THE LIGHTNING QUEEN

Be prepared to be swept away. Thom Rivera and Christian Barillas's narration envelops listeners from opening sentence to final celebration. Their voices speed and slow, fade and boom with the shifting intensity of the action. Their character portrayals are the icing on the cake for a family saga brimming with vitality. Listeners will journey with young Mateo to his grandfather's village in Oaxaca, Mexico, as the story crosses generations and cultures. With a gentle Mexican-Spanish lilt, grandfather Teo looks back to the 1950s, telling of the native Mixteco people and their Romany (Gypsy) visitors, especially Esma, who, against all expectation, becomes his "friend for life." The production concludes with a musical suggestion of Esma's song and an afterword by the author in which she shares her inspiration for writing about the Mixteco and Rom. A.R. © AudioFile 2016, Portland, Maine [Published: JANUARY 2016]