Does bringing the flavor of one’s culture to life come naturally to authors?
Perhaps it does, but I especially appreciated it as I read Merci Suarez Changes Gears by Meg Medina. Ms. Medina writes boldly and unapologetically with a Hispanic flavor. It’s Hispanic culture brought to life.
Summary:
As a scholarship student in the Seaward Pines Academy Middle School, Merci Suarez must stay on her best behavior. Her family is different, but there’s more than that throwing Merci off her game. Her beloved grandfather, Lolo, has been acting strangely: falling from his bike, calling people by the wrong names, and getting angry over nothing. Worse, no one will tell her what is going on.
This story of a family struggling with the emergence of Alzheimer’s is universal, and beautifully told. Medina expertly weaves the emotional threads of the story to great effect.
What I personally loved about this book:
The Suarez family has roots in Cuba. They’ve been in America (in Florida) for generations now, and as is common in Hispanic households, they speak Spanish at home as well as English. It makes sense, then, that the narrative includes occasional Spanish phrases. What is different than I’ve commonly seen is that the Spanish is not always translated into English.
This made me happy as someone who has lived outside of America and appreciates “American ways” as only one of many wonderful ways of living. We should all be challenged once in a while to look up words we don’t understand—whether in another language or our own. (After all, it’s easy with Google!)
Inside Track:
My experience as a high school exchange student in Peru gave me an “inside” track with this book language-wise, so I confess, no Googling was necessary for me.
If foreign language in stories frustrates you, or you are unwilling to either guess at meanings contextually or Google them, this is not the story for you.
If you love Hispanic culture as I do, or you want to and are willing to dive into a brief “immersion experience,” run on down to the library and check out Merci Suarez Changes Gears, by Meg Medina.