Silver People: Voices from the Panama Canal

by MS Margarita Engle

In 1914, the world celebrated the opening of the Panama Canal, which connected the world's two largest oceans and signaled America's emergence as a global superpower. It was a miracle, this path of water where a mountain had stood--and creating a miracle is no easy thing. Thousands lost their lives, and those who survived worked under the harshest conditions for only a few silver coins a day.
From the young "silver people" whose back-breaking labor built the Canal to the denizens of the endangered rainforest itself, this is the story of one of the largest and most difficult engineering projects ever undertaken, as only Newbery Honor-winning author Margarita Engle could tell it.

• ISBN10: 0544109228
• ISBN13: 9780544109223
• Publish Date: 25 March 2014 (first published 1 January 2014)
• Publish Status: Transferred
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Clarion Books
• Format: eBook
• Pages: 272
• Language: English

Reviews

[Kelly]

http://www.divabooknerd.com/2014/04/silver-people-by-margarita-engle.html
Margarita Engle could only be considered a poet, her immaculate use the simplest of words have a incredible impact on the reader. Told from several points of view, the two main characters of Mateo and Henry represent how each class is treated differently, and more severe than the last, while local girl Anita watches her beloved forest being bulldozed and destroyed.

Silver People was incredible. A fictional story behind those who created the Panama Canal, it's told in verse giving the points of view workers, engineers, presidents, locals and forestry animals a powerful and poignant voice. This is just another example how I've fallen in love with the University of Queensland Press. They never fail to publish incredible novels with strong social and environmental messages that have the ability to incite change, emotions and the way we view the world. They are truly the environmental publisher of the young adult generation.

I loved the journey that Margarita Engle weaved and it's cemented my love of versed novels even further.