Immigration to the United States of America has been monumental in the development of this great nation. In both The Barbarian Nurseries, written by Hector Tobar, and Summer of the Big Bachi, written by Naomi Hirahara, are centered around two characters that once moved to America from a foreign land, in hopes to have the American dream, the traditional social ideals of the United States, such as equality, democracy, and material prosperity. Both of the characters work in laborious fields and undergo scrutiny and interrogation of unfortunate circumstances that were out of their control. The strain that is put on immigrants from other countries is prominent in both of these captivating novels. In The Barbarian Nurseries, the main …show more content…

But when you came right down to it, it had everything to do with bachi and Joji Haneda” (Hirahara 136). This passage goes into detail the battle that Mas is going through during this period of his life. Just as Araceli had an internal struggle with defining who she was, he is trying to understand the best route for his situation. Araceli not only goes through internal battles she also battles the justice system because of the mistakes of others. When a brutal argument between Scott and Maureen becomes heated and violent, the children are left in the care of Araceli. She struggles with what to do with the children. Her struggle with this begins when, “She stood with her arms folded and looked down the street, hoping to see el senor Scott’s car coming around the corner, but the vista never changed from the blank-page seep of wide roadways. He’s not coming home either,”(Tobar 132-133). It is at this point that Araceli realizes that she has been left in care of the Torres-Thompson children. She ends up trying to take them to their grandfather’s house which ends up backfiring on her. Each of these stories has similar endings in that they both have positive outcomes for Araceli and Mas. In The Barbarian Nurseries, Araceli is goes through the court process, but because she is an illegal worker, there are added on difficulties with her court case. For example, there had been