Gary Soto Essay

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“Our shelves were not lined with books, they were lined with menudo [a type of soup].” This is a quote from Gary Soto, an American author and poet. Soto was born in 1952 and is still alive today. Gary Soto faced many hardships growing up as a Mexican-American, so many of his works including “Oranges” and Buried Onions were based off of character’s struggles. Soto was born in 1952 in Fresno, California, where Buried Onions takes place (Soto 1). Throughout his life, Soto “Went to the public schools and...seemed to live at Romain and Holmes playgrounds” (Soto 1). He didn’t enjoy reading at an early age, He graduated Roosevelt High School with a 1.6 GPA (Soto 1), but still managed to get into California State University (Pritish 1). Soto, while answering a question, mentioned that he discovered the works of authors such as Edward Field, W.S. Merwin, Charles Simic, James Wright, and Pablo Neruda that inspired him during his studies at California State. Soto graduated California State University in 1974 with a B.A. (Gary 1). Although the odds were against him, Soto was able to get past them and became a famous author and poet. Many of Gary Soto’s books were based off his real life experiences. “...Soto’s own childhood dreams and aspirations are relayed through his characters, as they struggle and fantasize about leaving their impoverished …show more content…
Ben Charpiar, who gave the book four out of five stars, wrote, “...anybody that would read this book would be able to find at least one character that they could relate to...”(Goodreads 1) in his review. Some reviews stated that Buried Onions is suitable for older readers, even though it is a young adult book. Another review, written by Asenath, states, “I thought this book had no resolution and was too gritty to be enjoyable”(Soto 1). A few other critics have a similar point of view, and think it may not be very intriguing to certain younger
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