Under the Mesquite

Written by Guadalupe García McCall

Narrated by Guadalupe García McCall

Lupita, the oldest of eight siblings, is used to taking the lead—and staying busy behind the scenes to help keep everyone together. But when she discovers Mami has been diagnosed with cancer, Lupita is terrified by the possibility of losing her mother, the anchor of their close-knit Mexican American
family. Suddenly Lupita must face a whole new set of challenges, with new roles to play, and no one is handing her the script.

In the midst of juggling high school classes, finding her voice as an actress, and dealing with friends who don’t always understand, Lupita desperately wants to support Mami in whatever way she can. While Papi is preoccupied with caring for Mami, Lupita takes charge of her siblings. As Lupita struggles
to keep the family afloat, she escapes the chaos at home by writing in the shade of a mesquite tree.

Overwhelmed by change, she seeks refuge in the healing power of words.

Told with honest emotion in evocative free verse, Lupita’s journey is both heartwrenching and hopeful. Under the Mesquite is an empowering story about the testing of family bonds, the strength of a teenage girl navigating pain and hardship with surprising resilience, and the kind of love that cannot be uprooted.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Recorded Books, Inc.
• Release date: Jun 13, 2023
• ISBN: 9798889562764

Guadalupe García McCall

Guadalupe García McCall was born in Mexico and moved to Texas as a young girl, keeping close ties with family on both sides of the border. She has written five books as well as many poems for children. She moved from Texas a few years ago and now lives in the Pacific Northwest. Though she loves taking nature walks in the great outdoors, she doesn't go out alone at night because she knows there's all kinds of cucuys out there!

Reviews for Under the Mesquite

[bdartnall_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Novel in verse told from the point of view of a loving 15 yr old Mexican-American daughter, oldest in a family of 8, finding her gifts while watching her vibrant, happy mother slowly disintegrate from the ravages of cancer. Gentle, even poetic in its metaphors and simple diction, scattered throughout with Spanish words. Glossary at the end helps with the Mexican references, and words in Spanish!

[jothebookgirl · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Lupita is the heroine of this novel in verse. It's an emotional coming of age story. Lupita struggles with the ordinary things of growing up, it's true, but she does it all the while watching her mother die of cancer. She does it while trying to be both mother and father to her younger sisters and brothers. She becomes an adult all too soon as she tries to cope with the devastating news--the diagnosis, the treatment, and the cure that just didn't last long enough. Where does she find the strength to face the day? How does she hold it all together? How does she keep things together enough with her family? Well, it's a mystery to her too. But taking those drama classes sure does seem to be helping. And her coach wonders why she can cry on demand...

[bookconcierge · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Lupita is the oldest of eight children, and just beginning high school. Born in Mexico, she and her parents immigrated to Texas when she was a six years old and have lived in Eagle Pass ever since. They are a close-knit family and Lupe does all she can as the oldest to help her mother care for the younger children. Like all teens she has to find her individual voice amid the cacophony of siblings, friends and relatives, and juggle the expectations of her parents, grandparents and teachers against her own passions and fears. When her mother is diagnosed with uterine cancer the illness will forever change the family relationships. Struggling to find her own path to adulthood, and taking on more responsibility as her mother’s illness progresses, Lupita finds solace in writing poetry.

This is a semi-autobiographical novel, written entirely in verse. Presented as a journal, the story follows Lupita as she deals with high school classes, friends and teachers who don’t understand, and her desperate desire to support her mother and help her siblings as they all deal with the devastating news of Mami’s cancer.

Garcia McCall says so much with so few words! Her poetry is evocative and restrained, powerful and tender, vivid and elusive, full of sadness and joy, but mostly full of love. One quote:
Waiting for la Muerte to take Mami
is like being bound,
lying face up on the sacrificial altar
of the god Huitzilopochtli
pleading with the Aztec priest,
asking him to be kind
while he rips out my heart.

[sachaurora · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This book was so sad to me from start to finish, yet at the same time I'm grateful because I can't imagine how hard it must've been for her to share this heartwrenching experience.

[kimby365_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Me and verse novels are a bit like oil and water... they don't mix often. Out of the Dust remains my favorite by far; few others even touch that. This was one of the better ones I've read in the past few years (alongside Inside Out and Back Again). I expected a bit more focus on Mami's cancer battle and less on the whole picture of Lupita's teenage experience, but perhaps that was for the best (after all, how many "cancer books" do we have already?). Since I'm so at odds with the format it was written in, the lovely prose didn't do too much for me beyond admiration of some of the more inspired phrasings. Personal preferences aside, this is a lovely little book with a strong protagonist.

