Mice and Beans - Pam Munoz Ryan

In doing research for my final paper on Esperanza Rising (which, in case you couldn't tell, was my favorite book I read this month), I started looking into other books that Pam Muñoz Ryan had written and realized she'd written many children's books. Those books range from Mice and Beans to When Marian Sang. Although I also read When Marian Sang, I chose to blog about Mice and Beans because it was much different than many of the picturebooks I had read throughout these 5 weeks of classes.

Mice and Beans tells the story of a grandmother named Rosa María who is preparing her tiny house and tiny yard for the seventh birthday of her youngest grandchild named Catalina. She is paranoid of mice and in order to keep them away, constantly sets mouse traps and cleans fervently. Because she is so busy in the days leading up to Catalina's birthday, she forgets if she has set mouse traps or not and ends up re-setting them every day. Suspicious things also begin to happen - like missing napkins, candywrappers on the floor, vanishing mousetraps, and vanishing spoons. She continues to re-set the traps, and finally, after Catalina's birthday, she realizes that her motto of "When there's room in the heart, there's room in the house...except for a mouse" has been memorized incorrectly. It's actually "When there's room in the heart, there's room in the house...even for a mouse." She realizes that there's nothing to worry over if a few mice are in her house, especially if they are helpful ones.

I didn't like Pam Muñoz Ryan's writing style in this book nearly as much as I did in Esperanza Rising, and I think it's because I thought that this book had substantially less substance to it. I liked the book, but didn't love it. I liked the integration of Mexican culture, the glossary of Spanish words at the back, and the silly illustrations, but I didn't feel as if I necessarily gained much out of reading the book. However, I could see how children might find the story silly and how it could even be helpful in teaching them how to predict future events or infer information from page to page. I almost felt a little as if because my inference skills and prediction skills are at an adult level that I couldn't appreciate this book as much as a child because I found it relatively pointless. I knew, the entire book, that there were mice in the house. I knew that they were the ones stealing the spoon and eating the candy and stealing the traps. Honestly, it frustrated me that it took her Rosa María so long to determine this on her own! I think that Pam Muñoz Ryan's style of writing is much more effective in a historical fiction setting, because it doesn't limit her to a specific amount of pages in which she has to cram all of her information.
Despite not being a big fan of this book, I don't think it would be a bad thing to have in a classroom library. The illustrations are sweet, the writing is solid, and there is cultural authenticity, particularly enhanced by the glossary at the end of the book. I just have to come realize that not all books are my cup of tea and that simply because I don't like a book doesn't mean I should keep it from my children in the classroom.

I enjoyed seeing these lesson application of the book which made me more open to integrating it into an actual lesson (see those here).

Esperanza Rising - Pam Munoz Ryan

"Look at the zig-zag of the blanket. Mountains and valleys. 

Right now you are in the bottom of the valley and your problems

loom big around you. But soon, you will be at the top of the mountain again. 

After you have lived many mountains and valleys, we will be together."

- Abuelita speaking to Esperanza, page 51

Very few times am I incredibly and utterly touched and impacted by a book. I fall in love with books easily. I read them like magazines, from cover to cover. Sometimes over and over again. But Esperanza Rising was one of those books that I will not hesitate to put in my classroom library. It is a book that I think could be incredibly powerful to read-aloud to 5th and 6th graders. And finally, it is a book that struck a chord with me. I'm sitting here, on my couch, after finishing the book, and am stunned by the beauty of the words of Pam Muñoz Ryan, smiling because I am happy for Esperanza, amazed that this is based on the story of Ryan's grandmother, and unabashedly touched by the overwhelming perfection of this book. 

When we talked about historical fiction in class yesterday, I didn't realize it, but it is by far my favorite genre of literature. Many of my favorite books growing up and as an adult have been historical fiction books - Number the Stars, Girl with a Pearl Earring, Gone with the Wind, Roots, The Kite Runner, O Pioneers!, and My Antonia. Now, I can without a doubt add Esperanza Rising to that list of favorites. Pam Muñoz Ryan tells readers the story of a girl named Esperanza Ortega who lives in Mexico in the 1930s and tells of her incredible journey of coming to America and coming to terms with the sad reality of her life. Esperanza is extremely close with her Papa, a big, burly man who spoils her rotten. 

Although the Ortega family is living in Mexico, they are extremely wealthy and Papa gives Esperanza everything she could ever want. When bandits kill Papa the night before Esperanza's birthday, her world begins to crumble, and we see many other things become difficult. Her trickster uncles (one - the mayor, the other - the head banker) will not give Mama and Esperanza the money they have in the bank and unless Mama gets married to one of them, they promise to make the Ortega's family life difficult. They do this by setting fire to the house in the middle of the night. This leads Esperanza and her Mama to realize that they must move to California with their servant's family - Hortensia, Alfonso, and Miguel. This only begins the journey that Esperanza goes on from being the queen of the universe to being a peasant. 

Bits and pieces of this book reminded me of The Little Princess, because it takes a girl who is extremely close with her father, strips the father away, and then puts her in servitude. However, with Esperanza, there is no coming back for Papa, whereas Sarah is reunited with her father in the end. The transformation that Esperanza goes through during this book is incredible, and as the reader, we are taken on a conflicting journey. We adore her and the life she has in the beginning. We become frustrated with her when she acts like a stuck-up princess on the train and insults Miguel. We feel embarrassed for her when Marta picks on her and shames her because she doesn't know how to sweep. We feel happiness for her when she becomes independent. We feel sadness for her when Mama becomes sick and must go to the hospital. But most of all, we feel hope for Esperanza, which is ironic - because in Spanish, Esperanza means "hope." I think that was purposeful - what a beautiful and literal representation of the possibilities that a life holds. 

The "Author's Note" in the back of Esperanza Rising is a documentation of the personal life of Pam Muñoz Ryan's grandmother and a description of how the book came to be. This represents and adds to the accuracy and authenticity of the text, something extremely important for historical fiction. It also introduces Pam Muñoz Ryan as a cultural insider because these are the tales of her grandmother, and is also a winner of the Pura Belpre medal, a medal given to "a Latino/Latina writer and illustrator whose work best portrays, affirms, and celebrates the Latino cultural experience in an outstanding work of literature for children and youth" (found on the website here). There are also various websites with ways to effectively integrate this book into the classroom, including different activities that Scholastic has suggested here. 

I'm planning on ordering this book to have it in my personal collection because of how wonderful it is. Because of how culturally accurate it is. Because of how much I connected with Esperanza. and Because of the hope that it can give children. I'll end with a quote from Abuelita - the most prophetic character in the book. 

"We are like the phoenix," said Abuelita. 

"Rising again, with a new life ahead of us."

Let us always have that esperanza.