RETURN TO SENDER
by Julia Alvarez
Yearling/Random House
Hardcover: 9780375858383
Paperback: 9780375851230
Ages 8-12
352 pages
Julia Alvarez takes on America's uneasy immigration policies in her latest young adult offering. RETURN TO SENDER begins with a foreboding incident: 11-year-old Tyler's father is injured in a tractor accident, and their rural Vermont dairy farm needs immediate help. Hiring an unauthorized immigrant family from Mexico brings a solution to their problems, but young Tyler thinks that saving the farm may not be worth the higher price of breaking the law.
Mari is the oldest of the three daughters in the immigrant family. She is not only dealing with the disappearance of her mother but also beginning a new life far away from the things and people she loves. Alvarez examines Tyler and Mari's friendship, allowing it to blossom under the veil of moral shadows, with each child weighing the plausibility of their situation as well as the fearful expectations of what will come should the authorities find out about Mari's family. As the two grow closer, the intensity of the world's injustices regarding immigration policies becomes even more painful and realistic to them and, thus, to the reader.
Alvarez is a pro, a consummate writer who can find an interesting debate line between right and wrong and still manage to instill a humanistic edge to the discussion. By making the protagonists young, she offers the opportunities that come from youthful observation: the possibility of finding a new way of doing things, the ability to admit when something so cemented in one's culture is not working and must be changed. The rising sense of advocacy for new legal strictures is a fascinating by-product of this story about how young people can reach hands across cultural differences and find a place in the middle that provides a safe harbor for friendship and understanding between others with so much to keep them apart.
Immigration policies are unveiled in an emotional way. The burdens of anger and fear that Mari's family suffers under are palpable in their talk and deeds, and Tyler learns some nasty truths about his homeland that will surely stun and move young people as well as older ones. Julia Alvarez has created a remarkably solid and unforgettable story in RETURN TO SENDER. It transcends all borders and will join together many young readers in a new age.
--- Reviewed by Jana Siciliano
Click here now to buy this book from Amazon.com.
Back to top.
