American Tumbleweeds

Marta Elva was born in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, and raised in El Paso, Texas. Both locations form the backdrop to American Tumbleweeds, a novel which gives voice and colour to a group of people who tend to be on the sharp-end of a flat and one-dimensional public narrative.

This is a novel of two sides: life as a Mexican living in one of the border towns which scrabble for existence and their own identity, whether that be the Mexican side of the border or the American side. There's the push-me pull-me between the old ways and the new, as characters both young and old struggle to reconcile their Mexican heritage and catholic upbringing with the pull of the new. The sexual revolution, the emerging youthquake spearheaded by pop music and the Americanisation of Mexican culture all exert powerful effects upon Inez who has to choose whether to make the leap her parents never quite made and let go of the old country to embrace a new destiny in the United States.

American Tumbleweeds begins in a tense manner where Ramon and his cronies are approaching the American border with a truck load of marijuana in the back. All too predictably. he is arrested and plunged into a legal system predicated upon having the money, contacts and language skills to navigate a way out. He cannot take any deals offered by the state because of the danger grassing poses to his family and his wife and children, alongside parents in the old country, are left having to face the music within their own community and the American community that encircles their own. Amalia, the matriarchal grandmother is fighting hard to save her child and grandchildren from the licentious west and, after having lost her daughter to America once, is desperate to keep her remaining family members close by. Inez finds the old ways a safe refuge away from the uncertainty the USA has brought but she is attracted by the promise of a new American way of life in El Paso.

Elva hauntingly turns place into character in her novel, each chapter in the voice of a character set against their vivid cultural backdrop. If you loved The Book of Unknown Americans by Christina Hernandez, you'll adore American Tumbleweeds and its wonderful cast of characters who blow back and forth, tumbled and pushed by currents far more powerful than they.

Set in the 1960s the El Paso/Ciudad Juarez cultural differences serve as a backdrop for this coming-of-age story. The decision to leave a strong family for a potentially better life makes for a difficult choice for Inez. Told through differing viewpoints, this is a powerful depiction of the ways in which a family can be split apart. The image of a tumbleweed is especially apt! Recommended.

Thank you for the opportunity to review this publication.