Esperanza Rising

Pam Muñoz Ryan's Esperanza Rising is a moving story for 11 year olds about a girl who loses almost everything and has to start her life again.

What happens

Esperanza has always had it all. She lives on a huge ranch in Mexico, with vineyards, servants, silk dresses and a papa who adores her. Her birthday comes at the end of the grape harvest every year, with a big party to celebrate both. This year she'll be thirteen.

But the night before her birthday, Papa doesn't come home.

Worth knowing before you hand it over

This one is heavy from the very beginning. Esperanza's father is killed by bandits in the opening chapters, and she's there when his body is brought home in a wagon. Soon afterwards their house is set on fire (and everyone knows exactly who's behind it). It's written with real tenderness, but it's very sad. A child who's lost a parent could find it hard going. For a reader who's ready for a big, emotional story, it's the kind of book that stays with you.

What comes next is a proper page-turner. Papa's stepbrothers are greedy and powerful, and one of them wants to marry Esperanza's mother. When she says no, he makes their lives impossible. So Mama makes a secret plan. They'll escape to California with the housekeeper's family, hidden under a load of guavas in a farm wagon.

For Esperanza that's a shock in more ways than one. Hortensia, Alfonso and their son Miguel have always been the servants. Now Mama and Esperanza depend on them completely. Esperanza isn't always easy to like at first (she's been quite snooty about Miguel being the housekeeper's son). Watching her begin to understand how the world really works is what makes this book so special.

Her grandmother is wonderful. She walks barefoot through the grapes quoting poetry, and she teaches Esperanza to crochet a zigzag blanket. Mountains and valleys, she says. Right now Esperanza is at the bottom of a valley, but she'll be at the top of a mountain again.

Spanish words and sayings are sprinkled all the way through, and they're always explained. It's a lovely book to read aloud together.

What to read next

If this one goes down well, Pam Munoz Ryan's Paint the Wind is about Maya, who lost both her parents and lives with a very strict grandmother. All she has left of her mum is a box of old toy horses and a single photo.