Introduction

In a novel-in-verse that brims with grief and love, National Book Award-winning and New York Times bestselling author Elizabeth Acevedo writes about the devastation of loss, the difficulty of forgiveness, and the bittersweet bonds that shape our lives.

Camino Rios lives for the summers when her father visits her in the Dominican Republic. But this time, on the day when his plane is supposed to land, Camino arrives at the airport to see crowds of crying people…

In New York City, Yahaira Rios is called to the principal’s office, where her mother is waiting to tell her that her father, her hero, has died in a plane crash.

Separated by distance—and Papi’s secrets—the two girls are forced to face a new reality in which their father is dead and their lives are forever altered.

And then, when it seems like they’ve lost everything of their father, they learn of each other.

Great for summer reading or anytime! Clap When You Land is a Today show pick for “25 children’s books your kids and teens won’t be able to put down this summer!"

Plus don't miss Elizabeth Acevedo's The Poet X and With the Fire on High!

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Discussion Questions

From the publisher:

1. The author writes the first part of the book switching between the sisters’ points of view in each chapter. In the last section of the book, however, their perspectives are combined, and we often have to figure out who is speaking by context clues. Why do you think the author chose to structure the book in this way? How does your understanding of the sisters change when you start seeing them through each other’s perspective?

2. Camino and Yahaira both have complicated feelings about suddenly having a sibling. What are some examples of their conflicting feelings in the text? How do these feelings change over time?

3. Both Camino and Yahaira have close, trusting relationships with other female friends, family, and/or girlfriends. What are some moments in the book where women show up, protect, and care for one another? How do Camino and Yahaira define sisterhood? How do these views change throughout the book? What is sisterhood to you?

4. What are some of the ways that Camino and Yahaira describe the way they feel after losing their father? What are the similarities and differences in how the sisters grieve for their father while trying to understand him? How does their grief change over time and throughout the book? The plane crash in this book does not impact only Camino and Yahaira. How does the island react when Camino’s papi passes? How is Yahaira’s neighborhood affected by the crash? How are Dominican people everywhere affected?

5. “My father was the one who always threw the get-togethers, & even in death, he brings us all home” (pg. 134). How does their father’s death bring everyone “home”? How can death bring people together, both literally and figuratively? How can death and grieving change relationships between the people who are left behind? How is this shown in the book?

6. What does Yahaira mean when she says “in the real world I am not treated as a lady or a queen, as a defender or opponent but as a girl so many want to strike off the board” (pg. 94)? How are Yahaira and Camino treated as disposable by the men in this novel? How are they controlled by men? How does the way you see yourself differ from who the world believes you to be? What do you do when those two things don’t match up?

7. What makes Yahaira feel like her body is not her body? (pg. 176) How does this experience change Yahaira’s feelings about winning her chess tournament? How do Tia’s assumptions about El Cero’s attention (pg. 155) affect Camino?

8. What silences both sisters when they want to talk with the adults in their lives about what’s happening to them?

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