A review by tokagelizard
The Secret of the Moon Conch by Guadalupe Garcia McCall, David Bowles

adventurous emotional hopeful sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? N/A
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.75

My YA World Challenge read for Mexico. More at my blog at https://ya-world-challenge.tumblr.com

Her father disappeared to the US without contact years ago, her mother died of a broken heart, and now a dangerous gang member wants her as his girl. 17-year-old Sitlali has nothing left in her Veracruz hometown, just the ghost of her abuela watching over her, and she has decided to make the trek north to the border. The night before she leaves she finds a conch with inscrutable rune markings on the beach.
500 years in the past, Calitzo has lost everyone he loves to smallpox. Inside the Mexica city-state of Tenochtitlan, he trains with other teen boys in preparation to fight off the Spanish invader Cortés who holds the city under seige.
Somehow, the conch connects Sitlali and Calitzo across space and time and they each guide each other in their journeys.
I really enjoyed the immersion we got into 1500s Tenochtitlan and the juxtaposition of Mexica peoples' struggles in two different times. The connection across time allowed for the two main characters to form a unique romance based on deep understanding of each other. Though I felt like some of the traumatic things, especially in Sitlali's time, were rushed through without time to process, there is a lot going on in two different centuries, and perhaps makes sense in that Sitlali's only half-living in her own time at this point.
This is a very enjoyable historical adventure with some time-traveling and a love story mixed in, as well as a celebration of the resilience of the indigenous peoples of Mexico. 
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