Mari Cruz

Mari Cruz is the female protagonist of the novel. As the novel opens, she must help care for her sisters as her mother is lost and her father and uncles have to spend much time working on the Paquette farm. Mari had to grow up faster than most children because as the oldest of the daughters, she is expected to be a mother figure for her sisters. She cares for them, and she has to make more wise decisions than her sisters’ impulses lead them to want to make.

Mari is the only one of the Cruz sisters who is not an American citizen. She was born in Mexico, and her parents brought her illegally to the United States when she was four years old. Because of this, Mari feels different from the rest of her relatives. Her elders are Mexican and her sisters are American. She...