Memoirs of a Generation" (Oprah's Book Club): a young woman's journey from the mango groves and barrios of Puerto Rico to Brooklyn, and eventually on to Harvard In a childhood full of tropical beauty and domestic strife, poverty and tenderness, Esmeralda Santiago learned the proper way to eat a guava, the sound of tree frogs, the taste of morcilla, and the formula for ushering a dead baby's soul to heaven. But when her mother, Mami, a force of nature, takes off to New York with her seven, soon to be eleven children, Esmeralda, the oldest, must learn new rules, a new language, and eventually a new identity. In the first of her three acclaimed memoirs, Esmeralda brilliantly recreates her tremendous journey from the idyllic landscape and tumultuous family life of her earliest years, to translating for her mother at the welfare office, and to high honors at Harvard.
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More Details:
Author
Esmeralda Santiago
Pages
288
Publisher
Grand Central Publishing
Published Date
2006-02-28
ISBN
0786736860 9780786736867
Ratings
Google: 3
Community ReviewsSee all
"I assigned this book to my current freshmen students during their Narrative Nonfiction reading unit and I must say that I was not disappointed. Santiago's writing style is unique and engaging; she includes authentic dialect within her dialogue and narrative (there is a glossary in the back to define the words), includes descriptive language to illustrate the setting and atmosphere, and structures each chapter and smaller stories with smaller lessons that lead to the novel's prevalent theme. There were moments of happiness, sadness, confusion, and anger which entirely captures a person's experience while coming of age. There is something in this book that any reader can connect with and I think that is what makes this reading so enjoyable and worthwhile."