At once a completely heart-wrenching exploration of the current child migration crisis sweeping across the North American continent and into the heart of this city, but also a masterclass for writers in new, exciting things you can do with an essay. Nothing has captured for me precisely how hard it is to come to this country - all the griefs and humiliation and loss - and all the reasons why you'll do everything you can to stay once you're here.
— MadeleineHumane yet often horrifying, Tell Me How It Ends offers a compelling, intimate look at a continuing crisis--and its ongoing cost in an age of increasing urgency. --Jeremy Garber, Powell's Books
Valeria Luiselli's extended essay on her volunteer work translating for child immigrants confronts with compassion and honesty the problem of the North American refugee crisis. It's a rare thing: a book everyone should read. --Stephen Sparks, Point Reyes BooksTell Me How It Ends evokes empathy as it educates. It is a vital contribution to the body of post-Trump work being published in early 2017.--Katharine Solheim, Unabridged Bookstore
While this essay is brilliant for exactly what it depicts, it helps open larger questions, which we're ever more on the precipice of now, of where all of this will go, how all of this might end. Is this a story, or is this beyond a story? Valeria Luiselli is one of those brave and eloquent enough to help us see.--Rick Simonson, Elliott Bay Book Company
Appealing to the language of the United States' fraught immigration policy, Luiselli exposes the cracks in this foundation. Herself an immigrant, she highlights the human cost of its brokenness, as well as the hope that it (rather than walls) might be rebuilt.--Brad Johnson, Diesel Bookstore
The bureaucratic labyrinth of immigration, the dangers of searching for a better life, all of this and more is contained in this brief and profound work. Tell Me How It Ends is not just relevant, it's essential.--Mark Haber, Brazos Bookstore