Illegal

by Bettina Restrepo

A family’s search across borders

Regular price $17.30 USD
Regular price $28.84 USD Sale price $17.30 USD
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Awards & Recognition

  • Editorial selection

    Booklist Top Ten First Novels for Youth

    Selected for Booklist’s Top Ten First Novels for Youth

AlbakiReads Editorial

A family’s search across borders

Nora’s father leaves Mexico to find work, while Nora and her mother remain behind, facing poverty and uncertainty. When his letters and money stop, they travel to Texas to search for him. The novel places a young person’s separation from family and home within the broader experience of migration, tracing the challenges of crossing a border and beginning again in an unfamiliar place. The paperback edition includes a foreword and additional resources.

Good fit for readers who enjoy

  • Teens and young adults interested in stories about immigration and family separation.
  • Readers seeking young adult fiction centered on a girl’s experience of migration from Mexico to Texas.

Themes

Immigration and border crossingFamily separationPoverty and uncertaintySearching for belonging in a new place

Based on publisher information and book metadata.

Book overview

In this timely and gripping novel, author Bettina Restrepo exposes the challenges of one girl's unique yet universal immigrant experience. This is an eye-opening look into the harrowing journey a family takes to forge a more hopeful future. The paperback includes a new foreword and additional resources.

Nora is on a desperate journey far away from home. When her father leaves their beloved Mexico in search of work, Nora stays behind. She fights to make sense of her loss while living in poverty--in wait of her father's return and a better day.

When the letters and money stop coming, Nora decides that she and her mother must look for him in Texas. After a frightening experience crossing the border, the two are all alone in a strange place. Nora must find the strength to survive while aching for small comforts: friends, a new school, and her quincea

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