Solito

Javier is a migrant that made the journey to "la usa" as a child with strangers. The recollection of emotions and trials that he experienced is a testament to how ingrained the experience is, from the good moments to the traumatizing ones. He tells it from his perspective as a child, and he does not hold back on his fears or worries to try to cover up what some adults would likely be too anxious to ever put down into words. He also does not try to fill in gaps or add extra information to try to get points across. There is a lot of information that you do not know about because the kids wake up to adults arguing or things happening and they just have to run. Unless he got an answer on what was going on, the blanks are left in.

There is a lot of misconception on what crossing the border looks like and I feel like this could help some understand what actually goes on. But I don't know if it would really be the best option for that because while the journey is harrowing and dangerous and bad things happen, I feel like Javier and his group ultimately found quite a bit of luck along the journey, and this is especially noted when they speak to other families that have been sent back into Mexico.

I'm very glad that I read this book and I feel like it would be a worthwhile read for anyone to be able to get a glimpse into what the journey into America can look like.

My immediate thoughts on finishing reading this intense memoir were, selfishly, relief at my own privilege meaning I am unlikely to ever have to undertake such an arduous journey myself, and also a deep sadness on realising how desperate Javier's parents must have been in order to commit their nine year old child to coyotes' promises and the care of strangers for an epic trek that they had already undertaken themselves. They knew how tough it would be even if nothing went wrong.

Javier's story is incredibly evocatively told so I felt as though I were travelling alongside him into the unknown for thousands of miles. His child's perspective gives such a poignant atmosphere to the book, especially when the things he worries most about are being unable to tie his shoelaces properly, or about being perceived as a little kid if he doesn't appear as stalwart as the adults around him. Zamora brings every mile, and all his fellow travellers, vividly to life so Solito is an ideal read for anyone wanting to fully understand the emigrant experience in the Americas. As an adult, Zamora has a poet's soul and this comes across so well in his beautiful prose. I loved the inclusion of Spanish phrases too. Nothing too difficult and often translated or paraphrased in the English text, and this gave me a sense of how Spanish phrases and references change through the different Central American countries. Young Javier doesn't only have to cope with the physicality of his journey but also, and perhaps more importantly, it is essential that the travellers not stand out too obviously from local people. Even something as usually inconsequential for a traveller as his not knowing the local word for a drinking straw could get the whole group arrested - and nearly does. It's one of a number of seemingly mundane, yet incredibly tense moments that make up Solito.

Solito is one of the most impressive and valuable memoirs I have read this year. I can only begin to imagine how traumatic it must have been for Zamora to revisit those seven weeks, so many years after the fact, but I am so grateful that he did so and that I had this opportunity to read the result.