title: An Uninterrupted View of the Sky
author:  Melanie Crowder 
description: Gr 7 UpSeventeen-year-old Francisco wears violent anger just under his skin, despite a tranquil life with his parents and eight-year-old sister in Cochabamba, Bolivia, in 1999. He and his family are irrevocably affected by Law 1008, a statute initiated in response to U.S. threats of economic sanctions, which seeks to find and imprison individuals connected to coca production. Francisco's father, a taxi driver, is arrested while taking gasoline to his stopped car, charged with the intention of making cocaine with the gas, and placed in an overcrowded, dangerous men's prison. His mother visits with the children and without warning deserts them there, leaving Francisco feeling gutted. He assumes the role of primary caregiver for his sister, transporting her to and from school and the prison where they must now live. Always at odds with his father over his studies and future goals, Francisco promises to graduate from high school to give the man some hope, despite knowing that his own dark skin and short stature seal his fate in a stratified Bolivian society where the indigenous remain poor and victimized. Themes of poverty, social injustice based on ethnicity, violence toward women, coming-of-age, romantic love, and a sliver of precarious hope are woven into the plot. VERDICT This poetic, historical novel is an important addition to libraries given its focus on the consequences of U.S. involvement in Bolivian politics.Ruth Quiroa, National Louis University, Lisle, IL
zlib_text: ![](Images/image00147.jpeg)
  
  **PROLOGUE**
  
   **FATHER AND SON**
  
  **ONE**
  
  **IT WAS THREE A.M.** on the button when the unmarked white box truck turned
  onto the steep slope of Sweetwater Mesa Road and began to climb up into the
  exclusive Serra Retreat neighborhood of Malibu, California.
  
   _Majestic mountain peaks rising to the left_ , thought Vida Gomez as she
  looked out from the truck’s passenger seat. _Nothing but moonlit ocean to the
  right._ No wonder so many movie stars lived here.
  
   _As if the sights matter_ , Vida thought, tearing her eyes off the million-
  dollar view and putting them back on the screen of the iPhone in her lap. What
  was up with her? She never got distracted on a job. She took a calming breath.
  She seriously needed to buckle down. Taking her eye off the ball here would
  not be prudent. Not tonight.
  
  She was in the midst of typing a text when out of the corner of her eye she
  noticed the driver trying to look down her shirt again. No wonder she was a
  little off her ga