[backus2 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Lupita is the oldest of eight and loves her family more than anything, especially the bond that she has with her mami. When she finds out that her mami has cancer, she not only is scared of losing her, but is frightened of the unknown. Lupita takes on challenges of a high school girl, as well as a mother of her seven siblings. Through the artwork of writing and drama, Lupita makes it through. But, it isn't until she realizes the true symbol of the mesquite that helps her gain the strength to let go.

[mbklibrary · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Written in verse, this emotionally charged story centers around Lupita, the oldest of eight siblings in a tight knit immigrant family. Lupita's mother is diagnosed with cancer and it is up to Lupita to take over care for the family as her father cares for her mother, and her mother fights for her life. The story is beautiful, heartwrenching, hopeful and realistic. It is an honest look at a family facing devastating news, and how they must reevaluate their lives, their priorities and their family ties in order to keep together and continue to perservere.

I have been meaning to read this ever since I met the author last summer at the ALA conference in Anaheim. As I listened to her talk about her book I realized just how much of a labor of love it was. She was so authentic and enthusiastic, that I bought the book there at the conference. It just took a while to get to it and I am so glad I did!

[sullywriter_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A beautifully written family story and an impressive debut novel.

[katherinec032 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Lupita’s family has moved from Mexico to los Estados Unidos in order to have a better life, and for a while, it is better – until Lupita’s mother is diagnosed with cancer. Lupita is thrust into adulthood responsibilities as her mother battles a horrible disease, but she finds that her writing and acting can help her cope with her feelings.

[bornbookish · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Under the Mesquite was broken into six main sections, each section breaking down into smaller chapters. I started it right before bed one night and as I was reading kept telling myself just one more section and I’ll go to bed, just one more, until I had read the whole book! One of my favorite things about this book was the time span. Very rarely do you get to see a character grow up throughout their entire teen years. This book starts when the main character, Lupita, is a fourteen year-old freshman and we get to see her grow up all the way through high school graduation and a little beyond.Lupita was a very strong, personable, main character. Being the oldest of eight siblings a lot of responsibility rests on her shoulders once her mother gets sick, forcing her to grow up fast.The one thing that was confusing at times were the names of Lupitas’ younger siblings. With the exception of her sister, Victoria, most of them are only mentioned a handful of times so it’s hard to keep them all straight.Another thing I really enjoyed was the author’s use of both Spanish and English; a lot of the chapter headings as well as everyday household words like mother, father, house, dinner, etc. were in Spanish. Having taken a year of Spanish in school, I thought it was cool to try and remember the words and see if I was right. Just to let you know, there’s a Spanish glossary in the back of the book, which would have helped a lot if I had found it before I finished, HAha!I’ve decided to end with one of my favorite quotes from the book. “ The mesquite listens quietly as if the poems budding in my heart, then blossoming in my notebook, are scripture- and never tells a soul the things I write.”

[angelacinva · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This was a fine book, but didn’t really blow me away. Maybe it’s that I’ve read too many novels written in free verse lately. Maybe it’s one too many books about a parent dying of cancer. But this book didn’t grab me. It was good to see Lupita come through the tragedy and go forward to create a new life for herself. But this one didn’t have the same impact for me as A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness.

[abbylibrarian_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Well-crafted novel-in-verse about a Mexican-American teen dealing with her mother's cancer. Would recommend to teens who liked Virginia Euwer Wolff's MAKE LEMONADE or to teens who are looking for a book that will make them Feel Things.

