Halfway to Somewhere

November 4, 2024
Pimienta (Luminous Beings) explores themes of identity, belonging, and the complexities of compulsory assimilation via Ave, a Mexican youth struggling to adjust after moving from Mexicali to
Lawrence, Kans. Ave feels displaced in her new environment, watching her younger brother Ramon effortlessly make friends while her relationship with her mother grows tense. Ave also misses her older nonbinary sibling Cruz, who stayed behind in Mexicali with their father. Despite struggling to learn English, she befriends an intersectionally diverse group of peers, each navigating their own identities. These relationships help Ave reframe her situation, fostering personal growth and reshaping her perspective on family and belonging. Clean, rounded illustrations rendered in soft, muted pastels create a warm, approachable atmosphere that complements the graphic novel’s introspective ambiance. Careful paneling alternates between broad scenes that showcase Kansas and Mexicali landscapes and intimate close-ups of characters’ expressions, which heighten emotional resonance and adds rhythmic pacing to the narrative. Quiet moments blend with richer conversations about identity, cultural authenticity, and family dynamics in this thoughtful portrayal of transition and adolescence that balances lightheartedness with more serious undertones. Ages 8–12.

January 1, 2025
A nonbinary tween explores their identity after they move from Mexico to the U.S. with half their family. Twelve-year-old Ave lives in Mexicali, Baja California, with their dad, Rodolfo, older sister, Cruz, younger brother, Ram�n, and mom, Joss. When Joss is offered a teaching position at the University of Kansas, she takes the American-born half of the family to Lawrence, leaving behind Mexican-born Cruz and Rodolfo. While Joss and Ram�n embrace the change and quickly make connections with locals, Ave struggles to find their place, seeking solace in an anticipated family reunion--but stumbling upon a secret instead. Pimienta explores the complexities of identity through multiple lenses, including language, culture, values, gender, and family structure. The characters, who variously identify as Mexican, Mexican American, and Latinx, are illustrated with a range of skin tones. Different-colored fonts represent language shifts: blue when English is being used and black to indicate Spanish that's translated into English; occasional Spanish words and phrases appear. The artwork lovingly and accurately captures the rough beauty of the desert and the ambience of the Midwestern college town. In their author's note, which includes photos of the landscape around Mexicali, Pimienta describes their engagement with "the complicated yet sincere question I'd been asking ever since I moved to the United States: 'If I don't live in Mexico, what makes me Mexican?'" An intriguing variation on border stories that looks at the challenges surrounding an intentional family separation.(Graphic fiction. 9-13)

COPYRIGHT(2025) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Starred review from January 1, 2025
Grades 5-8 *Starred Review* When Ave's mom gets a new job teaching at Kansas University, their family splits in half--literally. Ave, brother Ram�n, and their mother move to Kansas, while their father and sister, Cruz, stay in Mexicali. Ave hates it. Mexicali is their home, and they don't want to assimilate for fear of losing their ties to their family and identity. As Ave slowly warms up to new friends at school, they learn that there are so many ways to be Mexican, American, and Mexican American. This is Pimienta's final installment of the Mexicali trilogy. This last book explores the push and pull between heritage, the desire to preserve one's cultural roots, assimilation, adapting to a new culture, and creating and maintaining culture. Pimienta's bright, commanding art and Ave's wandering spirit bring to life the complex beauty of living in the diaspora. While upper-elementary and middle-schoolers from all backgrounds will relate to and learn from Ave's journey to cultivating a solid sense of self, above all else, Pimienta's final installment is a love letter to borderland kids working to shape, nurture, and forge their own cultural identities.

COPYRIGHT(2025) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

March 1, 2025
Pimienta's (Suncatcher; Twin Cities, rev. 9/22) latest graphic novel explores divisions and connections across families, borders, languages, and cultures. Middle schooler Ave has reluctantly moved from Mexicali to Lawrence, Kansas. Living apart from their father and older sister, stuck in a predominantly English-speaking community, and confronted with their family's set of expectations regarding gender roles (e.g., cooking, chores), Ave, who is nonbinary, finds themself in a perfect storm of adolescent frustration. Tensions reach a boiling point when Ave's mother confirms that her separation from their father is permanent. Slowly but surely, Ave develops meaningful friendships with a handful of classmates while simultaneously building a greater understanding of their family members' unique relationships with assimilation. The hand-drawn and inked illustrations have a lively, undulating line, with flat, understated digital colors. Pimienta's storytelling features substantive dialogue ("And you're okay with speaking broken English?" "It's not broken. It's growing"), skillful transitions between past and present, creative use of a largely three-tiered page/panel structure, and employment of silent panels to develop setting, mood, and characterization. Back matter includes an author's note with sketches and reference photos. Patrick Gall

(Copyright 2025 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)