Cover of Mother Tongue

Mother Tongue

"It is a great beauty of a book, and I am so proud of you for standing with and for the disappeared. A sister, a lover, a witness."

Read more

—Alice Walker

Mary is nineteen and living alone in Albuquerque. Adrift in the wake of her mother's death, she longs for something meaningful to take her over. Then Jose Luis enters her life. A refugee from El Salvador and its bloody civil war, Jose has been smuggled to the United States as part of the sanctuary movement.

Mary cannot help but fall in love with the movement and the man. And little by little, she begins to reveal to Jose Luis the part of herself she has never known. . . .

"A book that becomes more timely every day, in our present political climate, and deserves the widest possible audience for its beautiful prose and humanitarian heart."

—Barbara Kingsolver

"Demetria Martinez has pulled out all the stops: here is truth to arouse any hardened heart; here is the 'insanity' of a woman in love calling forth a revolutionary lucidity. Read it. Get angry. And act."

—Luis J. Rodriguez, Author of Always Running

Audience
adult
Length
medium · 208 pages

Click a tag to see books like this one that share it. Point at it (on a phone, tap it) for less of it instead.

Read it? Sign in to help tag it.

Liked Mother Tongue? Here’s where I’d start.

These suit anyone who liked Mother Tongue. Sign in and mark a few books for picks shaped around your own taste.

  1. Face of an Angel Shares fiction, chicana o
  2. Heart of Aztlan Shares fiction, latino, historical fiction
  3. Under the Feet of Jesus Shares fiction, latino lit, latino
  4. Waiting in the Wings: Portrait of a Queer Motherhood Shares feminism

“People who read Mother Tongue tend to reach for these next.”

  1. The Rain God
  2. Lost in Transmission
  3. Massacre of the Dreamers: Essays on Xicanisma
  4. Flash House

“If you want more of the same (historical fiction about diversity), start with these.”

  1. True's Love
  2. The Right Time
  3. Macho!
  4. The Story of Maha

“If it was the chicana o that hooked you, try one of these.”

  1. Loverboys
  2. Caramelo
  3. The Mixquiahuala Letters
  4. Geographies of Home

“These start from a similar idea, even if they go somewhere else with it.”

  1. A Bed for the Night: Humanitarianism in Crisis
  2. A Hope More Powerful Than the Sea: One Refugee's Incredible Story of Love, Loss, and Survival
  3. A Thin Bright Line
  4. Blackwing Beast