Esperanza's Box Of Saints Book

I loved this book too much to talk about it coherently, so if you want to read a real review, go to Kevin Ansbro's. In it, Kevin says you'll thank him for recommending this book. Thank you, thank you, thank you, Kevin. And also thank you for telling me this book would remind me of my own Zelda McFigg. I'm not only flattered because I loved Escandón's writing but I'm so grateful that you noticed the ephemeral similarity.

I love protagonist Esperanza's love for her "missing" daughter. I love the heroine's journey'so haphazard, sometimes hilarious, and always original. I love the language. I love the character. I love the masterful transitions between double-spaced sections'not an extra anything, and the way the plot moves forward with completely unexpected but absolutely organic shifts of first persons. I never knew where it was going and I loved being surprised.

And most of all, I love that beneath what Kevin calls a "captivating escapade," there is real substance: what is reality, what is faith, are events magical or is there another reality that, when noticed, changes one's perspective and is therefore critically necessary? Anybody who has had what most people will call a psychic or supernatural or maybe even a spiritual experience that defies regular physics will understand what I'm talking about. And since I have had such an experience, although I'm not religious or nuts and don't talk to saints in dirty oven windows (the instigating event for Esperanza's journey), I deeply grok this story.