[perednia_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Lupita is the oldest child in a growing family of Mexican-Americans who love each other very much. Even so, she feels her bond with her beloved mother is the closest of all. To prove this, she searches through her mother's purse to find a small, wizened brown thing. It is her umbilical cord. Her Mami saved it.So begins Guadalupe Garcia McCall's debut book, a novel in free verse that describes Lupita's coming of age. The verses include the longing for Mexico even as their family puts down roots (and plants roses bushes amid which a stubborn mesquite thrives) in Texas, Lupita's discovery of drama class and poetry, and her mother's cancer.In one of the most dramatic parts of the story, Lupita is put in charge of her younger siblings while her father goes out of town to stay with her hospitalized mother. The children don't obey her, neighbors and relatives resent giving them food for such a prolonged period -- apparently an entire summer -- and Lupita marvels at how easily her mother took care of them.However, in this section, as in the others, any emotional impact is supplied by the reader. McCall's understated verse is bare bones writing that calls upon her readers to enrich Lupita's small moments and larger journey.Under the Mesquite won this year's Pura Belpré honors as work that "portrays, affirms and celebrates the Latino cultural experience in an outstanding work of literature for children and youth", as stated on its American Library Association home page. While it's not the best written piece of literature, with poetry on the level of what its young readers will be able to write themselves, it is an important work in putting on the pages of a book experiences that speak directly to young Latino/Latina readers. McCall, herself a teacher, has written a book that will be shared in many classrooms and libraries.

[reginar_447079 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Beautiful absolutely beautiful. Under the Mesquite is a story about a young girl growing up to adulthood. It is a story about saying good-bye and about the loss of a loved one so integral to one’s life that it is impossible to imagine life without them. Under the Mesquite is about a family’s journey across the border of one country and into another country and how people make cultural adjustments and acclimate to a new home. And, this story is about going home and how going home can help us figure out how to move forward. Despite the numerous threads of storylines and themes running through this book, it is a short book, written in verse and readable in a few hours. Do not let the style of the book – verse – turn you off from reading this. Unfortunately, I am not a fan of poetry; I just can’t attach myself to the words of poetry in the same way I can a story. But this story is different. I immediately became emotionally involved in this story. The topic of meshing cultures and the journey of emigration is a difficult tale to write. Inevitably, multiple languages must be woven together to write the story; descriptions of cultural rituals – such as cooking – must be described. And it takes a very special author to write these day to day things in a way that is authentic in both the language of the originating country (in this case Mexico) and the language of the new home (USA) and is authentic culturally. Ms. Guadalupe Garcia McCall does this so very well; it is obvious that she has experienced this. Many authors try to make their story appear to contain a bilingual character and to do so, the author translates the occasional word in to, say Spanish. But from my experience, many authors who have not experienced the cross cultural reality – they translate the wrong word in to Spanish, putting emphasis where there never was. Or the author may describe a cultural habit that just does not take place. Ms. McCall never makes these mistakes; she uses Spanish in her English novel in a very authentic way but she also makes it accessible for her English only speakers, for example: “Look at my beautiful, talented muchachita,” she keeps telling Papi.”“As the latest episode of her favorite telenovela unfolds, the soap opera drawing her in, the skins from the potatoes she is peeling drop into her apron like old maple leaves.”“Eyes shimmering, I am a ratoncita, a sly little mouse.”And to aid her readers, the author includes a glossary of Spanish terms and cultural references at the back of her book. On the topic of maturing, the main character is conflicted. She is already the oldest child in a house of 8 kids and has quite a few responsibilities but she is not ready to grow up:“But for me, señorita means melancolia; setting into sadness. It is the end of wild laughter. The end of chewing bubble gum and giggling over nothing with my friends at the movies, our feet up on the backs of theater seats …. Señorita is a niña, the girl I used to be, who has lost her voice.”Ms. McCall writes very effectively the pull of adulthood and the sadness in leaving childhood behind. As I write this I think of my own oldest daughter and how conflicted she is about growing up. McCall captures it perfectly. Because, the main storyline is the young girl interacting with her beloved family, much of the book involves the lead character taking care of her siblings and waiting for her mother to die.“Mami’s cultivating six budding daughters and two rowdy sons; eight thriving blue roses clustered together so closely, they tremble as they cling to the withering stem of her life.”“Waiting for la Muerte to take Mami is like being bound, lying face up on the sacrificial altar of the god Huitzilopochtli, pleading with the Aztec priest, asking him to be kind while he rips my heart out.”“Sometimes she was a comfortable as a blanket, enveloping us in her warmth. She was so soft, we never wanted to let her go.”Despite the difficult topics tackled in this verse driven novel, in the end, the story leaves the reader with hope, “sometimes it’s best to take things down and start all over again.” I highly recommend this short novel.

