When most young people are defining themselves, Excel knows he can't. The Son of Good Fortune, Lysley Tenorio's second book (after Monstress), sympathetically illuminates the tenuous lives of undocumented immigrants, those who are "not really here."
Born on a Philippine Airlines flight to a mother fleeing abuse in Manila, they arrive in San Francisco with no documentation, and Excel identifies as "TNT"--Tagalog for "hiding and hiding." His mother, Maxima, a B-movie action star in the Philippines, works menial jobs and scams men online. Excel knows their lives could implode if he draws attention to himself, so he's "the quiet kid who keeps quieter.... What took effort and strategy became, as the years went on, instinct and habit."
At 19, Excel sees no future beyond working for the tyrannical owner of The Pie Who Loved Me pizza shop, who requires no Social Security number and pays him in cash. So when his girlfriend, Sab, invites him to move with her to the off-the-grid desert community of Hello City, he bids Maxima goodbye and leaves. Sab grew up bouncing among relatives, and with good humor and optimism they anticipate better days. Hello City brings new experiences, but after nine months, multiple crises send Excel back to Maxima. Consistently responsible and kind, he works to satisfy a debt and hopes to reunite with Sab, while mother and son establish a new bond. The Son of Good Fortune avoids sentimentality. Tenorio's characters are humorous and loving, in spite of the exclusion overshadowing their very existence. --Cheryl McKeon, bookseller, Market Block Books, Troy, N.Y.