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Make Your Home Among Strangers by Jennine Capo Crucet
Lizet Ramirez is the first to go to college from her Cuban immigrant household in Miami, and her parents see it as an act of betrayal. Lizet's family breaks up before she even leaves, and upon arriving at school, she struggles socially and academically. Returning home for Thanksgiving, Lizet and her whole family become embroiled in the case of a young Cuban boy whose mother died at sea en route to seeking asylum in the U.S. Author "Capo Crucet has created an utterly believable character in Lizet, whose struggles ... will resonate with older teens who are preparing to leave their own childhood homes" (SLJ).
Review from School Library Journal Starred:
In this beautifully written and compulsively readable coming-of-age novel, Lizet is the daughter of Cuban immigrants and the first in her family to attend college—and it's not Miami-Dade Community College, either; it's Rawlings College, an elite liberal arts school in upstate New York, where Lizet has received a full scholarship. While Lizet is away from home, experiencing snow for the first time and finding out just how poorly Hialeah Lakes High School prepared her for higher education, her family and boyfriend Omar continue their lives in Miami and don't understand what Lizet is doing. It's 1999, and Lizet's mother is caught up in the case of five-year-old Cuban refugee Ariel Hernandez (a fictionalized but essentially accurate version of the Elián González case), which serves as a mirror for Lizet's own situation of being torn between two cultures. Lizet's trips home at Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter reveal the growing distance between where she came from and where she wants to go.
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