[shelleydaugherty · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A touching novel in verse about life in the Latino world. Lupita is the oldest in her family and once the move to the United States they begin to think their dreams have come true. Then Lupita finds out that her mother has cancer and Lupita must struggle to keep her family together during her mother's battle for her life. As Lupita takes up the role of parent to her siblings, she also tries to juggle school and worrying about her future. She is a talented actress and knows that her future is riding on her success in that department, but she doesn't explain her home life to her teachers and they can't understand her disinterest in school. As she fights to take up her mother's role, she finds a developing admiration for how her mother kept their family together, and only hopes she can continue to keep the family together even under the worst of circumstances. Extremely moving book.

[bagambo_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Truly captivating book about a young girl having to grow up too fast. Coming to America, Lupita's family is after the American dream - work hard and be successful. Things are going well and then Lupita learns her mother has cancer and her whole world is turned inside out. No longer one of the kids, she must now (as a freshman in high school) take on the responsibilities of helping to run the household - taking care of her siblings, cooking, cleaning, etc. Told through amazingly honest and beautiful verse, we learn how Lupita feels, changes and endures this experience. Such an emotionally and engaging read that will stay with you for days afterward. Highly recommend!!

[kmaziarz_4 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Lupita is the eldest of eight siblings. Her father and mother brought the family to the United States from Mexico when Lupita was still young, and they return to visit their Mexican relatives often. Lupita struggles to find her identity, writing poetry, acting, attempting to lose her accent, and striving to become the first in her family to get a bachelor's degree. At the same time, however, she must take over much of the care of her wild younger siblings when their mother is diagnosed with cancer and their father must work long, hard hours to pay for treatment.A simple and poignant tale of a family dealing with cancer, with the fear and the grief that brings...and the story of a young woman coming of age during difficult times. Told in free verse, the style takes a bit of getting used to, but is not saccharine or inaccessible.

[thelostentwife · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

For such a short little book, this one sure packs a punch.Don’t be fooled by the “a novel in verse” – this isn’t a story that contains rhymes or cheesy moments. This is a beautifully paced, lusciously written story on the life of a young girl from Mexico who, along with her family, moves to Texas with the hopes of bettering their lives.Unfortunately, tragedy strikes and Lupita has to grow up in ways she never had dreamed as a little girl.I think I appreciated this story all the more for the portions of Spanish scattered throughout, the beautiful descriptions of home and country and the love shown through sacrifice.This is not a story to be missed. It’s short, there’s no excuse not to read it, and it will impact you in ways that novels 3 times its length will not manage to do.

[juliedillard · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I loved adding this book to my class library for a several reasons--the story is powerful, the world rich, the character relatable and admirable, and the form appealing. That a story can be told in lovely poems, poems that piece together the light and the dark and the mixed up nature of life (especially in those early teen years and under such challenging circumstances), is such a terrific thing to share with my students. I know they'll devour it quickly and dig back in to favorite sections. It's a fast read, but in no way sparse--not with the imagery and the heart it contains. I'm already looking forward to Garcia Mccall's next book! This debut is bound to find a wide, appreciative audience--and will make it easier to help teens fall in love with poetry and its potential!

[mamzel_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I received this book through the Early Reviewer program.This is a novel in verse written from the view point of Lupita, the oldest daughter of a family moving back and forth between their native home in Mexico and their home in Texas. In Mexico they have their family, in Texas work, friends, and school. Lupita becomes more than a daughter and sister when her mother develops cancer and Lupita becomes the head of the house as her father tends to her mother. Will she manage to hold her brothers and sisters together?It is possible to finish this book in one sitting. It is meant to be a collection of Lupita's journal entries but the timeline shifts back and forth. The story is a common one and it ends, perhaps, a little too predictably and neatly. (Left without food, an ice cream truck miraculously breaks down in front of their house and the driver lets them take all the ice cream they want. As if...) When I finished the book I was left with the feeling that the author stretched out a short story into the verse format to stretch the story out into a book. Since I work in a school with a high number of Mexican immigrants I really wanted to like this story more.

[sdbookhound · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The free verse style of Under the Mesquite made reading the book quick and simple. McCall beautifully drew us into the lives of Lupita and her family. Although I found the writing lyrical and sweet, I felt myself wishing for more. I wanted to know the other family members better. I wanted more about their transition to living in the United States. I am not used to this style of writing, so perhaps that was my problem. I do think that young people would enjoy the book. The length would be encouraging to reluctant readers. It would also be a good book for young people dealing with situations similar to Lupita's. I will be interested to see what this author does in the future, and I am encouraged to try more books written in free verse.

