Book Review of "Down to the Bone" by Mayra Lazara Dole

TITLE: Down to the Bone

AUTHOR: Mayra Lazara Dole

ISBN: 978-0-06-084310-6

PUBLISHER: HarperTeen

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RATING: 4 out of 5 stars

BOOK BLURB:

Here's what it means to be a tortillera. It means you're a girl who loves girls.

Which means you get kicked out of Catholic school faster than Mother Superior Sicko can say "immoral."

Which means your wacko Mami finds out.

Which means you're kicked to the curb with nowhere to go, and the love of your life is shipped off to Puerto Rico to marry a guy.

But this is Miami, and if you have a bighearted best friend and a loyal puppy at your side, and if your broken heart is still full of love, you just might land on your feet.

In her first novel, Mayra Lazara Dole goes beyond the many meanings of tortillera to paint a vivid picture of a girl who gets kicked out of home only to find a new kind of family.

BOOK REVIEW:

At 17, Laura Amores is a Cuban teenager in Miami who attends a Catholic high school. But when she is caught reading a letter from a friend and not paying attention to the class, the nun reads the letter aloud. Turns out, the missive is from Laura's girlfriend, and details an intimate relationship Laura has kept hidden from everyone.

Suddenly friends Laura has known her whole life turn on her. Her own mother is mortified at her immoral behavior and throws her out of the house, refusing to speak to or even see her until she decides to become straight. Even the girlfriend seems to buy into that mentality, returning to Puerto Rico when her brother discovers their relationship and choosing to settle down into a loveless marriage instead of fighting for her heart's desire.

The only people who stick by Laura is her childhood friend, Soli, and Soli's mother, Viva. They take her in when she has nowhere left to go, and they love her unconditionally. Soli, an over-the-top hairdresser with a zest for life, tries to convince Laura to embrace her sexuality. But the pain of being outed in front of her classmates, coupled with being shunned by her own family, has left Laura confused. If she weren't gay, none of this would have happened.

This story is a wonderful look at the confusion that many feel when they're on the path to discovering their own sexuality. Laura denies that she is gay ~ her belief is that she was in love with a girl, but she can't say the words out loud, even to her new queer circle of friends, for fear of a rejection similar to that she suffered when she was first outed. So instead, she vacillates between a growing attraction to a beautiful girl she meets at a gay club and the desire to be accepted as "normal" and "straight." Throw in a growing friendship with a confident lesbian who self-identifies as a "boi," Soli's unrelenting pressure to own up to her own heart, and her mother's continuous cold shoulder, and the reader will find it hard to put this book down until the very end.

Laura's journey rings true. Many times I found myself frustrated with her, only because she couldn't readily embrace who she was, but I had to keep reminding myself she was only 17. The road to self-acceptance is a hard one, for anybody, and the author doesn't go easy on her character. Laura is torn apart emotionally, her life a roller coaster that anyone who remembers their own turbulent teenage years will identify with all too well. When she finally begins to figure things out for herself, the change is vividly written:

"Something comes over me. I feel as if I've finally taken off a tight iron mask that I've been wearing all my life."

"It's about finally letting go of the fear that didn't allow me to be who I truly am."

There is something for everyone in Laura's story, whether gay, lesbian, bisexual, trans, genderqueer, or questioning. Through her tale, she grows into a stronger person, more sure of herself and her heart. In the final pages of this book is a lesson we can all embrace, an acceptance not only of ourselves but of others around us, as different as they may be. Laura learns to embrace her sexuality ~ and, through the process, learns who loves her unconditionally and, in return, is deserving of her love.