Book Review: Abuela Don’t Forget Me, by Rex Ogle, published September 6, 2022. A Finalist for the 2023 YALSA Excellence in Young Adult Nonfiction Award. Recommended for ages 12-18 or grades 9-12. Please note: this book is not yet in the Pageturner library and will require student requests in order for purchases to be made.
Ogle has written a series of books about his life: Free Lunch, Punching Bag, Road Home (release date May 14, 2024) , and this one. He's also written other books, including Pizza Face, Four Eyes (series), and another series: The Supernatural Society, among others. Two of his books are Junior Library Guild selections: Free Lunch (2019) and Punching Bag (2022). This book is composed in free verse.
The only star in the deep night of his life as a child was his grandma (mine, too, so I really relate). His dad had left the family when he was very little, replaced by an alcoholic stepfather who beat his mom. She herself was viciously violent and snide, so Rex grew up with cigarette burns and other scars from both. But his abuela, who lived in another state, always helped him out, buying them food when none was available, sending them furniture when they had not a stick to sit on, and having Rex live with her whenever his mother, who apparently hated her mother, would allow. He couldn't understand how his abuela could work 8 different jobs while between the two of them, his mother and stepfather had none. Again and again his mother left her mother in the lurch. First, she commandeered--stole--the car his Abuela had bought for him. He'd been paying the monthly bill and insurance, and his mother didn't pay those, so abuela had to, or lose her good credit. His abuela even bought a house for his mother and stepfather, but they never paid rent and she soon lost her good credit because of their determined neglect.
At school, Rex got into fights as other kids called him names for being partly Mexican. He wore clothes that had no style and couldn't afford what other kids had, which further isolated him. And he often showed up with a black eye, or bleeding, from yet another beating. By high school, he was convinced he wouldn't survive to graduate. He even tried moving to Alabama to live with his father, who kicked him out and disowned him after learning Rex is gay.
In this book, he is much older and settled into a good life because his abuela had taught him to study hard, and he'd won scholarships to college. But now, his beloved grandma has dementia:
"My abuela is having a hard time remembering things because she—the most important person in my life—is living with dementia...She is the woman who offered her home to me when the violence at my mom’s became too much. Abuela is the woman who got me off the streets after my father kicked me out for being gay. She told me if I wanted to be a novelist, then I should pursue it, that if I worked hard, I could accomplish anything. By every definition of the word, my grandmother is an angel. My own personal fairy godmother. Abuela is the only parent I’ve ever known who showed me truly unconditional love, kindness, and support. And now she is forgetting me.
"I can be strong for her, because she was always strong for me . . . though when I get off the phone, or leave her house, I cry long and hard, feeling like a forgotten child...She may forget. And one day, I may forget too. But for now, the memories are captured, like insects in amber, ready to survive for millions of years. My memories of a wonderful woman are written in words and verses and fragments in this book, unable to be unwritten. And if it is forgotten, it can always be read again."
Writing saves him. "If I write in a journal, my ideas might bloom like a garden of stories, to make my life worth something, To matter, to be someone more than my mother’s son, or my father’s forgotten child, more than a punching bag of bruises, more than the butt of jokes at school where my lunch is free."
Everyone can benefit from keeping a journal. Rex's mother punches him over and over as she wrests the one his grandmother had bought for him, with its gold edges and leather cover. But she could not prevent him from learning Spanish to talk with his grandma in her own language, and he could not prevent her from recording the worst she did to him until he freed himself. And he did, beautifully:
"Decades have gone by. But abuela and I still speak often. She does not always remember the pecan trees or the geese or even the hamper, but when Abuela and I speak, she says, 'Te amo.' And I say, 'Te amo siempre.' And she says, 'I love you more.' And I say, Impossible.' And I mean it."
For the sake of limited space, I haven't reproduced his words here in verse. I'm sorry about that, as verse provides far greater impact. It's a book that deserves a spot on every teen's bookshelf, or in their ereaders.
Ogle has written a series of books about his life: Free Lunch, Punching Bag, Road Home (release date May 14, 2024) , and this one. He's also written other books, including Pizza Face, Four Eyes (series), and another series: The Supernatural Society, among others. Two of his books are Junior Library Guild selections: Free Lunch (2019) and Punching Bag (2022). This book is composed in free verse.
The only star in the deep night of his life as a child was his grandma (mine, too, so I really relate). His dad had left the family when he was very little, replaced by an alcoholic stepfather who beat his mom. She herself was viciously violent and snide, so Rex grew up with cigarette burns and other scars from both. But his abuela, who lived in another state, always helped him out, buying them food when none was available, sending them furniture when they had not a stick to sit on, and having Rex live with her whenever his mother, who apparently hated her mother, would allow. He couldn't understand how his abuela could work 8 different jobs while between the two of them, his mother and stepfather had none. Again and again his mother left her mother in the lurch. First, she commandeered--stole--the car his Abuela had bought for him. He'd been paying the monthly bill and insurance, and his mother didn't pay those, so abuela had to, or lose her good credit. His abuela even bought a house for his mother and stepfather, but they never paid rent and she soon lost her good credit because of their determined neglect.
At school, Rex got into fights as other kids called him names for being partly Mexican. He wore clothes that had no style and couldn't afford what other kids had, which further isolated him. And he often showed up with a black eye, or bleeding, from yet another beating. By high school, he was convinced he wouldn't survive to graduate. He even tried moving to Alabama to live with his father, who kicked him out and disowned him after learning Rex is gay.
In this book, he is much older and settled into a good life because his abuela had taught him to study hard, and he'd won scholarships to college. But now, his beloved grandma has dementia:
"My abuela is having a hard time remembering things because she—the most important person in my life—is living with dementia...She is the woman who offered her home to me when the violence at my mom’s became too much. Abuela is the woman who got me off the streets after my father kicked me out for being gay. She told me if I wanted to be a novelist, then I should pursue it, that if I worked hard, I could accomplish anything. By every definition of the word, my grandmother is an angel. My own personal fairy godmother. Abuela is the only parent I’ve ever known who showed me truly unconditional love, kindness, and support. And now she is forgetting me.
"I can be strong for her, because she was always strong for me . . . though when I get off the phone, or leave her house, I cry long and hard, feeling like a forgotten child...She may forget. And one day, I may forget too. But for now, the memories are captured, like insects in amber, ready to survive for millions of years. My memories of a wonderful woman are written in words and verses and fragments in this book, unable to be unwritten. And if it is forgotten, it can always be read again."
Writing saves him. "If I write in a journal, my ideas might bloom like a garden of stories, to make my life worth something, To matter, to be someone more than my mother’s son, or my father’s forgotten child, more than a punching bag of bruises, more than the butt of jokes at school where my lunch is free."
Everyone can benefit from keeping a journal. Rex's mother punches him over and over as she wrests the one his grandmother had bought for him, with its gold edges and leather cover. But she could not prevent him from learning Spanish to talk with his grandma in her own language, and he could not prevent her from recording the worst she did to him until he freed himself. And he did, beautifully:
"Decades have gone by. But abuela and I still speak often. She does not always remember the pecan trees or the geese or even the hamper, but when Abuela and I speak, she says, 'Te amo.' And I say, 'Te amo siempre.' And she says, 'I love you more.' And I say, Impossible.' And I mean it."
For the sake of limited space, I haven't reproduced his words here in verse. I'm sorry about that, as verse provides far greater impact. It's a book that deserves a spot on every teen's bookshelf, or in their ereaders.