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The Iguana Tree
Michel Stone
(Hub City Press, Hardcover, 9781891885884, March 2012, 224pp.)

The Short of It:

The Iguana Tree is written with compassion, yet provides only a brief glimpse into the lives of undocumented workers.

The Rest of It:

Hector, Lilia and their newborn daughter live in Puerto Isadore and dream of a life in America. As the novel opens, Hector has paid someone to take him across the border. The plan, once there, is to find a job, save money and send for Lilia and the baby as soon as possible. Lilia, impatient to be with her husband, finds passage herself and what follows is their story.

This novel had promise. It opened beautifully and I found myself taken with Lilia and Hector and the small town they live in. As Hector makes his way across the border, I considered many times, how desperate a person had to be, to risk everything for the American dream. But what happens seems almost too good to be true and then right when you begin to question just how good things are, they are hit with tragedy which was all-together too convenient for me.

As I was reading, I got the sense that the author didn’t want to upset anyone, including herself. That she wanted these characters to come out on top, but then knew or perhaps felt that it couldn’t possibly turn out well and then at the end, (which I will not spoil for anyone) she goes back into the other direction again. Kind of.

If I had spent more time with these characters in their hometown, I would have understood their motivation more. If the author had focused on one aspect of their story, perhaps more time could have been spent on developing that one aspect instead of trying to touch on all the issues involved with undocumented workers. And last, but certainly not least…what is she trying to say? I don’t feel as if a statement was made. Does she support illegal immigration? Does she support undocumented workers? Is she saying that the process should be easier to enter the country legally? I’m not sure and I really searched for this in order to give this book a fair shake.

I wanted and expected a lot more because there were pieces that did work well and there were times where I did feel something for these characters, but in the end, no stance was made and that choice affected the entire story.

Would I read another book by this author? Yes, because what I liked, I liked quite a bit, but I wanted more. I do think this would make a good discussion book for a book club though. There is a lot to explore.

To visit Michel’s website, click here.

To view Michel’s other TLC tour stops, click here.

Source: Review copy provided by the publisher via TLC Book Tours.
Disclosure: This post contains Indiebound affiliate links.

Hello there. You probably forgot all about me. The Boy reminded me yesterday that I did not post a Sunday Salon post. Apparently, he looks for them. I had no idea. Well, Sunday has come and gone but I just wanted to pop in to say hello. I had quite a weekend which kept me busy and because of it, I just never got around to posting. Plus, I am still using that lame laptop of mine and it’s glitchy, at best.

Friday night, I completely lost my mind and ripped out all of the downstairs carpet. Why? Because the dear Otter Pup, AKA Chloe, Squirrel, Pupper Dog, got scared during a storm we had and did a number on the carpet. Not once, but several times and it was just too much to deal with. So, I ripped it out. Plus, this post on Pinterest piqued my interest. Stained concrete will be the end result. We spent all of Saturday doing prep work and then this weekend we will do the final prep work and then apply the stain. It will be nice to finish this weekend, but I am okay with it taking another week in order to get it right.

Here are some pictures. The first one, you can see the huge stain we made while cleaning the carpet. We have one of those home carpet cleaners. We always thought it was doing a really good job. Nope. It may have been clean on the surface, but underneath the carpet and pad… ugh. I never want carpet again.

After all that ripping, and sweeping and sealing, we went out to eat and I had one heck of a reaction from three bites of a tortilla. It was supposed to be a corn tortilla, but apparently it wasn’t. It did look a little suspect. Needless to say, after all the dust from the carpet and then accidentally glutenizing myself, I had the mother of all allergic reactions. Blisters down throat, near fainting and dizziness. It took me awhile to figure out what it was because I really didn’t think it was that tortilla. Needless to say, I collapsed into a heap and was out. The pup checked on me once to see if I was breathing but no one else did!! I woke nearly four hours later and they were eating dinner. Hello??

When Sunday came along, I was not feeling up to hitting the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, but The Girl saw the event insert and noticed that she missed Judy Blume on Saturday. Talk about guilt! I was barely functioning and I had no idea she would be so upset about missing her but it also warmed my heart a tiny bit that she was so passionate about seeing her. That said, I sucked it up and off we went.

We did not see Judy Blume, although she was there because we saw people waiting in line to see her.

I did not buy any books. I was REALLY out of it.

I took silly pictures with my phone because I wasn’t focused enough to do otherwise.

All in all, it was a fun trip. Normally, I attend the panels but I always regret not having the time to browse so this was a nice change of pace.

On the reading front, I am still juggling a handful of books and doing well, but still behind on my reviews. I suppose I will never catch-up if I continue to read. If everyone could have such problems! Ha!

Chatting with friends about books and life…