What Night Brings focuses on a Chicano working-class family living in California during the 1960s. Marci—smart, feisty and funny—tells the story with the wisdom of someone twice her age as she determines to defy her family and God in order to find her identity, sexuality and freedom. *Starred Review* At one point in this compelling first novel, set in 1960s northern California, 11-year-old Marci says to her uncle, "Secrets, everyone has them, even me." First-person-narrator Marci, with her unconventional way of looking at life and uncensored mouth, is a funny, very savvy guide to her family's hidden shames. She has her own secrets (she loves girls, not boys, and she wants her father to go away--forever) and knows many of her family's--her father's infidelity, her uncle's homosexuality, her cousin Danny's drug addiction. This complex melange drives the story and lends urgency to the plot. But it is the indomitable Marci, the burr beneath her parents' skin and the author of her own salvation, who is the center of this book. What Night Brings is a robust addition to the growing body of Latino and Latina writing. Reminiscent of Anaya's coming-of-age novel, Bless Me, Ultima (1972), and Hart's memoir, Barefoot Heart (1999), it most strongly brings to mind Reinaldo Arenas' Before Night Falls (1993) in its frank portrayal of physical violence, the rawness and obscenity of the Spanish dialogue, and the awareness of Marci's budding lesbianism. Trujillo is definitely a writer to watch. Ellen Loughran Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved "Carla Trujillo's What Night Brings puts one more wonderful Latina novelist on the must-read list right up there beside Sandra Cisneros, Julia Alvarez and Cristina Garcia. This moving story, told in the completely convincing voice of its young protagonist, explores living with domestic abuse and longing for the maternal protection that always fails to materialize. We touch the mysteries of religion in a child's life, and are completely captivated by a young girl's budding lesbian identity. Character and situation building are exemplary, yet we are hit hard when the book takes its final turn. What Night Brings is a page-turner that lingers long after the last page has been turned." —Margaret Randall "A story that is at once heartbreaking and hilarious, beautifully told by a wise and wise-cracking young girl." —Sandra Cisneros " What Night Brings  is a robust addition to the growing body of Latino/a writing...Trujillo is definitely a writer to watch." —Ellen Loughran,  Booklist Carla Trujillo is a Mexican American fiction writer, editor and administrator at the University of California, Berkeley. She has lectured on Ethnic Studies, both at U.C. Berkeley and also Mills College in Oakland, California. She has also taught courses in Women's Studies at San Francisco State University. She is the former Director of the Graduate Diversity Program at U.C. Berkeley. She is the author of two novels,  What Night Brings  and  Faith and Fat Chances . She is also the editor of an anthology,  Chicana Lesbians: The Girls Our Mothers Warned Us About,  and a critical study,  Living Chicana Theory.  She lives in the Bay Area.  Used Book in Good Condition