Loteria: A Novel (P.S.)

the best book I read in years It truly touch me in so many ways thank you MARIO ALBERTO ZAMBRANO

The book was in great condition but I gave four stars for the actual content. It was ok, it just ended and not that I expect a happy wrapped up ending but something would have been nice. I kept reading it because someone recommended it and I felt bad if I didn't finish it. I love loteria, the game, but the storyline was not really related to the game except to designate the chapters.

A very interesting premise for a story-- not told in a continuous narrative, but rather through spurts of memories triggered by Loteria cards. Loteria, a Mexican version of bingo, has many intricacies of play. The cards are numbered and labeled, but rather than calling the cards by name, they are called by riddles. It is with that, the author then uses the cards as symbols by which the young narrator, 11 year old Luz, can tell her story. Some other readers have identified, and slighted, the novel for its Spanish phrases sprinkled throughout the book. However, I caution against being discouraged by this. First, this is very typical of the genre of Chicano(a) literature. Second, it allows the author to depict the mind of a young Chicana--- thoughts mostly in English, but with certain memories and phrases tied to the original Spanish (such as riddles for the cards, and conversations between her parents). A quick read with beautiful color images.

I don’t usually write comments on the books that I read, but Lotería by Mario Alberto Zambrano is such a uniquely moving work that I feel compelled to share my enthusiasm with others. This is Zambrano’s first novel, and it is highly original in numerous ways. The story is related entirely through the eyes of an eleven-year-old girl named Luz. She lives on the McAllen, Texas, side of the border across from Reynosa, Tamaulipas. Luz has family in both Mexico and the United States, but is more comfortable speaking and writing in English and living in the United States (where she was born). At the opening of the book Luz is being held in an institution, but we aren’t sure why or just what has happened. She does not speak to the staff of the facility, but regularly writes in a journal that she is surreptitiously keeping. She has a deck of Mexican lotería cards – they are used to play a game that is similar to bingo – and uses the cards to trigger memories which she then writes about in her journal. The unique organization for Zambrano’s book, with the young girl’s memories triggered by the pictures on the lotería game cards, keeps the reader in suspense to the very end. Luz’s life experiences are revealed one at a time, but not necessarily sequentially. Through her memories we get to know her parents, her sister Estrella, and other members of the extended family. We experience Luz’s emotions, and find her to be a sympathetic and likeable little girl. The reader agonizes over what she has already experienced going through life. We also wonder to what extent Luz’s life experiences are common in the border communities. I will be watching for other work by Mario Alberto Zambrano in coming years. Maybe the author will continue to chronicle the life of this young character. I’ve never read anything quite like Lotería before, and recommend it without hesitation.

“’What did you do all together? What did you do with your Papi?’” But she wouldn’t get it. She wouldn’t know what it was like. We all fought. We all hit each other.” Such is the normality of family life for Luz, the eleven-year-old narrator of Lotería. Through her eyes, Mario Alberto Zambrano tells a story of growing up in Mexico and the United States, of family struggles, and of the love and loyalty that holds families through tough times. Zambrano, a former contemporary ballet dancer and graduate of The New School and Iowa Writers’ Workshop, debuts his writing with this powerful novel, drawing upon his own experiences growing up and playing Lotería as a child. He explains the rules of the popular game, after which the novel is titled, in a brief prologue. It shares many similarities with bingo, but Lotería relies on cards rather than numbers, and each card comes with a riddle. The novel is structured around those cards, and weaves itself in beautifully subtle riddles through the voice of Luz. Each chapter begins with the picture of a card, and each card sparks a flashback as Luz struggles to work through the trauma of her childhood. The story is non-linear to a degree, as if Zambrano shuffled the deck, but each story flows into the next and each piece of the puzzle builds the story Luz is trying to tell. As a result, the chapters vary widely in length, but the pace keeps moving. Zambrano does an excellent job of dealing with childhood trauma tenderly, yet realistically. Luz is the perfect narrator because she is imperfect. She is a child dealing with adult situations, and Zambrano balances these sides of her character well, mixing childlike naiveté with a gritty vocabulary and the maturity forced upon her. Her descriptions flow from her youthful perspective, for example when describing her father’s alcoholism, she says, “It was coming from that man in the bottle, Don Pedro. He’d get inside Papi’s head and shake him until he turned into someone else.” Zambrano uses images to explain things rather than resorting to the way adults say things. When describing her father drunk, she says, “that’s how he moved, like if he were on a boat in the middle of an ocean.” Luz brings an energetic, bright voice to a tragic story. She can find beauty in even the darkest of times, and must as she grapples with her past. She has a colorful vocabulary for an eleven year old, at one point getting in trouble for calling her sister a “smart-ass,” and at another saying that another character “didn’t have the balls to explain how wrong she was.” Yet, as she tells the story of growing up in Mexico and then the United States, her vocabulary doesn’t seem out of place at all. Luz also reverts to Spanish during emotional highs or lows, intensifying the experience and highlighting it in the music of another language. The bilin...