Publisher's Weekly Review
This free-verse novel by Salazar (The Moon Within), set in 2018 and narrated in the perceptive, compassionate voice of fourth grader Betita Quintero, offers a close look at the experiences of an undocumented Mexican-born child and her pregnant mother in a family detention center. Betita lives in modest circumstances in East Los Angeles with her loving, hardworking Mami and Papi, learning from inspiring teacher Ms. Martinez to create daily picture poems "to paint our feelings." The Quinteros' hopes that the sanctuary state will provide safety are dashed with an ICE raid at Papi's work site; when Betita and Mami travel to visit him at the Tijuana border, a missed turn takes them into Mexico and detainment in a "big frozen/ concrete monster," where they huddle with other women and children under Mylar "capes" in chain-link cells, and are mocked by the guards. Betita's faith in the story Papi tells--that one day "our people would return to Aztlán," the land of the cranes, the U.S. Southwest--sustains her as the picture poems she creates become both solace and a source of important documentation. Salazar's lyrical verse fashions empowerment out of indignity and suffering, creating a stirring and accessible, all-too-timely story. Ages 8--12. Agent: Marietta B. Zacker, Gallt & Zacker Literary. (Sept.)
Horn Book Review
In her second verse novel, Salazar (The Moon Within) draws on her own experience as an undocumented child living in East L.A. to tell the story of nine-year-old Betita and her family, immigrants from Mexico. Betitas father tells her that their people belong where they are, since the area is in fact their ancestral homeland of Aztln -- and that they, like cranes (used as a metaphor throughout), were always destined to return there. But when Papi is arrested by ICE and set to be deported to Mexico, a place too dangerous / to call home, Betita learns that her family is sin papeles, undocumented. Soon she and her mother, who is newly pregnant, are also detained, locked into a / chain-link cage made for cranes. Betitas voice is sensitively rendered in Salazars verse, whose varied placement on the page, along with delicate black-and-white line drawings evoking Betitas picture poems, creates a sense of place, testimony to the experiences (including family separation and sexual abuse) of migrants and refugees detained at the border. Ultimately, despite the danger, Betitas family chooses voluntary departure; their bittersweet family reunion in Mexico leaves open the possibility that they, like the cranes, might someday return. Anamara Anderson July/August 2020 p.142(c) Copyright 2020. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
A fourth grader navigates the complicated world of immigration. Betita Quintero loves the stories her father tells about the Aztlán (the titular land of cranes), how their people emigrated south but were fabled to return. Betita also loves to write. She considers words like "intonation," "alchemy," and "freedom" to be almost magic, using those and other words to create picture poems to paint her feelings, just like her fourth grade teacher, Ms. Martinez, taught her. But there are also words that are scary, like "cartel," a word that holds the reason why her family had to emigrate from México to the United States. Even though Betita and her parents live in California, a "sanctuary state," the seemingly constant raids and deportations are getting to be more frequent under the current (unnamed) administration. Thinking her family is safe because they have a "petition…to fly free," Betita is devastated when her dad is taken away by ICE. Without their father, the lives of the Quinteros, already full of fear and uncertainty, are further derailed when they make the small mistake of missing a highway exit. Salazar's verse novel presents contemporary issues such as "zero tolerance" policies, internalized racism, and mass deportations through Betita's innocent and hopeful eyes, making the complex topics easy to understand through passionate, lyrical verses. An emotional and powerful story with soaring poetry. (Verse fiction. 8-12) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
Salazar's (The Moon Within, 2019) poignant novel in verse tells the heartbreaking story of undocumented nine-year-old Betita and her family's mistreatment at the hands of ICE and La Migra (immigration enforcement) in 2019 East L.A. Betita has always loved Papi's stories of how their people came from Aztlán, "Land of the Cranes," now known as the U.S. Southwest, but when he's deported and she and her mother are detained, Betita witnesses the suffering and separation of families and, with the nuanced and honest perspective of a child who has had to grow up too soon, reveals her American experience and family trauma through "picture poems," depicting the beauty she finds in simple things like home-cooked family meals and the folktales of her ancestors. Through vignettes of her neighborhood and family, Betita weaves a story of the ancestral cranes trying to fly freely in a society that cages them, realizing the price of the American Dream and its realities for those who sacrifice and suffer in order to achieve it.
