"Crossing the Wire" Response

Crossing the Wire was an unbelievable book.  In my 20 years I have only met one person who was struggling in the process of getting citizenship.  I didn’t know him very well, but I had heard about how much it affected him and his family and how hard it was for them and his friends to handle the situation.  Reading this book opened up my eyes to the whole immigration struggle.  Yes, we have immigration issues right now, but America has dealt with immigration for centuries!  What made this book so remarkable was how detailed it got in many parts.  I felt as if I knew Victor, I had sympathy for him and I could relate with him in some ways and other ways I looked up to him and his courage.

                This book may not be based on an actual person, but I’m sure it doesn’t stray too far off from the true struggles.  What’s crazy for me is that I’ve always heard people identify America as the place of opportunities and dreams, but what we forget is that for some people it’s the place for a future; a future for a single person, a future for his/her family, a future for his/her future children, and a place to make a home for themselves.  One part of the book that made me really step back and rethink my actions was when Miguel told Victor that he’d have to watch what he spent his money on because he’d lose it to all the wasteful and junky items sold everywhere.  It’s so unbelievable true though!  We Americans have so much junk we get garages to store more useless junk, and yet we continue to buy more and complain about things we don’t have. 

                Seeing how little Victor and his family had in Mexico and then seeing how much Victor struggled once he got to America was really difficult for me.  He built a lot of relationships and had a lot of them ruined because that’s just what had to happen.  It’s incredibly sad.  I can’t image being a young teenage boy, having to leave home and venture off to a place where I don’t know the language or the streets, and then have to cope with the fact that I may never get back.  That’s a lot of pressure for one kid! 

                I thought it was really cool that the book started in Mexico and then ended here in Washington.  A lot of the places/cities that were mentioned in the book I recognized which made it really easy to relate to the book and it was also easy to create a mental image of the scenes described in the book.  

Will Hobbs did a fantastic job writing this book, he made it easy for the reader to relate to the main character, his chapters were short making it appealing to reluctant readers, and he wrote about a touchy/current topic in a way that addresses the issue, but doesn’t take sides which is really fantastic.  He shows the struggle of an innocent boy trying to get across to save his family, and for a brief section in the book Hobbs writes about a border patrol man and his take on the immigration issue.  It was overall a fantastic book, I’d recommend it to ages 4^th and up, easy and quick read!