Love That Book!

Book Review: Mexikid,* by Pedro Martin, published August 1, 2023, 320 pages, Lexile 530, recommended for ages 10-14 or grades 5-9. Please note: this book is in the Pageturner library but only for one middle grade class. It requires student requests for additional purchases.   N.B. If you have a Kindle Paperwhite as I do, this book will show in black and white only.  To view it in full color, I resorted to my Apple Ipad.  Fire ereaders will also show in color.

Pedro Martin is a cartoon artist, and this graphic memoir is a story about his childhood which, he writes, is, "100% true, 90% of the time. My memory and my heart like to play tricks on each other. The results are what make my stories.”  He first introduces all the members of his immediate family; his parents have nine children, of which Pedro is the seventh born. He introduces all of them with both their Mexican and Americanized names, helping the reader along with pronunciation. As he lists them, he also includes their respective perspectives on himself:

“Leon and Noe. ‘He’s not fast. And he’s weird.’ Lila. ‘Leave him alone. He’s just creative.’ Ruth [pronounced Root]. ‘That’s code for ‘he lives in a fantasy world.’ Sal. ‘That’s my fault. I took him to see Star Wars once and he’s never been the same since.’ Hugo. ‘He likes comic books too. And he can draw pretty good. Except for the hands. He sucks at hands.’ Alex. ‘He collects dolls.’ Adam. ‘He calls them ‘action figures.’ Apa [their dad, depicted playing an accordion]. ‘We think he should become a priest or maybe a mariachi. Both make hundreds of dollars a weekend.’ Ama [their mom]. “He’s a great translator when I have to go to the doctor or shop for a bra. He knows a lot about bras now.’ NOT TRUE. MOVING ON.”

There are seven boys!  The older kids were all born in “adobe barns” in Mexico and learned Spanish from birth.  When the family moved to the states, they had to start over to learn English.  The ones born here they call “the hospital babies.” They were born into English and are still sometimes having a tough time with Spanish.  Pedro particularly dislikes comic books in Spanish, as they take a lot more time to read! Another disadvantage of being “hospital babies” will show up later, when the family drives two thousand miles to bring their failing elderly grandpa, or arbuelito, from Jalisco back home to California with them; while all the Mexican-born kids can apparently drink Mexico’s raw milk with no consequences, it causes explosive diarrhea among “the hospital babies.”  At the time narrated in the story, the family lives in Watsonville and works a strawberry farm. They earn their living cultivating, picking and selling baskets of strawberries from a roadside stand. (1)

The family keeps photos of their living members on the fridge door; those family members who’ve died are shown on the freezer door.  Pedro is constantly checking. Lila asks, “Are you checking to see if you’re dead?’ ‘DAILY! You always want to check to see which side of the fridge you’re on. You never know, you might wake up dead and not know it.’ ‘Sounds logical.’”  

The older boys especially mock Pedro because he’s stout. They call him the Barrel. They’re also very physical and apt to cause bruising.  Eleven people are crammed into one small apartment, so they have to eat at different times and are never at the dinner table all at once because they don’t fit. Yet they are bent on adding their abuelito to the ménage. Pedro wonders whether they’ll get along, and whether his grandpa will like him.

Their apa had recently purchased an old Winnebago on the cheap, as someone had died in it.  “It was Apa’s pride and joy. He considered it VERY FANCY AND LUXURIOUS for what he paid.” Unlike modern Class C campers, this one had no actual bed, only the sadly squinchy ones converted from tabletops and such. Even with a real bed, all campers still have those squinchy ones, as well.  But the camper won’t hold eleven people, so they also take the family pickup truck.  Dad has rigged THAT with a wooden bench seat in the cargo bed, replete with seat belts concocted from rope. 

“My parents’ hometown was more than TWO THOUSAND miles away on the west coast of Mexico. In the past, when we were super little, we could all cram into a station wagon like so much baggage. OR we could caravan with my uncle Rafa and his family. But THIS TIME, the older kids were going to DRIVE THEMSELVES! Us younger kids would mourn their inevitable abduction by road bandits.”

As they travel, Apa carefully avoids all the tourist traps they crave to see, including Disneyland and “Pea Soup Andersen’s, “serving over two million bowls of pea soup a year!” (2) At the Mexican border, all the many packages of gently used stuff poor Mexicans need that had been stored on the camper’s roof is swiftly confiscated by poorly paid Mexican border guards carrying automatic weapons, despite Apa’s initial attempts at familiarity and final attempts at bribery. The pickup is somewhere behind them and gets through with no issues at all.  

