Luis Alberto Urrea - Queen of America

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The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

Copyright 2011 by Luis Alberto Urrea

Reading group guide copyright 2012 by Luis Alberto Urrea and Little, Brown and Company

Cover design by Allison J. Warner

Cover art: painting Erich Lessing / Art Resource, NY; bird The Granger Collection

Cover 2012 Hachette Book Group, Inc

All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher constitute unlawful piracy and theft of the authors intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at permissions@hbgusa.com. Thank you for your support of the authors rights.

Little, Brown and Company

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First e-book edition: November 2011

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ISBN 978-0-316-19204-0

Striking. Urrea deploys the passion of a visionary, making music with his phrases, evoking a world in the ebullient manner of antique storytellers while employing effective modern narrative techniques. The novelists powers work their way in this entertaining and intelligent historical fiction, studded with delights, rich in image and metaphor, the voice strong and at the same time comforting as it creates a universe replete with a multiplicity of characters, complete in body and soul. And as in the best of fiction, though the novelist himself is not physically present, his voice speaks worlds.

Alan Cheuse, Chicago Tribune

I am happy to report, a bit wet-eyed, that this new work holds its own, cleverly written so that a reader could take up the saga here. Urreas touch with secondary characters is Dickensian; his long years of research into remote time and place inspire our surrender. Best of all, perhaps, is the sensual, musical prose set to English. Urrea dances along the fertile crescent between Spanish and English. Queen of America reads like a thrill, and its conclusion feels like a blessing.

Karen R. Long, Cleveland Plain Dealer

Urrea has given us that rare breed of literary sequel, a story that will satisfy fans of the original while standing solidly on its own. Paints an informed and entertaining portrait of a country still trying to find its footing in the first years of the new century. At once magical and corporeal, grounding and transporting, Queen of America tells the compelling true story of a young woman caught between worlds, between her childhood in Mexico and her adulthood in the United States, between the spiritual world and the material world.

Michael David Lukas, San Francisco Chronicle

Who is more of an outlaw than a saint? one of Luis Urreas characters poses. The answer is this ferocious, ribald romance of the border. Jaunty, bawdy, gritty, sweet, Queen of America has a bottomless comic energy and a heart large enough to accepteven revel inall of human folly.

Stewart ONan, author of Emily Alone and Songs for the Missing

Captivating. With deft humor and a poetic lyricism that seamlessly folds one scene into another, Urrea unfolds the story of his real-life great-aunt Teresita, a teenage saint who was known for healing miracles. Each scene in Queen of America unfurls gracefully like delicate wisps of smoke. Whether Teresita is being held captive in Northern California by a band of profiteering medical professionals, or being feted like a queen in New Yorks social circles, this epic novel paints a portrait of Americaand its inhabitantswith grace and style. It will spark fire in readers hearts.

Megan Fishmann, BookPage

Urrea has exhumed Teresas past and perched her high. Queen of America weighs in at nearly five hundred pages of suspended reality and dream states leavened with jolts of history. The reward is clear in reading both Queen of America and The Hummingbirds Daughter. Urreas voiceblended with those of his familyanimates that family urge toward story. Urrea does so with poetic prose and devilish dialogue. He is serious, irreverent, and magical.

Dianne Sols, Dallas Morning News

Enchanting. Fantastical. Urrea has stitched a seamless end to the saga.

Mythili G. Rao, New York Times Book Review

Sometimes the connection between an author and his subject is so strong that it seems as if hes fated to write a particular book. Thats the case with Luis Alberto Urrea. Teresita remains a wonderful character: a combination of deep mysticism and unpretentious common sense. Most provocatively, Urreas description of how the nineteen-year-olds ordinary, girlish desires for pretty dresses, for romance, for independence from her loving but domineering father, suggests that divine grace may be as much a burden as it is a gift.

Marcela Valdes, Washington Post

Queen of America not only brings Teresitas story to a satisfying and emotionally powerful conclusion but also complements themes of family loyalty, clashing cultures, spirituality, and magic that helped make Hummingbird a beloved best-seller. Urrea lightens these heavy themes with a prose style by turns playful and poetic. By the novels moving conclusion, we see Teresita in full: a living, breathing woman of faith. Urrea seems to be showing us that a saints spirituality can burn brightly in anyones life.

Clarke Crutchfield, Richmond Times-Dispatch

Urrea delights in the texture of things. Turn-of-the-century America, particularly New York, comes alive at his fingertips: He sees both the silk and the mud. In imagining the story of his great-aunt Teresita, Urrea might have chosen to make her a hero; that would have been easier. What we get is more complicated, more modern. Hers is the story of what it means to have a gift, and how a talent can also be a burden.

Carolyn Kellogg, Los Angeles Times

A gritty, bold, and much-anticipated sequel to The Hummingbirds Daughter. Fiercely romantic and at times heartbreaking but also full of humor, Urreas latest novel blends fairy tale, Western adventure, folktale, and historical drama. Fans of Hummingbird and readers new to Urreas work will surely enjoy this magnificent, epic novel.

Library Journal,