THE MESQUITE TREE

Manuela gave birth to Fatima at a scared sixteen. Fatima gave birth to Blanca at a love-struck fourteen. Blanca gave birth to Carmel at a desperate sixteen. Carmel gave birth to Destiny at a rebellious fifteen. Now Destiny is an aloof fifteen, and Blanca wants more for her granddaughter than the monotonous life of a young mother stuck in the same small house in South Texas as five generations of her abuelas. Can she change her family’s destiny before there’s another mouth to feed, or is the cycle of poverty too crushing for one woman to combat? Filled with laughter through tears, The Mesquite Tree: an American Tragedy is an intimate examination of the small joys and painful traumas of a far too common family of strong Latina women who, like mesquite trees, find ways to plant their tough roots deep into the desert dirt and flourish in the harshest of conditions.