El Lector

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Thirteen-year-old Bella has one great ambition: She wants to become a lector, just like her grandfather. It's easy to see why: In the cigar factory in Ybor City, Florida, Grandfather sits on a special platform, reading books and newspapers all day to the workers as they roll their cigars. In the Cuban-American community, lectors are respected and revered. But in these harsh Depression years, things are changing; lectors and other workers are being dismissed, leaving Bella to wonder whether her dream has become an anachronism. This story about 1930s "modernization" seems hauntingly relevant to our own times.

Children's Literature

Durbin's tale is a family story set in the world of Florida cigar-makers living in the early part of the 20th century. In this era before radio took over, many factories had "readers" who performed poetry, novels, newspaper readings, as well as reading aloud the union newsletters to keep boredom at bay. These readers were supported by the workers themselves, and later became the target of union-busters who preferred to keep the workers uninformed. El Lector is told from the point of view of a teenager who wants to be a lector like her grandfather. She struggles between making enough money to feed the family and fulfilling her ambition. Durbin has also written Blackwater Ben (a really great story!) and Broken Blade. Try him. You'll like what you find. 2006, Wendy Lamb/Random House, and Ages 10 up.
—Gwynne Spencer

VOYA

In 1931, when Cuban American Bella Lorente, the oldest daughter of a widowed mother of five, finishes her last year of elementary school, she hopes to attend high school in the fall. She wants to become a lector like her grandfather, who reads novels, poetry, and news to the cigar rollers at a factory in Ybor City, Florida. Instead Bella finds herself working in harsh conditions in a tobacco factory for pennies a day to help her mother buy food for the family. During that summer, Bella's aunt, Lola, is unjustly jailed for being a member of the tobacco workers union, and grandfather, the most respected reader in the area, is replaced by a radio. Daring to defy convention, Bella manages to find a job for her grandfather and herself at a local radio station. With the support of the community and their family, the two become widely known for the excellence of their Spanish-language broadcasts. They are then able to help the family financially, and Bella will be able to attend high school. This historical novel's setting in depression-era Florida and its Cuban American characters make it unique in young adult literature. Based on actual events, the workers' struggles, the ruthless disregard of workers' rights, and the tyranny of the Ku Klux Klan are woven through a believable story with realistic details, but the characters are two-dimensional, and the depictions of Cuban culture are superficial and not authentic. VOYA CODES: 3Q 2P M J (Readable without serious defects; For the YA with a special interest in the subject; Middle School, defined as grades 6 to 8; Junior High, defined as grades 7 to 9). 2006, Wendy Lamb Books/Random House, 193p., and PLB Ages 11 to 15.
—Sherry York

School Library Journal

Gr 5-8-Bella Lorente, 13, dreams of becoming el lector like her grandfather, reading literature and poetry to the Spanish-speaking cigar-factory workers of Ybor City, FL. However, the Depression, the conflict between workers and owners, and racial tensions alter her plans when her Aunt Lola is arrested for participating in a union meeting. Bella's extended family struggle to free the woman and to seek community in a divided city. Durbin succeeds admirably in creating an accessible world rich in detail. While most children will not know much about lectores, cigar rolling, and Depression-era Spanish Floridian culture, Durbin explains each one clearly, providing tidy translations for all of the Spanish used. In one particularly evocative passage, the wind brings smells from fresh-baked bread, guava, or damp tobacco, depending on its orientation. However, this richly envisioned world sometimes eclipses the rising action of the labor struggles and slows the book's pacing, weighing it down with numerous subsidiary plot threads. At certain points, there is an overload of information as the author jumps from labor troubles to Depression-era unemployment to Babe Ruth to 1930s fashions and films. That said, El Lector is better-than-average historical fiction with a strong female protagonist. Give it to fans of Pam Mu-oz Ryan's Becoming Naomi Le-n (Scholastic, 2004) as a read-alike.-Caitlin Augusta, The Darien Library, CT Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.