The Book of Rosy

ADD TO YOUR TBR! I normally don’t read ARCs this far in advance, but felt that this June 2020 release deserved my immediate attention. I read it in its entirety over the past 24 hours and it was well worth my time in bumping it up my TBR.

Keep your eye out for it in June ~ especially those of you I’ve heard lately begging for a large publisher to hype an #ownvoices story about immigration to the US - so proud of Harper One for snagging this deal!

Remember that pre-orders massively help demonstrate what readers care about and that requesting that your library purchase a book counts as a pre-order. Also just marking a book as to-read here helps boost it.

As for a full review, I don’t really feel equipped critically review a story such as this. A story of a woman’s trauma, and the story of the woman who helped her is really just what it is. Can you like or dislike such a thing??? My only criticism is that I wish it were longer.... it felt like we just got the tip of the iceberg here. Also, this is only one story of one woman whose journey had a miraculous turn when she got essentially rescued by IFT. Remember that her story doesn’t represent all who travel to the US from Central America, but her reasons for fleeing are shared by so many. Rosy’s words are in English via translation but I’m excited to hear that this book is being published simultaneously in English and Spanish. I’m excited to read more thoughts about this book when it’s been more widely reviewed.

This book broke my heart in all the necessary ways. It is beautifully written, especially considering the devastation of the subject matter, and I recommend it to anyone who is interested in the immigration crisis at the southern border of the United States.

Harrowing, heartbreaking, and compulsively readable. This memoir is co-written by Rosy, a Guatemalan mother who flees gang violence and death threats with her 2 young sons along the Migrant Pipeline to the US and her 3 spirit-breaking months in dentention center after she is forcibly separated from her chiildren. One amazing facet of her story is that the traumatic experience strengthens her connection with Spirit and God, and she begins ernestly praying and seeking inner solutions for the outer events she cannot control. The most vivid depictions were the travel from Guatemala to the US and the time spent with other women who had been separated from their young children in the detention center.

Once she is freed by a wonderful group of activists and taken under their wing, they move her to NYC, where her children have been lovingly cared for in a foster home. The story moves quickly then. A woman named Julie, head of the organization that has been instrumental in posting bond for many women in detention and then leading them to new lives, writes her own memoir section of the book. She is a former social worker and as head of a large organization, much of her writing is statistics. It did not seem as engaging and heart-rendering as the first-person account by Rosy.

Highly recommended as a first-person account of traveling to migrate to the US from Central America, being separated by family and thrown into detention prisons by ICE, not sugarcoated. Raw brutal truth.

Wow. It is so hard to formally write a who’re because I am speechless. This book is probably my best read of 2020. I cried, I worried, and I cried again. It is such a moving story of strength and persistence. A mother’s love knows no boundaries. I will be recommending this to everyone I know. Love it.

I received a free electronic copy of this memoir from Netgalley, Rosayra Pablo Cruz, and publisher HarperCollins - Harper One. Thank you all for sharing your hard work with me. I have read this memoir of my own volition, and this review reflects my honest opinion of this work. I heartily encourage friends and family to read The Book of Rosy. This is an honest look into the policy of separation of families at the border being experienced by those refugees seeking political asylum in the United States. Many of us live just an hour to two from the border. This is happening at our back door.
I personally live just one hour from the international bridge at El Paso, Texas – Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua (El Paso-Juarez). We border locals do what we can - there are baskets at the exits to our local grocery stores for non-perishable food donations to this cause, and most of the thrift stores in this area would let you donate a box of solidly packed assorted clothing for $10. Of course, the Corona Virus has us currently shut-in and nothing is being recycled anywhere - and this problem of asylum seekers being separated and jailed has not shut down even during the pandemic. New Mexico has International bridges at Antelope Wells, New Mexico – El Berrendo; Chihuahua; Columbus, New Mexico – Palomas, Chihuahua; and Santa Teresa, New Mexico – San Jerónimo, Chihuahua. California has six border crossing areas and Texas and Arizona have many crossing areas so you can see that this is not a casual problem for us southwesterners, even in the best of times.

At this moment there are still many children removed from their families years ago who are 'lost' in the details. I cannot imagine how that could happen, but it has and is still a problem. For-Profit containment areas for these mothers and fathers are poorly run and inhumane for the most part and in many the virus is rampant. There is no such thing as social distancing in a prison environment. For example my New Mexico county of Otero has just 8 cases of the virus, with two deaths. Our jails, however have 79 confirmed cases at the county prison and 66 at the ICE processing center on the Texas border as of Friday, May 22.

We live in a world filled with refugees rampant on all continents. As a world, we have to learn how to settle these problems before they happen. I don't have the solution but a little reinspection of the works of Mandela and Gandhi come to mind as a pattern to emulate.

Please, read this book. Rosayra is only one of many abused by this system. And VOTE! Study your options well, and be first in line at the polls this fall. We do have a voice, at least in spirit, so do what you can, where you are, to bring humanity back to governments around the world.

The first hand account of a woman's journey to cross into the United States is so powerful. As a reader I felt so torn for her because what she left in Guatemala was unimaginable and the challenge she faced in the United States were unimaginable too (including the separation of her children). She was living in two worlds with two very different challenges. Julie's (the co-authors) perspective was so informative as to how her group was able to support women across the country and their reasons for raising the money to help strangers.
One of the biggest frustrations I felt for Rosy (and there were many) was when she was seeking asylum, the judge kept asking her about the police report in Guatemala. In all of the impossibleness of the situation she only had a few visible scars but the judge failed to take into account her mental state and how unsafe she must have been to leave other children behind. Her lack of control of the corruption of the police in Guatemala seemed to be all the judge wanted and that was so unfair.
The only negative of this book was that the timeline wasn't chronological and at times it was a bit confusing to follow which author was writing. I think a bit of a introduction or preface to share Julie's role in supporting Rosy while writing or vice versa would have been helpful to the reader.
This book is also a very good book for any reader that is not well versed in the immigrant challenges and reasons people may leave a country. It is also a reminder that life is still very hard once immigrants arrive to the United States. I appreciated this eye opening and raw account of Rosy's story and the harrowing support Julie (and many others) are able to provide.
Thank you to Netgalley for the electronic access to this book. I Had previously read a physical copy off the book, but Netgalley allowed me to read the updated Epilogue and followup on Rosy's journey.

Thank you for letting me read and review this book. This was a timely discussion on immigration. I really connected with Rosy.

Such an important and topical book to be published at this time. I hope it is widely read so that all of us can have a better understanding of what is happening at our borders currently.

If you read this book you will be filled with empathy and then anger as you see how immigrants crossing our borders are treated, especially the mothers and children being separated from one another.

Rosayra's story is one of grit and determination as she crosses the border not once, but twice to find a better life for her some of her family. It's also a book about hope as I read about all the amazing Americans helping those in need with money, clothing, housing and much more.

It's inspiring!