The Wind Knows My Name by Isabel Allende 5

 

"But no crying. We have to be good. No, we're not lost. The wind knows my name. And yours too. Everyone knows where we are. I'm here with you and you know where I am. See? There's nothing to be scared about. Mama will be able to find us; she just has to call and ask Miss Selena or Tita Edu. We don't have to worry about the guardian angel either. She always knows where we are and she never goes too far away."      -Anita to her sister Claudia

I chose this book because I thought I had enjoyed another novel by this author but in looking at a list of her work, I saw nothing familiar. According to her bio she is known for magical realism, a genre that I don't always like. In this novel, it worked for me because it came in the form of imaginings of a traumatized child, her escape in a very real way. I've rated the book a 5.

This novel spans time and place by presenting the stories of Samuel Adler, sent as a Jewish child from Vienna in 1938 to London to avoid the Nazis and Anita Nogales, a 7-year-old blind girl brought from El Salvador by her mother and separated by the heartless U.S. immigration policy in 2019 of taking children from parents.

Anita's story reminded me of We Are Not From Here by Jenny Torres Sanchez about young people making their way north after fleeing a horrendous situation in Guatemala and trying to survive very dangerous situations to get to the U.S.

Other characters important to the plot are Selena Duran, a social worker who becomes very involved with Anita's predicament and Frank Angileri, a lawyer recruited by Selena to help with the needed legal work.

I loved how the two immigration stories are compared and contrasted and how Anita's story is woven into Samuel's. It was interesting being reminded of the onset of COVID 19 restrictions and the author reflects negatively on President Trump's first term because of his treatment of the pandemic AND his cruel immigration policies.