For all the big events that define Mexico’s remarkable history (e.g., the rise of the Aztec and Mayan civilizations, the Spanish conquest, the Mexican-American war, the Tlatelolco Massacre), it is sometimes the little ones that are the most interesting to consider. In the late 19th century, a few decades before the popular revolution that would reform the country’s political system, a young girl is born out of wedlock in the distant state of Sinaloa. Impoverished and of mixed heritage, Teresa Urrea had little going for her and seemed to be destined for an anonymous life of servitude and misery, especially after her teenage mother abandons her into the care of mean-spirited aunt, who treats her like one of the household livestock.

Despite it all, Teresa proves to be a strong, smart, and courageous person who is noticed by both Huila, an indigenous medicine woman, and Don Tomas, the wealthy Mexican landowner who turns out to be her father. Under their tutelage, Teresa learns to be a talented midwife and healer for the People who inhabit the environs of her father’s Sonoran ranch. When a violent event leads to her apparent death, Teresa stuns everyone by returning to life, but transformed with miraculous, new-found powers. She soon develops a large following among the dispossessed and forgotten citizens of the region, who consider her to be a messenger of God and take to calling her ‘Santa Teresita’. This status as a holy hero of the People threatens the existing power structure (i.e., the Church, the dictator Porfirio Diaz), who quickly plot Teresita’s demise.

The Hummingbird’s Daughter tells Teresita’s true-life story, from her humble birth to her rise to common sainthood to her eventual exile from her homeland. Author Luis Alberto Urrea, a distant relative of the real Santa Teresita, spent years of meticulous research constructing the record of his great-aunt’s history and that attention to detail shows up on every page of the novel. Indeed, Urrea has managed the improbable: he has blown life into a small, but significant, event that would otherwise be lost to the ages and given the reader a moving and compelling fictional experience. He writes with compassion, humor, and insight that combines the picaresque style of Larry McMurtry’s The Lonesome Dove with the familial and political narratives of Isabel Allende’s The House of the Spirits, with the additional bonus of being a true tale. This is historical fiction at its finest and it is a book that I can recommend without hesitation. ( )

Totally awesome! ( )

Overall good moving story. Some parts a bit weird. ( )

This book had me weeping more than once. The incredibly moving story of Teresa Urrea, The Hummingbird's Daughter, is based on a true historical figure who inspired a Mexican revolution, and who also happens to be a distant relation of the author, Luis Alberto Urrea. The first sections describe in realistic detail the impoverished childhood of a mixed-race girl, bastard daughter of a landowner and an Indian worker who abandons her child. However, the girl receives wealth beyond gold when she is taken in by a gifted medicine woman. When Teresa's own powers bloom, she astonishes everyone around her. A gripping tale of a truly good person facing down the evil of our world. ( )

Teresita grows up on the rancho of Don Tomás in Sinaloa. Intelligent and inquisitive, she gains the attention of Huila, the curandera of the rancho who recognizes the faint gift of healing within the girl and begins her training. As her gift grows, Teresita becomes known as something of a saint to the people of the rancho and the surroundings towns as well as to the indians--much to the alarm of General Porfirio Díaz who wants to wrestle control of the land from the indians.

This is a remarkable story about one woman's belief in her own abilities and her sense to do what is right even when it goes contrary to the desires of an entire government. It's rich in detail and filled with wonderful and unique characters. And what makes the story even more intriguing is that Teresita is based on an actual person--who was an ancestor of the author. I definitely recommend reading this book. ( )