Description
The Red Umbrella is a wonderful work of historical fiction set in Cuba during Castro’s revolution. Lucia Alvarez and her brother are sent to America as part of Operation Pedro Pan–an organized exodus of more than 14,000 unaccompanied children. In 1961, two years after the Communist revolution, Lucia still leads a charmed pre-teen life, dreaming of her quinceañera. But when the soldiers come to her sleepy Cuban town, everything begins to change. Freedoms are stripped away. Neighbors disappear. Her friends feel like strangers. And her family is being watched. As the revolution’s impact becomes more oppressive, Lucia’s parents make the heart-wrenching decision to send her and her little brother to the United States–on their own.