Laura Resau

A child in Ecuador is sent to be the servant of a rich mestizo family where she is mistreated. She teaches herself to read and write and escapes, but she is lost between two cultures. Based on a true story.

On the Hill of Dust, in the remote mountains of Mexico, an eleven-year-old Mixtec boy called Teo lives with his family and the animals that he has healed, but one day a Romany caravan rolls into town with a young girl who calls herself Esma, the Gypsy Queen of Lightning--it is the beginning of a life-long friendship that will change both their lives.

"Fifteen-year-old Zeeta lives in a different country every year with her flighty English-teaching mom, Layla. The wandering life suits Layla, who lives in the moment, quotes mystical poetry, and hangs out with penniless artists and scraggly-haired clowns. But Zeeta yearns for the normal life she sees in American magazine ads. This year, Zeeta finds herself in the Ecuadoran Andes, where sacred waterfalls grant wishes and old Incan gods dwell in mountains....

After eleven-year-old Zitlally's father is deported to Mexico, she takes refuge in her trailer park's forest of rusted car parts, where she befriends a spunky neighbor and finds a stray dog that she nurses back to health and believes she must keep safe so that her father will return.

"One activist's story shows how indigenous communities can fight to protect their sacred lands-and win"--