Review:
April is curious about her father's new patient Fernando, an El Salvadorian refugee. Soon, her curiosity turns to fascination, and it's not long before her heart becomes tangled with feelings of love for the young man with the frightening past. When Immigration and Naturalization Service officials begin snooping around and threatening her father for helping Fernando, she discovers a whole new side to the man who raised her. Dennis Covington is a brilliant storyteller--crafting these characters with realism, compassion, and just enough of a rough edge so that they sparkle from the page. This is a powerful tale of many different kinds of love.
From School Library Journal:
Grade 8 Up?After her parents divorce and her father finally gets his alcoholism under control, April is happy to be living in his rustic island home. And yet, in a strange way, she is attached to the pain and unpredictability that used to dominate her life. Then she meets and falls in love with Fernando, 19, an illegal alien and political exile from El Salvador. He has a magnetism that is both unsettling and irresistible, and possesses strength and wisdom that contrast powerfully with his fragile appearance. She shields him from the INS investigators and educates herself in the culture and politics of his homeland. Their experiences have been radically different, yet their emotional challenges bear striking similarities. Unlike April, however, Fernando has worked through his pain, found a purpose, and is able to articulate his thoughts beautifully. Through the young woman's first-person narrative, Covington cleverly weaves together familiar YA themes with those of immigration and a foreign culture. Readers share April's compassion for Fernando and his frightening story of persecution. But he is no Prince Charming, and there is no fairy-tale ending. Fernando is a believable individual whose dash of ambiguity makes him intriguing. The author has exchanged the quirky characters and slightly bizarre world of his successful first novel, Lizard (Delacorte, 1991), for a much more realistic creation. His considerable skills as a storyteller make this book a worthy purchase.?Margaret Cole, Oceanside Library, NY
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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