Phillippe Diederich

An 11-year-old struggles to connect with his past and survive the tumult of his present.

From recollections of Papi, his late Haitian father, to what happened yesterday, Lalo Lespérance’s memories feel “like secret notes in bottles floating in the ocean.” Even when he finds one, it’s “usually vague or written in code.” Now that Covid has forced everyone online for school, his neighbor Vivi and her grandmother Alita welcome Lalo and his 17-year-old brother, Claudio, over to use the internet for online classes. Lalo, whose mom is Mexican American, loves to escape into Alita’s stories about Mexico, especially ones about magic. One day, Vivi and Lalo spy a strange motor home in the parking lot of their apartment building. Vivi believes it belongs to a roba chico, or kidnapper. As they devise ways to catch him, Lalo discovers a mysterious old-fashioned radio in a storage closet. He becomes certain that the radio is helping him find his memories—but he isn’t sure if remembering is good or bad. Diederich immerses readers in Lalo’s confused emotional landscape: The uncertainties surrounding his identity, friendships, and place in his family push readers to explore these questions, both in terms of Lalo and themselves. The definition of memory and how integral it is to understanding oneself are heavy themes made accessible for younger audiences without sacrificing depth.

A slow-burn of emotional exploration. (Fiction. 10-14)

-Kirkus Review… (meer)

Frank Delgado was born in the United States from parents who had fled Castro and the Cuban revolution. All his life he hated his father for being a boring, “typical” American, who didn’t seem to have any interest in life other than work and home, and who seemed to hate anything that had to do with his former homeland.

Frank is part owner of a failing restaurant in New York, (while also failing at relationships and college.) When his business partners convince him to go to a famous restaurant in Cuba to steal a recipe for chicken that had been stolen from his Uncle, Frank discovers that Cuba (and his father) are not what he had thought.

I didn’t find the plot line of “Sofrito” to be believable. I felt the things Frank did to try and get the recipe were very unlikely, his interactions with the secret police were not plausible, and the fact that he fell in love with a prostitute in less than a week was the final nail in “Sofrito’s” coffin. In addition, I am pretty sure Cuban people don’t start every sentence with the curse word “coño.” I lost track of how many times it was said while Frank was in Cuba.

I know this book was more a “take” on the political scene of Cuba and how exiles feel disconnected or connected to the island and its memories, while locals feel very patriotic or hate its leader. However I didn’t like it, as the unrealistic storyline kept me at arm’s length.

Though I wasn’t a fan of “Sofrito,” I will leave it up to you to decide if you want to read it or not.

Book review link: https://shouldireaditornot.wordpress.com/2016/06/05/sofrito-phillippe-diederich/… (meer)