[palmaceae · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Guadalupe Garcia Mccall is a talented writer, but the problem with Under the Mesquite is that it's so short that we don't get to enjoy that much of it! I know someone out there will object to this comment by saying that Under the Mesquite was written for a young adult audience and thus would not appeal to me at the ripe old age of 23, but I would retort that even at age 12, I would have dismissed Under the Mesquite as a waste of paper. There are some young adult books that are so good that I will enjoy them for the rest of my life, but this is not one of them. The sheer amount of white space on the pages is disheartening – I’m a fast reader admittedly, but I read the book in under 30 minutes, and that’s the major reason why this book is getting such a low rating from me. Mccall has such a way with words, she really does. My heart broke when I read the scene (SPOILER) when the daughter talks about how she begged her father to call 911 so her mother could die in a hospital and not at home in pain in front of the children. However, Mccall just states things in a very simple and short way. The way I see it, this “book” should have been a novella, or it should have been fleshed out into an actual novel worthy of being 224 pages long (I'm not the one who called it a novel - the back cover of the book did). I don’t object too much to the use of free verse, but really, the free verse feels like a cop-out so Mccall could excuse herself from writing more.

[beaujarkko · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

My first review! Thanks to the Early Reviewers program for giving me this opportunity.I'm a high school language teacher with a reading class this year and a wonderful YA literature collection that I bulked up over this summer, and I'm so happy to add "Under the Mesquite" to my collection. (Extra special note: I told my students about the site and the program and how I got this novel and what it was about and I had three students who said they wanted to read it, so I've already "checked it out" to one of them!)Author Guadalupe Garcia McCall's voice is beautiful, fresh, lyrical, and through the poetic journal entries of her young protagonist Lupita, we are immersed in a world of culture and Culture, far beyond the boring "EXPLORE OUR WORLD!" entries of a Spanish-language class textbook.I love Lupita. She is an aware, appropriately concerned, bright child of two countries, two languages, two cultures, and she maintains a balance some of us can't seem to find with half these differences. The way McCall infuses her with such a wonderfully optimistic (and not painfully Panglossian) point of view, but still keeps her relatable and realistic (as a 28-year-old not Hispanic-American, I was able to identify parts of myself in Lupita) is to be admired. I can not say enough about the beauty of McCall's/Lupita's voice, and her artful way of melding languages (again, totally not in the way of a Spanish-language textbook. Yawn.) made me feel smart. I figured it out! Seriously, I smiled through the whole novel (save the saddest parts) and tore through it in a way I rarely can. Do yourself a favor and read "Under the Mesquite".

[kristenl_69 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Spoiler Alert.This young adult novel written in first-person free-verse shares the story and thoughts of Lupita, a Mexican-American teenager living on the Texas border as her mother is diagnosed with cancer, undergoes treatment, and eventually dies. At one point in this book, Lupita's teacher asks her, "Where is your...passion?" I found myself asking the book the same question. A parent's diagnosis and treatment for cancer, and a parent's death, are painful emotional experiences, yet none of that emotion comes through in the writing. It wasn't that it was a bad book, it just left me uninterested. I only finished reading it because I received an advanced reading copy through early reviewers.For young adults, this book might best be used for struggling readers (the free-verse is less daunting than prose because there are fewer words on a page) or as an introduction to free-verse (it is easy to folow the story).

[bridgetmary_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A phenomenal novel and one of the best books I've had the pleasure of reading this year! I honestly was a bit worried about this book when I learned it was a novel in prose. I usually find it hard to connect with that style--I find the narrators a bit too distant due to the physical limitations of poetry. However, I zoomed through this novel and didn't even really notice I was reading poetry. Lupita is a wonderfully well-rounded character and I finished the novel dying to know the rest of her story!

[amanda_r_26 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Such a great story! Lupita is a girl who's mother has cancer. They think it's gone after an operation but sadly it comes back. This is the story of how Lupita deals with everything going on in her life from her mom's cancer to school and everyday life. It will leave you crying. The story is written in free verse so it makes for an interesting and engaging read.

[meliarose · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Good book when you are in the mood for a short, emotional read! Written in free verse, Under the Mesquite is a tearjerker. The main character is teenage Lupita who has to take care of her younger siblings when her mother gets cancer. It was a good story about the love in families and how to deal with tragedies