Current Readings: In the Time of the Butterflies, by Julia Alvarez

Disclaimer: This is not a review. This is my current thinking on a book that I have not yet finished.

        In the Time of the Butterflies is an incredible adaptation of the story of the Mirabal sisters, four girls who fought to end the harsh Trujillo Regime in the Dominican Republic. It is an epic tale of real life freedom fighters.

Julia Alvarez is a commercially successful author who has written highly acclaimed books such as How the Garcia Girls Lost their Accents and In the Time of the Butterflies
Julia Alvarez was born in New York City on March 27, 1950. She moved to the Dominican Republic when she was 3 months old, but moved back to the United States when she was 10 after the rebel underground her father was in was discovered. She technically knew English when she went to America, but, as I quote from her official website, “classroom English, heavily laced with Spanish, did not prepare me for the "barbaric yawp" of American English -- as Whitman calls it.” Her classmates were not very welcoming of her, since she was one of the only Latin Americans in the school. (JuliaAlvarez.com) They would call her “Spic!” when they were at the playground. (JuliaAlvarez.com)
        Julia got her bachelor’s degree in the arts at The Middlebury College, and got her
Master’s degree in creative writing at Syracuse University. Before she was a writer, she was a teacher for many years. It was a full twenty years of writing before she actually got a book contract for her first published novel, How the Garcia Girls Lost their Accents. (JuliaAlvarez.com)
        Now Julia is the writer in residence at The Middlebury College in Vermont. She has been married to Bill Eichner for 27 years (as of 2016).
       
        In the end, her work most certainly paid off. She now has several bestsellers, such as
How the Garcia Girls Lost their Accents, and In the Time of the Butterflies. How the
Garcia Girls Lost their Accents is about a some girls who are in a situation much like
twelve year old Julia Alvarez, meaning they were sent to America while they were
accustomed to their homeland. In the Time of the Butterflies is about the Mirabal sisters
and their incredible efforts to free the Dominican Republic.

Works Cited
            Editors, Biography.com. "Julia Alvarez Biography." The Biography.com Website. A&E Television Networks, 2 Apr. 2014. Web. 22 Sept. 2016.
            Potts, Sienna M. "About Me." Julia Alvarez. Julia Alvarez, 21 July 2016. Web. 22 Sept. 2016.
Julia Alvarez put a lot of time and effort into writing before she even succeeded.