Summer of the Mariposas

By Guadalupe Garcia McCall

Ebook

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When Odilia and her four sisters find a dead body in the swimming hole, they embark on a hero’s journey to return the dead man to his family in Mexico. But returning home to Texas turns into an odyssey that would rival Homer’s original tale.

With the supernatural aid of ghostly La Llorona via a magical earring, Odilia and her little sisters travel a road of tribulation to their long-lost grandmother’s house. Along the way, they must outsmart a witch and her Evil Trinity: a wily warlock, a coven of vicious half-human barn owls, and a bloodthirsty livestock-hunting chupacabras. Can these fantastic trials prepare Odilia and her sisters for what happens when they face their final test, returning home to the real world, where goddesses and ghosts can no longer help them?

Summer of the Mariposas is not just a magical Mexican American retelling of The Odyssey, it is a celebration of sisterhood and maternal love.

Download this Summer of the Mariposas Reading Journal created in collaboration with Guadalupe García McCall and the Lee & Low literacy team.

Read the first three chapters of Summer of the Mariposas online here.

Check out the Vamos a Leer Educator's Guide for Summer of the Mariposas created by the staff at the Latin American & Iberian Institute (LAII).

Check out Why Culturally Responsive Literature Matters in Middle and High School for Summer of the Mariposas.

Learn more about Guadalupe Garcia McCall in “Guadalupe García McCall: A Storyteller of Cultures and Odysseys” by R. Joseph Rodríguez and KaaVonia Hinton in SIGNAL journal, the Journal of the International Reading Association’s Special Interest Group: Network on Adolescent Literature.

Discover Guadalupe García McCall's entire collection!