Reviews with content warning for Racism - The House on Mango Street

I'm not rating this because I feel like the era this book is from ended within the past 10 year. I feel like I'm late to the scene. I didn't read this as part of a class when that's been the common way of interacting with this book.

This book is very much of the baby boomer generation (I had to use an inflation calculator), the setting is a single year circa 1977-1984. I'm not sure how much is historically accurate. There's obsolete parts.

This had been on my to read list since I was a little kid. I finally got an audiobook copy from my library today & it was only 2h19m long. Circa 2014 i was reading chapters of this book out of order because i approached it as an anthology similar to "chicken noodle souo for the [fill in the blank] soul". Also my reading speed back then sucked.

Um, let's just say there's a massive rape culture, massive domestic violence, and there's at least 1 murder. Also suicidality. There's a part in the book where the girls are parroting transphobic biological essentialism, but to be fair that part of the story kind of calls out the academics who do that as people with power making just-so stories in order to maintain how they outrank others (hence calling this sort of queerphobia as naive).

I feel like this book was presented way back in my day how "braiding sweetgrass" is these days. I'm not sure how to feel about that. The book "settlers" by j sakai was contemporary to this book. IDK why this book became the popular book for including Latinx/hispanic people in academia.

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readingwithkaitlyn's review

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reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

2.25

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krys_kilz's review

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emotional reflective fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I loved the writing style of this book - a collection of vignettes that is not quite novel or poetry or short story, but a different form altogether. There is so much emotion in each one too.

"Geraldo No Last Name" will especially stay with me for a long time.

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dlsmk's review against another edition

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dark emotional hopeful fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

2.75

Trigger warning for a lot of things in this my sweet.

Included below are the trigger warnings not given as options in the click boxes.

Moderately mentioned; teen pregnancy, emotional abuse, assault

Lightly sprinkled; poverty

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divyareads's review

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challenging emotional hopeful reflective fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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caitlink's review

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Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

5.0

Spoiler

Super minor spoiler. Doesn't come up a lot but I love the fact that I read this book for English and found that the main character had also moved around a lot.

I thought of the ending as a bit sad but happy.

Spoiler

Because I wanted to know a little more about where Esperanza is in her life. Like what is she doing and did she actually ever go back to Mango Street for the people she said she would. But I view it as happy because it kind of seems like Esperanza did leave Mango street like she wanted.

Spoiler

I love how the author used "We didn't always live on Mango Street. Before that we lived on Loomis on the third floor, and before that we lived on Keeler. Before Keeler it was Paulina…" in the first paragraph of chapter 1 and starts off the third paragraph in the very last chapter off.

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mariebrunelm's review

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dark emotional lighthearted sad fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

This book feels like a collection of candid snapshots taken by our narrator and main protagonist, Esperanza. She's a young girl from a Latina family growing up in Chicago, who doesn't know where she belongs. Her story is that of so many first-generation immigrants and she faces the same hardships, some she sets light on, others she's too young to really notice. This novel told in bite-size pieces is quite touching but tumbles into dark territory toward the end (see most of the content warnings).
Rep: Mexican-American family.

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mlovesbooks's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful reflective fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

No sabrán por ahora que me ido para volver. Volver por los que se quedaron, por los que no.

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