I often wonder if we are living the wrong life in the wrong country.

Talia is being held at a correctional facility for adolescent girls in the forested mountains of Colombia after committing an impulsive act of violence that may or may not have been warranted. She urgently needs to get out and get back home to Bogot, where her father and a plane ticket to the United States are waiting for her. If she misses her flight, she might also miss her chance to finally be reunited with her family.

How this family came to occupy two different countries, two different worlds, comes into focus like twists of a kaleidoscope. We see Talia’s parents, Mauro and Elena, fall in love in a market stall as teenagers against a backdrop of civil war and social unrest. We see them leave Bogot with their firstborn, Karina, in pursuit of safety and opportunity in the United States on a temporary visa, and we see the births of two more children, Nando and Talia, on American soil. We witness the decisions and indecisions that lead to Mauro’s deportation and the family’s splintering–the costs they’ve all been living with ever since.

Patricia Engel is the author ofInfinite Country,aNew York Timesbestseller and Reese’s Book Club selection;The Veins of the Ocean, winner of the Dayton Literary Peace Prize;It’s Not Love, It’s Just Paris, winner of the International Latino Book Award; andVida, a finalist for the Pen/Hemingway and Young Lions Fiction Awards,New York TimesNotable Book, and winner of Colombia’s national book award, the Premio Biblioteca de Narrativa Colombiana. She is a recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. Her stories appear inThe Best American Short Stories,The Best American Mystery Stories,The O. Henry Prize Stories, and elsewhere. Born to Colombian parents, and herself a dual citizen, Patricia is an associate professor of creative writing at the University of Miami.

• Publisher:Avid Reader Press / Simon & Schuster (October 5, 2021)
• Language:English
• Paperback:256 pages
• ISBN-10:1982159472
• ISBN-13:9781982159474
• Item Weight:7.2 ounces
• Dimensions:5.5 x 0.7 x 8.38 inches