The Tortilla Curtain, a book that tells about two very unlike couples. One of the couple is an American couple that lives very casual and flourishing, but the other couple is Latino and they’re from Tijuana, and come to America to hopefully live a better and more successful life, but they come here illegally. I was very satisfied on how the author, T.C. Boyle, did an outstanding job with how very realistic he made every situation and problem that each character had to face with. Most of the immigrant’s struggles were very easily for me to relate to with my own family member’s problems, because my family, too had immigrated to the United States, they also too had to worry about the same things as the Latino couple such as but they came from a small village, called La Descubridora.

What I also love about this book is how it demonstrated how both immigrants from Mexico and American view each other. The perspectives of the two ethnic groups towards each other, is very ironic, because the immigrants are always worried and concerned about being caught from the “white man” or the migration, but if you look at what the Americans (in the book) are worried about are Mexicans breaking into their house or putting graffiti and gang signs all over their neighborhoods.

Another subject that I thought T.C. Boyle covered very well is how all of us humans survive and act very similar. Early in the book Delany (one of the main characters) had lost one of his dogs, due to a coyote taking it and eating it alive, but Delany blames that he lost his dog because the fences in his neighborhood weren’t taller enough. After a little while, Delany convinces his neighbors and community members to build taller fences around his neighborhood, but shortly after the new fences are built another coyote attacks his other dog. It took me a while to understand what the purpose of the coyotes were in the book, and until it finally it hit me. The purpose of the coyotes was to tell that coyotes are very similar to us humans. How these furry creatures symbolize us humans, is because coyotes will do any to survive, such as go in an unknown territory and try to find or hunt down whatever resource they can find, just as the immigrants in the book and real life. But not only does apply to the immigrants, but also to all other races, just look at how America was discovered, Christopher Columbus and his men came into our vast land knowing that they knew nothing about but still came here, and once they arrived they to eat and drink, but from what? Whatever water, animals, or any other resource they could find. But how come it is wrong for the immigrants to do what our founding fathers did centuries ago?

Overall I found “The Tortilla Curtain”, a very pleasing book to read, but if there is one thing to complain about, that is the ending. Even though the ending was very dramatic, it had left just confused and frustrated, because the end just had no connection with the whole story line. Even though the book had left me unsatisfied, I found that I could relate to this book a lot, which helped me understand the book and the messages that the author was trying to tell. I also highly recommended this book to any who is Latino, but if you’re not Latino I still highly suggest that you read this book.