Review: Too Many Tamales by Gary Soto

Title: Too Many Tamales

Author: Gary Soto
Published: Aug. 8, 1996
Publisher: Puffin Books
Pages: 32
Genre: Children
Review: library book
Buy Links: Amazon, Amazon.uk 

Christmas Eve started out so perfectly for Maria. Snow had fallen and the streets glittered. Maria's favorite cousins were coming over and she got to help make the tamales for Christmas dinner. It was almost too good to be true when her mother left the kitchen for a moment and Maria got to try on her beautiful diamond ring . . .
This is the story of a treasure thought to be lost in a batch of tamales; of a desperate and funny attempt by Maria and her cousins to eat their way out of trouble; and the warm way a family pulls together to make it a perfect Christmas after all.

So Maria and her mother are making tamales for Christmas dinner and while she is helping her mother mix the masa together her mother leaves her ring on the counter. Maria really loves this ring so when she tries it on and loses it and doesn't realize it oh no. What can Maria do. While visiting with her cousins she remembers the ring and it is up to her and her cousins to find this ring. What will happen with the tamales as it has to be in there right? 

This is a good story about telling the truth and remembering to not take things that do not belong to you unless you ask. 

This is a holiday book but I think it is a good book to read whenever. I hope that when I read it to K he understood how Maria felt when she thought she lost something that was important to someone else and how you should tell the truth, even if it means you could be in trouble. 

The illustrations are perfect and go great with the story being told. 

Gary Soto, born April 12, 1952, was raised in Fresno, California. He is the author of eleven poetry collections for adults, most notably New and Selected Poems, a 1995 finalist for both the Los Angeles Times Book Award and the National Book Award. His poems have appeared in many literary magazines, including Ploughshares, Michigan Quarterly, Poetry International, and Poetry, which
has honored him with the Bess Hokin Prize and the Levinson Award and by featuring him in the interview series Poets in Person. He has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation. For ITVS, he produced the film “The Pool Party,” which received the 1993 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Film Excellence. In 1997, because of his advocacy for reading, he was featured as
NBC’s Person-of-the-Week. In 1999, he received the Literature Award from the Hispanic Heritage Foundation, the Author-Illustrator Civil Rights Award from the National Education Association, and the PEN Center West Book Award for Petty Crimes.
Gary admires people who have done great service for others. High on his list are Jose Padilla of California Rural Legal Assistance, Arturo Rodriguez of the United Farm Workers, Dr. Marc Lasher of the Fresno Free Clinic, and Nancy Mellor of the Coalinga Huron Avenal House. As for his own service commitment, Gary has taught English to Spanish speakers as a volunteer. In his free time he likes to play tennis, tend his garden, attend musical concerts, and travel. Recently he has discovered that he enjoys baking cookies. He divides his time between Berkeley, California and his hometown of Fresno.