Knitting the Fog

Hernández’s debut memoir dives deep into moments before, during, and after crossing into a new country in the life of a young immigrant. Here is truly a matriarchal story: the author’s young existence is at once expanded and contained by her mother, aunt, grandmother, and two sisters. The female lineage and the women’s survival is radiantly strong; the men, abusive or loving, fade into the background. Hernandez’s hybrid style and focus on childhood (she writes about her girlhood and nascent adolescence for most of the book) draw readers into everyday surfaces where acculturation and defiance take place, such as the muddy riverbank in Tactic, Guatemala, as mango pits float by, and the oil-slicked blacktop in Cudahy, LA. Poems bubble up between playful and immersive prose chapters at key junctures in the journey to remind us that international borders are both less and more than just a line, and that resilient families won’t be contained by political strictures. This story of women, children, immigration, and the Latinx diaspora is a critical contribution to multiple narrative realms. It shines for its genre experimentation and loyal specificity to one girl’s experience.