Good Reads / Community Library Notes
Border Child
Michel Stone
Review by Priscilla Comen
Border Child
Michel Stone
Review by Priscilla Comen
"Border Child” by Michel Stone is the story, relevant to today’s problems, of Lilia and Hector. Their young daughter, Alejandra, disappeared when Lilia crossed the border from Mexico to Norteamerica with a “coyote." Alejandra would now be four years old. They question their friend Emanuel, whose uncle Carlos was responsible for their crossing and perhaps for the loss of their daughter. Author Stone brings life to the problem of border crossing which we only read about in the news. It is a real and human problem.
Diego is a friend of Emanuel’s who makes his living by diving off the cliffs of Acapulco and delivering truck loads of linens to fancy hotels. Hector thinks he might get a job through Diego, and he goes to Acapulco. Lilia goes to see the priest of their village and he calls the orphanage in the town where the coyote died in an auto accident three years ago. They will try to find the little girl.
Hector, in Acapulco, is hired by Ignacio and Sebastian, sleazy friends of Diego. They will pay him 800 pesos to take their boat to pick up a cooler containing an unknown item in the dark of night from a cliff top. Author Stone builds the tension as Hector retrieves the cooler from the rocky cliff. An unseen man helps him carry it down the cliff with a rope tied to his truck. When Hector heads back to the dock, he wonders what is in the cooler. Will he get into trouble for looking into it? What will he find? With many metaphors, author Stone shows us the humanity of the characters: Hector who wants to find his daughter, Rosa who helps Lilia to keep her baby from being born before term, Diego and Emanuel, who think they are “macho.”
Hector earns enough to leave Acapulco and rides the bus across many miles of Mexico. When he arrives at the orphanage, they take his blood to test his DNA. He must wait in a cheap motel for several days until the results arrive. Karolina who works at the orphanage, helps him talk to an attorney. She cares about the children there. Will Hector get his daughter back? It’s been three years since the accident. Has she been adopted by someone else? Will Lilia’s baby arrive too early or go to term? This is a loving story with a contemporary slant of immigration problems. It’s on the new fiction shelf of your community library.
Diego is a friend of Emanuel’s who makes his living by diving off the cliffs of Acapulco and delivering truck loads of linens to fancy hotels. Hector thinks he might get a job through Diego, and he goes to Acapulco. Lilia goes to see the priest of their village and he calls the orphanage in the town where the coyote died in an auto accident three years ago. They will try to find the little girl.
Hector, in Acapulco, is hired by Ignacio and Sebastian, sleazy friends of Diego. They will pay him 800 pesos to take their boat to pick up a cooler containing an unknown item in the dark of night from a cliff top. Author Stone builds the tension as Hector retrieves the cooler from the rocky cliff. An unseen man helps him carry it down the cliff with a rope tied to his truck. When Hector heads back to the dock, he wonders what is in the cooler. Will he get into trouble for looking into it? What will he find? With many metaphors, author Stone shows us the humanity of the characters: Hector who wants to find his daughter, Rosa who helps Lilia to keep her baby from being born before term, Diego and Emanuel, who think they are “macho.”
Hector earns enough to leave Acapulco and rides the bus across many miles of Mexico. When he arrives at the orphanage, they take his blood to test his DNA. He must wait in a cheap motel for several days until the results arrive. Karolina who works at the orphanage, helps him talk to an attorney. She cares about the children there. Will Hector get his daughter back? It’s been three years since the accident. Has she been adopted by someone else? Will Lilia’s baby arrive too early or go to term? This is a loving story with a contemporary slant of immigration problems. It’s on the new fiction shelf of your community library.