Napí and her little brother, Niclé, move with their family as the Mexican government relocates their Mazateca community in order to build a new dam. In the new village everyone works hard to clear the rain forest, plant crops, and build a new town: “We were giving birth to Nuevo Ixcatlán, and that meant we had to make sacrifices.” And yet, amid the sacrifice, there is also beauty in the forest spring, the silent jaguar in a tree, and family who love each other deeply. Parallel texts feature Spanish on the left of every double-page spread and the English translation on the right. lvb

Translated by Elisa Amado.

In this third book about Nap', the government is building a dam, forcing the Mazateca people to make a new village for themselves on inhospitable land. Nap' recounts what she remembers of this time Ñ traveling upriver to the place where they will resettle, the frighteningly beautiful jaguar she sees by the spring, the fierce fires that clear the land for farming, how her father has to walk all day to a far-off town so that he can buy food for the family. But what stands out in her mind very strongly is the misfortune that occurs when her father is kicked by a horse, which she first envisions in a vivid dream. It is Nap' who hastens back to the village to fetch her mother and uncles, her rapidity ensuring her fatherÕs survival.