Returning home can mean facing the past you' ve tried to forget. Elloree Elliston comes back to her family' s Charleston County home on Wadmalaw Island, South Carolina, haunted by a tragedy she cannot shake. Hoping for refuge from a looming lawsuit in Idaho, she expects isolation — but instead finds a community alive with secrets, hidden histories, and unexpected connections. As her father Jack' s health declines, Elloree uncovers the mysterious past of the man she thought she knew. Around...

Set amid the perils of illegal border crossings, The Iguana Tree is the suspenseful saga of Lilia and Hector, who separately make their way from Mexico into the United States, seeking work in the Carolinas and a home for their infant daughter. Michel Stone s harrowing novel meticulously examines the obstacles each faces in pursuing a new life: manipulation, rape, and murder in the perilous commerce of border crossings; betrayal by family and friends; exploitation by corrupt officials and r...

For Héctor and Lilia, pursuit of the American Dream became every parent's worst fear when their infant daughter vanished as they crossed from Mexico to the United States—now they must try to get her back. With great empathy and a keen awareness of current events, Michel Stone delivers a novel of surpassing sensitivity and heart.Young lovers Héctor and Lilia dreamed of a brighter future for their family in the United States. Héctor left Mexico first, to secure work ...

Young lovers Héctor and Lilia dreamed of a brighter future for their family in the United States. Héctor left Mexico first to secure work and housing. But when Lilia crossed the border with their infant daughter, Alejandra, mother and child were separated, and Alejandra disappeared.Now, four years later, back in their sleepy hometown of Oaxaca, the couple enjoys a semblance of normal life, with a toddler son and another baby on the way. Then they receive an unexpected tip that migh...

“Thoroughly modern, accessibly brainy, hilariously eccentric, and beautifully human.” —The New York Times Book ReviewJohn Irving returns to the themes that established him as one of our most admired and beloved authors in this absorbing novel of fate and memory.In Avenue of Mysteries, Juan Diego—a fourteen-year-old boy, who was born and grew up in Mexico—has a thirteen-year-old sister. Her name is Lupe, and she thinks she ...

This "extraordinary" novel of one man's border crossing reveals "a human history of sorrow and suffering, all of it beginning with the thirst to be free" (NPR).Héctor is trapped. The water truck, sealed to hide its human cargo, has broken down. The coyotes have taken all the passengers' money for a mechanic and have not returned.Héctor finds a name in his friend César's phone: AnniMac. A name with an American number. He must reach her, both for rescue and t...

Set in the Dominican Republic during the waning days of the Trujillo dictatorship of the 1960s, this extraordinary novel tells the story the Mirabal sisters—four women who opposed Trujillo, and became immortalized as Las Mariposas, "The Butterflies".It is November 25, 1960, and three beautiful sisters have been found near their wrecked Jeep at the bottom of a 150-foot cliff on the north coast of the Dominican Republic. The official state newspaper reports their dea...

From the beloved and award-winning author Junot Díaz, a spellbinding saga of a family’s journey through the New World.A coming-of-age story of unparalleled power, Drown introduced the world to Junot Díaz's exhilarating talents. It also introduced an unforgettable narrator— Yunior, the haunted, brilliant young man who tracks his family’s precarious journey from the barrios of Santo Domingo to the tenements of industrial New Jersey, and their epic passage fr...

This high-interest, low-vocabulary novella is intended for adult basic education (ABE) and English as a Second Language (ESL) readers. The year is 1920, and all of Mexico is at war with itself. Gangs of rebels roam the country, stealing money, food, and horses. Carlos is twenty-eight years old. He works in his father's cafe. One day, a gang rides into Carlo's village. When the gang leaves, they kidnap Carlos. Weeks later, the rebels and Carlos ride into the town of Rosita. Suddenly, Carlos...

Over a decade since its publication, Ann Jaramillo's heartbreaking middle grade novel La Linea—about crossing the Mexican border into the US—is more timely than ever.Miguel has dreamed of joining his parents in California since the day they left him behind in Mexico six years, eleven months, and twelve days ago. On the morning of his fifteenth birthday, Miguel's wait is over.Or so he thinks. The trip north to the border— la línea—is fraught...

Jack Searle is an American widower, bringing up his two stepdaughters Lidia and Marina alone in the border town of Laredo after losing his wife to cancer.Jack often takes the girls to visit their Mexican family over the border in Nuevo Laredo. Marina, the elder sister, persuades him to let her go there without him one night, to attend a concert with her cousin Patricia. Jack wants to say no - Nuevo Laredo is a very dangerous city, controlled by drug cartels and devastated by violen...

Eleven short stories of the Cuban immigrant experience as characters adjust to life in the United Sates, from an award-winning author.From the prize–winning title story—a masterpiece of humor and heartbreak—unfolds a collection of tales that illuminate the landscape of an exiled community rich in heritage, memory, and longing for the past. In Cuba I Was a German Shepherd is at once "tender and sharp-fanged" as Ana Menéndez evocatively charts the territory ...