Mexican High by Liza Monroy

From the Publisher

The daughter of an American diplomat, Mila has spent her childhood moving from country to country. When her mother is reassigned to Mexico City for Mila’s senior year of high school, Mila has no idea what to expect. Mexico seems to be a country with the ultimate freedoms: the wealthy students at her private international school—the sons and daughters of Mexico’s ruling class—party hard at exclusive clubs, dress in expensive clothing, and see more of their housekeepers than they do their globe-trotting parents. But Mila has more in common with them than they know: her father, whose identity has been kept from her, is a high-ranking politician with whom Mila’s mother had a one-night stand in her hippie days. Now Mila is determined to discover who he is, whatever the cost may be.

A novel that covers the same adolescent terrain as Prep, though in an entirely different landscape, Mexican High is an eye-opening, page-turning coming-of-age story about identity, belonging, and first love. In a setting rife with sex, drugs, and political corruption, it is also a revealing look at elite Mexican society, and its freedoms, dangers, and excesses. Monroy’s flawless evocation of the brink of adulthood, in many ways mirrored by the turmoil of Mexico City itself, makes this a truly memorable debut.

Publishers Weekly

Monroy's spirited, overreaching debut tracks a rocky coming-of-age. Milagro Márquez's father is a wealthy, powerful Mexico City native, but her mother, a California-raised Jew, who works for the foreign service, won't tell Milagro who he is. As mother and daughter move from Clinton-era Washington, D.C., to Mexico City for her mother's latest posting, Milagro sees a chance to seek him out. Thrust into the heady, drug-fueled world of diplomatic offspring and Mexican rich kids at her exclusive private school, Milagro quickly transforms from a "good girl" into a rebellious club kid, spending chunks of time with fresas, or "Eurotrash with Mexican passports." Her late teen precocity soon puts her at odds with her overbearing mother, who embarks on a series of far-fetched schemes to get Milagro back on track. Monroy makes Milagro a terrific observer of telling details, but her voice isn't built for the larger points Monroy tries to make about the contradictions of teenage life and the economic fragmentation of Mexican society. The result is more a fictive diary than a satisfying novel. (June)

School Library Journal

Adult/High School- Mila, the daughter of an ex-hippie diplomat, has settled into her Washington, DC, high school very nicely after stints in Asia, Europe, and South America. She's a straight-A cheerleader heading into her senior year in 1993 when her mother drops the bomb: she has been reassigned to Mexico City. Although intrigued by the possibility of discovering her mysteriously anonymous father, Mila is resistant and resentful of the move. Feeling insecure when faced with the ultrarich cliques of her international high school and reeling from a date rape, her good-girl, preppy self disappears as pot, Ecstasy, acid, cocaine, and peyote become part of her routine; much of the narrative is taken up with drinking in nightclubs, procuring drugs, and bribing policemen. The famously corrupt political arena becomes personal in more ways than one. The prose is dense, full of details about daily life, and the teen packs a lot of living into her senior year (yet still manages to get into Harvard). The Mila that narrates from a later date is sometimes a little too wise and philosophical, and her attitude toward the drugs and sex that punctuate the teens' lives goes quickly from shocked innocence to world-weary nonchalance. Teens who enjoy reading about the exploits of the young, rich, and virtually parentless (think "Gossip Girl") will enjoy this book.-Jenny Gasset, Orange County Public Library, CA

Kirkus Reviews

A bright teenager whose free-spirited Foreign Service worker mother is transferred to Mexico City spends a momentous senior year struggling to find herself at an elite private school. After a few stable years in Washington, D.C., Milagro "Mila" Epstein has plenty of misgivings when landing in the smoggy splendor of Mexico City. An excellent student raised in various countries by her single mother, Maggie, she is understandably curious to finally be living in the hometown of her biological father-a married Mexican politico whom Maggie refuses to name. (Her mom's secret, which she claims to be keeping in an effort to protect them both, is but a small obstacle to the intrepid Mila, who has ambitions of becoming a journalist.) What really stresses the 17-year-old out is starting over at a new school. The fortress-like International School of Mexico (ISM) is about as cliquey as they came. A hotbed of sex, drugs and underage drinking, ISM has a student body made up of American kids with parents working in the city, a majority being the glamorous offspring of Mexico's moneyed upper class (known as "fresas," or strawberries, in the local slang). The fresas live in a rarified world of extreme privilege, with designer clothing, private cars with drivers and a lack of supervision that American kids can only dream of. Initially, Mila hangs out with her own kind, even losing her virginity, disastrously, to a friendly seeming boy-next-door type who never learned that no means no. She also experiments with drugs (and dealers) and battles with her well-meaning mother. Of course, Maggie has dramas of her own: She starts dating her married boss after her stand-up boyfriend Armando is murdered. When Milastarts dating the dreamy fresa Manuel, Maggie cannot help but approve. The son of a well-connected plastic surgeon, Manuel introduces the girl to the upper echelons of Mexican society, including the mystery man who may or may not be her dad. It is then left to Mila to decide how far to go for the truth. Teen angst south-of-the-border: Monroy's debut is most notable for its pungent characterization of Mexico City, where political assassinations and bribery are commonplace in a 12th grader's life. Agent: Jennifer Lyons/Lyons & Pande

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