Mexico presents a world of wonders to the hospital babies.  First off, there’s “A Mexican Boy’s Guide to UNREGULATED TOYS made for children OF MEXICO by children—Mexican ingenuity, no oversight=FUN! EL DIABLO’S HEAD. Generates incredible heat when you spit on a piece of tinfoil and scrape off bits of the horn into it. My oldest brother, Sal (science is his thing), says that it’s quicklime (calcium oxide.) “TOY” BULLWHIP. An actual whip made for tourists and childlike teens who enjoy TORTURING their younger siblings (oddly specific.) THE LITTLE PEEPEE MAN. A hollow kewpie doll wearing a pink sombrero that looks like a baby bottle nipple. When you fill it with water and then squeeze the hat, a stream of “PEE” comes out of his little peepee (for fun!) A MINI MACHETE. It’s actually sharp and has the word “MEXICO” painted on it so you know that the guy killing you is FROM MEXICO (or just a classy tourist like my brothers)!”

Do Pop Rocks—now no longer in fashion, I know—but DID Pop Rocks really explode?? They did, in Mexico.  There’s a horrifically vivid description of a dirty kid with a long, jelled booger dangling from his nose, with whom they share pop rocks.  His snot explodes, too.  Great stuff for your average tween! (3) 

But then they really get into the weeds of long distance travel.  They have to drive along narrow, winding roads up steep hills with the debris of numerous junked cars that have plummeted down abrupt cliffs to remind them of the dangers they face.  One of the kids has messed with the knobs on the console and the camper dies without gas.  They have to wait hours for a gas truck. Ama is always giving them halved bananas and they’re ready to puke from the glut; Pedro insists there’s nothing more gross than half a banana.  There’s too much spam and not enough fresh veggies. Boredom reigns; the federales at the border had confiscated their only tape deck and now the only music available is Mexican.  One good thing, though—if they can’t stop at tourist traps, and there are no longer any, anyway, they frequently stop at various villages where innumerable hitherto unknown cousins live, and then the food is abundant! Even if dinner is served the next day as a stale breakfast, refreshed only with eggs on top. Still, who wouldn’t celebrate having cousins virtually everywhere?!

Multiple stories about their abuelito being a revolutionary war hero permeate the camper, and Pedro begins to draw him doing truly heroic things, although Lila corrects him by offering, “I don’t think he ever charged into battle with a basket of peaches on his horse.” She continues, “’The battles were only the ‘what’ of the story. You need to know the ‘why’ of the story.’ ‘The ‘WHY.’ What’s the ‘WHY’?’ ‘There were socioeconomic and political undercurrents that put all the land’s wealth and power into the hands of foreign investors and rich landowners who subjected the indigenous people, and…’ ‘OH, NO!’ ‘WHAT?!’ ‘I was just trying to draw that but my pencil died…OF BOREDOM!’”  Pedro reluctantly relinquishes when Lila gives him ‘the look.’

Once in their grandpa’s village, Ama decides Pedro needs a haircut and a local barber gives him a horribly old-fashioned style with a barber shop razor, ripe with his tequila-spit. His hands are so dirty he leaves fingerprint smudges on the back of Pedro’s neck.  Pedro makes the most of it and is not in the least deterred. He describes it as “A HISTORICAL HAIRCUT.” With it, he decides to woo an older girl.  In the village the girls walk in one direction, the bots in the other. The boys gift the girls with candy, and when they decide they’re a couple, they walk arm in arm in the same direction. Pedro can’t count Mexican money except by its various colors and buys, for far too much money (which he does time and again), an enormous old cookie the vendor’s had on display forever.  He hopes to give it to a girl whose very presence calls up “a cloud of butterflies and snow-white doves.” But the cookie is covered in more than a couple of flies. When they try to scrape them off, a lot of the icing comes off, too.  Eventually they give up and eat the cookie themselves, including some flies, whole and/or piecemeal. He calls this chapter “LOVE IN THE TIME OF FLIES.”

On the way home, a rangale of deer leap across the road. The last one is hit by another car.  They go to retrieve the poor dead animal, which will make a great stew called chocolomo—"fire in a stew” (4), or  guisado de venado, venison stew (5).  They need their grandpa’s strength to haul the deer up the camper stairs and into the shower.  Soon, however, the deer wakes up and starts howling and thrashing.  They ask Pedro to check, and he sees a completely broken hoof is dangling only by the hide.  They tell him to try cutting it off altogether to save the poor thing, but he isn’t strong enough. Abuelito finishes the deer to put it out of its misery.  Once home, Ama cuts it up, Apa mixes up his best marinade, and the deer meat is allowed to soak before being slow-cooked.  

It’s grandpa who says Pedro acted bravely as a real adult; while Pedro’s first inclination was to shrink because he felt utterly inadequate, abuelito makes him feel proud.

