Under the Mambo Moon

by Julia Durango, Fabricio VandenBroeck (Illustrator)

Overview

On summer nights Marisol helps out in Papi's music store. As customers come and go, they share memories of the Latin music and dance of their various homelands, expressed in a dazzling array of poetry. The diversity of Latin American music is brought to life in poems that swivel, sway, and sizzle with the rhythms of merengue, vallenatos, salsa, and samba.

Back matter includes a map, author's note, and further information about the musical heritage of Latin America.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781570917240
Publisher:	Charlesbridge
Publication date:	10/15/2019
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	48
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.20(h) x 0.30(d)
Age Range:	8 - 12 Years

About the Author

Julia Durango is the author of the bilingual picture book PETER CLAVER: PATRON SAINTS OF SLAVES (Simon & Schuster), as well as co-author of YUM! YUCK! She lives with her family in Ottawa, Illinois.

Read an Excerpt

On summer nights
Papi lets me help out 
at the music store. 


Papi says you can 
read people’s souls 
by the music
 they listen to; 
that hearts fly home when the music’s 
Just Right.


Papi says people come here 
to buy dreams 
and memories.


Mrs. García gets off at the bus stop in front of the store.
She walks slowly,
one hand on her back,
 trying to push away an ache. 
She’s been cleaning houses 
all day,
but still she smiles and stops to talk.


João hangs out by the door 
pretending not to watch 
the girls go by.
“A boy that handsome 
can only be trouble,”
Mrs. García says.
João likes to talk music 
with Papi.


Mrs. García


On the day of my quinceañera, 
I wore a gown of blushing pink and a gold tiara.

The tiny rosebuds on my cake 
matched the real ones in my bouquet,
and my gifts reached the ceiling.

A handsome mariachi band 
played all afternoon and serenaded me with
“Las mañanitas.”


On the day of my quinceañera, 
I was in Mariachi Heaven.

João

A girl from Ipanema
(no one ever knew her name) 
caught the eye of a composer 
who would never be the same.

“She’s a little bit of samba,
with a pinch of jazz thrown in.
 She’s the strum of my violão—
such a girl there’s never been.”

Then he wrote a brand-new song 
for the girl without a name, 
who strolled along the beach 
and brought the bossa nova fame.

Editorial Reviews

In understated verse, a girl named Marisol explores the role that music plays in her Latino community, introducing the people who visit her father's music store ("Papi says you can/ read people's souls/ by the music/ they listen to"). Grainy grayscale scenes inside the store alternate with kinetic acrylic and colored-pencil tableaus, placed opposite the visitors' monologues. Mr. and Mrs. Mayer strike a sinuous tango pose ("our legs/ swivel and/ turn like/ an electric/ taffy pull"), while Liliana, with "thin shoulders slumped/ under the weight of a full backpack," comes alive when salsa dancing with Rubén: "my troubles leave me/ like a flock of twitchy birds/ flying south for the season." A vivid mingling of poetry, narrative, and art. Ages 8–11. (July)

Publishers Weekly

Durango's ambitious, inventive poetry collection on Latino music and dance covers an enticing subject but ultimately tries to do too much.

During the summer, Marisol helps her father run his music store. This store attracts a plethora of Latino characters, many of whom long for the music of their home countries. Marisol's first-person free-verse poem frames 14 one-page poems, each titled after different characters. The book alternates between Marisol's evening at the store and these other poems, which appear in duos and trios until Marisol's own verse on the title mambo ends the collection. VandenBroeck's illustrations also rotate, from black and white for the frame narrative to color (replete with grinning, rosy-cheeked characters) for the individual poems. The shorter verses vary in style and length, including free verse, rhymed and concrete poems. Musical styles range from mariachi tovallenato, while the dances cover everything from the cha-cha-cha [sic] to the tango. Adding to the wave of characters, musical styles and dances are Spanish words with few, if any, textual clues, although the author does discuss each style briefly at the book's end. While a few poems allude to the tumultuous backgrounds of some of the styles, the author's note glosses over colonization and slavery in Latin American history.

Despite a few good poems and the much-needed subject matter, the end result lacks cohesion. (author's note, glossary)(Poetry. 8-12)

Kirkus Reviews