Communication can be hard for any two strangers, especially if it requires navigating a complicated language barrier. But for 14-year-old Almudena in Samuel Teer and Mar Julia’s Brownstone communication becomes even harder—and essential—when her mother leaves to go on tour in Europe as a dancer, leaving her with Xavier: the father she’s never met but her mom seems to love, who walked away from her life soon after she was born without explanation or contact.
When Almudena parts ways with her mom, she’s immediately immersed in a completely different environment. Xavier recruits her help in fixing up the brownstone he’s living in and renovating into an apartment for the neighborhood, but without knowing any Spanish and Xavier’s limited English, a next door neighbor and friend of Xavier’s, Idola, needs to step in.
However, Almudena’s lack of a connection with her cultural heritage creates some rift. Her sense of identity is warped when, for the first time in her life, she’s told that she’s Guatemalan, and that it’s completely different from being Mexican as she believed she was. Her experiences with the Latino neighborhood she’s in for the next month are similar. Surrounded by words she doesn’t understand, directed towards the ‘white folks aisle’, and criticized for being too white (bringing about the nickname ‘off-brand’), surviving the next month doesn’t look easy for Almudena. But making friends, bridging gaps, and truly taking in the culture and history that she’s missed out on for the first 14 years of her life comes before she realizes.
The book tackles several bigger topics from gentrification to the importance of recognizing and learning of one’s heritage, and even touches on things like immigration and homophobia.
There are challenges at every corner of the neighborhood for Almudena, but progress is steady in all aspects of this book. This includes Xavier and Almudena’s ability to communicate with each other, the brownstone’s progress into a livable apartment complex for the community, and Almudena’s connection to her heritage. Not to mention, she’s also able to get some of the answers that she’s been waiting 14 years for, by the end of this summer. Why Xavier did what he did, and what their relationship will look like moving forward.
Brownstone is a touching story on the importance of cultural heritage and identity with complicated, not so easy to support characters and issues that could have been explored further. It might leave more to be desired, but it’s an easy and entertaining read with tougher topics that highlights heritage and non-traditional family structures.