The author shows photos of his family, including his grandpa, Alejandro Martin, who was born in 1892 and ultimately lived to be 107 years old, leaving “53 grandkids, 161 great-grandkids, and 33 great-great-grandkids!” As the book progresses, Pedro comes to learn that while his abuelito is stronger than all of them, he also sleeps a lot. That he has a sense of humor and still enjoys his tequila. And that he trusts Pedro completely. As a coming of age story, this one truly rocks.

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* “Former Hallmark artist Pedro Martín shows being a 'Mexikid' can be universal in new graphic novel 

“In its first year in print, “Mexikid” has received numerous awards, including a Newbery Honor, the Pura Belpré, the Eisner Award and the Tomás Rivera Award. Though the story is specific to his family, Martín says it echoes an experience many have as children.” https://www.kcur.org/arts-life/2024-10-04/former-hallmark-artist-pedro-martin-shows-being-a-mexikid-can-be-universal-in-new-graphic-novel

(1)   “Thousands of Latin American immigrants, the majority of them Mexicans, work these vast fields.
 
“Some are well settled into the population centers of Salinas and Watsonville, districts that absorb 38% of California’s strawberry plantations and produce half of all the strawberries consumed in the United States. Others come only for short periods to plant or harvest. They are paid by the hour and by the box: $4.75 an hour oand $0.99 a box. 

They work at least ten hours a day bent over in the rows between the squat plants. They are fully aware that they’re producing wealth for California, a state to which the National Agricultural Statistics Service attributed 67% of all US strawberry fields and 88% of their production in 2006, thanks to an annual yield of 59,000 pounds per acre. This was double the average 28,000 pounds of Florida, its closest rival.” Excerpted from: https://www.revistaenvio.org/articulo/3825

UPDATE: In 2024, Watsonville offers a strawberry festival to help their community recover from the Loma Prieta earthquake. “About the Watsonville Strawberry Festival

“The Watsonville Strawberry Festival traces its roots to the Watsonville Strawberry Dessert Festival that was founded in 1994 to help downtown Watsonville recover from the Loma Prieta earthquake. The Festival now exists to:

See also: “Remembering Loma Prieta: Quake left Watsonville in ruin, united residents

“City banded together to face tall order. WATSONVILLE—When the Loma Prieta earthquake struck at 5:04 p.m. on Oct. 17, 1989, Second Harvest Food Bank CEO Willy Elliott-McCrea was in Watsonville, talking about disaster preparation… McCrea said he was faced with distributing two million pounds of food over 18 months to fill an unprecedented amount of need.

“All of a sudden overnight we had 25,000 people living outdoors, many in the parks, many in their backyards,” McCrea said. “We went from serving 15,000 people a month to serving 100,000 people a month, 25,000 a week. So it was always a scramble.”  [The Loma Prieta quake registered 6.9 on the Richter scale.] See: https://pajaronian.com/remembering-loma-prieta-quake-left-watsonville-in-ruin-united-residents/ 

(2) “What magic has attracted millions of people to its tables? Why do travelers, who have once visited Andersen's make a point of returning, though they must drive miles after hunger begs them to stop? The delicious Pea Soup? Yes, but it's much more than that, for Pea Soup Andersen's has a spirit of wholesome family warmth which draws people again and again through its doors. Long time "Pea Soup-ers" whose families brought them first to Andersen's are now bringing their children and their grandchildren!” From the restaurant’s site at:  https://www.peasoupandersens.net/

Sadly, in late January, ’24, NPR announced that Pea Soup Andersen’s had closed its doors after 100 years serving their famous—or infamous--pea soup. https://www.npr.org/2024/01/25/1226791312/iconic-central-california-restaurant-pea-soup-andersens-closes-1-location-remains (We used to stop there whenever we traveled CA in OUR Class C camper, forcing our kids to eat pea soup they couldn’t abide. In this memoir, although the kids pine for Pea Soup Andersen’s, their dad reminds them they, too, actually hate pea soup.)

(3) Thank the stars we have Mythbusters to answer my question. “Let's Bust A Myth: Will your stomach really explode if you eat Pop Rocks and soda?  When the candy comes in contact with moisture, whether it be saliva, milk, or Coke, the candy dissolves. The carbon dioxide within the Pop Rocks is released, which causes the fizzling sounds the candy is known for.

"While neither you nor your stomach will explode when you digest Pop Rocks and soda, the excess amount of gas in your stomach will need to be released. So be prepared to burp…a lot!”  https://lsc.org/news-and-social/news/lets-bust-a-myth-will-your-stomach-really-explode-if-you-eat-pop-rocks-and-soda

(4) Recipe for Chocolomo: Fire in a Stew, at: https://honest-food.net/chocolomo-recipe/

(5) Recipe for guisado de venado, at: https://24bite.com/guisado-de-venado-venison-stew/

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