Somos Como Las Nubes: We Are Like the Clouds (Bilingual English/Spanish)

by Jorge Argueta (Author) Alfonso Ruano (Illustrator)

Somos Como Las Nubes: We Are Like the Clouds (Bilingual English/Spanish)
Reading Level: 4th − 5th Grade

This powerful book by award-winning Salvadoran poet Jorge Argueta describes the terrible process that leads young people to undertake the extreme hardships and risks involved in the journey to what they hope will be a new life of safety and opportunity.

A refugee from El Salvador's war in the eighties, Argueta was born to explain the tragic choice confronting young Central Americans today who are saying goodbye to everything they know because they fear for their lives. This book brings home their situation and will help young people who are living in safety to understand those who are not.

Este poderoso libro del galardonado poeta salvadoreño Jorge Argueta describe el terrible proceso que lleva a los jóvenes a enfrentar las dificultades y los riesgos extremos que implica el viaje hacia lo que esperan sea una nueva vida de seguridad y oportunidades.

Refugiado de la guerra de El Salvador en los años ochenta, Argueta nació para explicar la trágica elección que enfrentan hoy los jóvenes centroamericanos que se despiden de todo lo que conocen porque temen por sus vidas. Este libro trae a casa su situación y ayudará a los jóvenes que viven seguros a comprender a los que no lo están.

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School Library Journal

Gr 3-6--Argueta likens the spirit of refugee and immigrant children from Central America and Mexico to the movement of clouds in this collection of bilingual poetry. Some of these poems successfully evoke the fear and anxiety generated by this exodus from violence and privation. The portrayal of the tattooed Salvadoran gangs in "El barrio la campanera" is particularly visceral. But most of the poems skirt the edge of urgency, creating an emotional disconnect. Apprehension by the U.S. border patrol is a dreaded terror refugees pray to avoid. But the poem "Nos presentamos a la patrulla" ("We Introduce Ourselves to the Border Patrol") couches the nightmare in terms of an innocuous meet-and-greet. In an introductory poem, "Mi barrio," the author describes a rooster eating a Popsicle ("paleta"), but Ruano features the rooster with a lollipop--the alternate definition of the word. This misinterpretation disrupts the cyclical nature of the Popsicle motif carried forth into the concluding poem. Furthermore, the brutal march across the Sonoran and Chihuahuan deserts claims countless lives every year, but the image depicted implies that the crossing is nothing more onerous than a day hike. VERDICT Despite flaws, this is a much-needed jumping-off point for elementary classroom discussions of refugees and immigration.--Mary Margaret Mercado, Pima County Public Library, Tucson, AZ

Copyright 2016 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Publishers Weekly

Starred Review

Poems written in Spanish and English poignantly address the struggles of child refugees fleeing Central America for the U.S. Shifting among the viewpoints of several children, the poems recount the sadness of leaving old lives behind and the dangers of the journey: "Don't let us fall/ into the hands of the migra, / and never in the hands of the traffickers," reads a prayer to Santo Toribio, "saint of the immigrants." Ruano's lush paintings feature surreal flourishes (a rooster in a track suit, tattooed gang members with cyclopean eyes) as well as haunting images of families crossing deserts and crowding onto trains. A sobering but hopeful collection. Ages 7-12. (Oct.)

Copyright 2016 Publishers Weekly, LLC Used with permission.

Review quotes

Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award
USBBY's Outstanding International Books List
ALA Notable Children's Books
Cooperative Children's Book Center Choices
Américas Award Commended Title
A Bank Street College of Education Best Children's Book of the Year/strong>
Malka Penn Award for Human Rights in Children's Literature Honor Book
With tenderness and humanity, this bilingual book describes the hopes, fears, and uncertainties of the thousands of displaced children that arrive every year at the southern border of the United States . . . Poignant, heartbreaking, and sadly, timely. — Kirkus, starred review

Argueta and Ruano present a unique and much-needed perspective on the reasons driving young people to immigrate to the U.S. ... extremely vital. — Booklist, starred review

A much-needed jumping-off point for elementary classroom discussions of refugees and immigration. — School Library Journal

The poems are vivid and accessible, and Ruano's earth-toned acrylic illustrations show people on the move who are both fragile and strong at the same time. — Julie Danielson, Kirkus Reviews

Delicately illustrated and painstakingly presented, Somos como las nubes/ We are Like the Clouds is highly recommended, compassionate reading. — Midwest Book Review
Jorge Argueta
Jorge Argueta is an award-winning author of picture books and poetry for young children. He has won the International Latino Book Award, the Américas Book Award, the NAPPA Gold Award and the Independent Publisher Book Award for Multicultural Fiction for Juveniles. His books have also been named to the Américas Award Commended List, the USBBY Outstanding International Books Honor List, Kirkus Reviews Best Children's Books and the Cooperative Children's Book Center Choices. A native Salvadoran and Pipil Nahua Indian, Jorge spent much of his life in rural El Salvador. He now lives in Daly City, California.

Margarita Sada is a well-known Mexican artist who has illustrated other stories that derive from Yoruba mythology, such as the award-winning Venir del Mar by Jose Alberto Caban. Many of her books have been selected for Mexico's SEP Libros del Rincon program, which provides books to school children throughout the country. She lives in Mexico City.
Classification
Fiction
ISBN-13
9781554988495
Lexile Measure
-
Guided Reading Level
-
Publisher
Groundwood Books
Publication date
October 20, 2016
Series
-
BISAC categories
JUV039070 - Juvenile Fiction | Social Themes | Homelessness & Poverty
JUV057000 - Juvenile Fiction | Stories in Verse (see also Poetry)
JUV039250 - Juvenile Fiction | Social Themes | Emigration & Immigration
JUV011030 - Juvenile Fiction | People & Places | United States - Hispanic & Latino
Library of Congress categories
United States
Spanish language materials
Bilingual
Poetry
Central America
Inmigrantes
Unaccompanied immigrant children
Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award
Winner
ALA Notable Children's Books

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