Review: We Never Asked For Wings

Letty Espinosa has been hard at work, juggling three jobs at at time. But it might just be possible that she works so much so she doesn't have to be at home and be responsible for her children Alex and Luna. That has never been a problem, since her mother has been happy to care for her grandbabies. Now her parents are moving back home to Mexico and Letty is left in charge of her family for the first time. With no one to watch her children, Letty finds herself taking Luna along with her to work. At the end of the day, she scrounges through the cabinets hoping to make a little food last until the next paycheck. One day, she comes up with a scheme that just might get her son Alex out of his terrible school and give them all a chance at a better life. But everything must go exactly according to plan or they will be in more dire circumstances than ever before.

In The Language of Flowers, Ms. Diffenbaugh showed the difficulties of the foster care system as her protagonist aged out of foster care and rememberd her experiences in group homes and with foster families. Just like that story was about foster care without being preachy or overwhelmed by it, We Never Asked For Wings has some realistic and compassionate things to say about immigration and the state of education in our country. Letty's parents go back to Mexico after years of living in the United States. Alex falls in love for the first time, but they both have problems - Ysenia is bullied and she worries her mother will be deported and Alex is a brilliant kid who is not being challenged at all in his underserved school. I so appreciate a fiction writer who makes me consider issues without feeling like I've been emotionally manipulated or hit over the head with facts. This is a well-written story with compelling characters. These characters just happen to be dealing with poverty, immigration, and a lack of education.

Diffenbaugh has a unique ability to make me root for characters who drive me crazy. Letty is often a less-than-wonderful mother and there were many moments when I wanted to put the book aside in frustration. But then we see Letty make an effort or Diffenbaugh reveals a small detail about her that kept me reading to the very end. We Never Asked For Wings is a worthy and wonderful follow-up to The Language of Flowers. 


We Never Asked For Wings
By Vanessa Diffenbaugh
Ballantine Books August 2015
320 pages
Read via Netgalley 

Late to the Party Reviews: The Language of Flowers

The Language of Flowers

By Vanessa Diffenbaugh

Ballantine Books April 2012

352 pages

From my shelves

 

Victoria is about to age out of foster care. She is furious at the system that let her down, at the foster parents that didn't keep her, and at a world that doesn't seem to care in the least. Victoria is living on the street until she realizes that her knowledge of flowers can go to good use. She begins working at a flower shop and finds she has a gift for putting together exactly the arrangements her customers need. As she begins to enjoy the comfort of routine and security, she has to decide if she can start letting people into her life. Can someone who has always pushed people away finally let herself be loved?

The Language of Flowers alternates between the present and Victoria's difficult past. We see her abused by foster parents who leave her out in the cold or refuse to feed her. But we also witness her tentative happiness with an older woman named Elizabeth. The mystery of this story is when readers see her progress with Elizabeth, but also know that she spent her last few teen years in a problematic group home. Victoria is often a difficult character to follow because she refuses help at almost every turn. For someone who has been abandoned and betrayed at every turn, she believes that her only recourse is to hurt people before they have the chance to hurt her.

Diffenbaugh has a real gift for writing. There were several moments when I had actual fear about what would happen to Victoria and other characters. It is a rare author who gives you no security about the fate of the people who live on her pages. I became really invested in these characters, from Vanessa herself to even the minor characters who hover around the periphery of the story. I also love that this author wasn't content to let readers know about the difficulty of aging out of foster care. She went and set up a foundation to help real-life kids through the process. Anyone who says fiction can't change lives isn't paying attention to Ms. Diffenbaugh's writing and tireless work through The Camellia Network.

The Language of Flowers is, dare I say, an important novel about a group of people who are all too easy to ignore. Few of us worry about the difficulties of children in the foster care system or their complicated transition into adulthood. This story is heartfelt and difficult, as any good tale about love and creating our families must be. I am really interested to see what Ms. Diffenbuagh does in her upcoming second book, We Never Asked For Wings, which will be out in August. 



Late to the Party Reviews are my thoughts on the books everyone else read years ago. I'm finally getting to them, so make sure to chime in and tell me about your experience with these stories!