FernFolio

Newly escaped from the coca pits and mourning the death of his best friend Mando, twelve year-old Diego has found refuge with the Ricardos, a family of poor coca farmers. In return for their shelter, Diego tries his best to help the Ricardos, looking after two year-old Santo and helping with the garden while Mr. and Mrs. Ricardo, their son, Martino, and their twelve year-old daughter, Bonita, struggle to harvest the coca crops before disaster can befall them.
Word has reached the Ricardos that the Bolivian army has conducted raids on other farms, confiscating their coca harvest and destroying the coca plants. When the army arrives, and takes the coca, and tramples over the vegetable garden, Diego is overcome with rage and attacks the army trucks. He is arrested and taken to a nearby army base where he argues for the return of the coca harvest, the Ricardo’s only means of earning cash to pay for things they are unable to grow or make themselves, and where he learns that the American government is paying the Bolivian government to eradicate the coca crop in an effort to cut off the flow of cocaine into the States.
Determined to get their crops back, the Cocaleros, or coca farmers, set up a blockade on a nearby bridge and refuse to let traffic pass. When the army is sent to negotiate with the protesters, Diego is allowed to rejoin his friends, the Ricardos, and discovers that they and their neighbours are prepared to do whatever is necessary to get justice for themselves and for other Cocaleros across Bolivia.
As the blockade continues, Diego learns much about the quiet courage of grandmothers and children and little nuns, and just as much about the hypocrisy of many of those in authority. He and the other very ordinary Bolivians who occupy the bridge learn to organize themselves to meet the needs of one another, and to resist the urge to respond to the escalating threats of their adversaries with violence. Most importantly, perhaps, they, and Diego, learn that sometimes the best you can hope for is to meet violence and oppression with courage and dignity.
This sequel to Deborah Ellis’ I am a Taxi is a profoundly moving book, one that explore the fight of poor farmers in Bolivia, caught up in North America’s single-minded drive to stamp out the illegal cocaine trade, often without regard to the cost paid by those least able to afford it. Do not miss this book!
FernFolio Editor