Queen of America

The historical Teresita Urrea, the “Saint of Cabora,” flees Mexico with her father after the Tomóchic rebellion of 1891, in Urrea’s sequel to the bestselling The Hummingbird’s Daughter. Pursued by assassins, the Urreas seek sanctuary in rural Arizona. Teresita’s father drinks heavily and refuses to accept the charity of pilgrims who’ve come to follow Teresita; the Urreas travel to Tucson, meeting the Von Order brothers, John and Harry. Teresita feels an immediate attraction to Harry, despite her burgeoning saintly powers. Father and daughter then move on to El Paso, where Teresita reluctantly takes a job as a journalist. She falls in love with a man and once again her saintliness conflicts with her romantic desires. She has a brief, unhappy marriage before finding redemption through the first of her many healings. This new chapter of her life leads her to San Francisco and then New York, where a sinister consortium exploits her abilities, working her nine to five and forcing her to choose between the saintly grace and simplicity of her old life and the modern trappings of fame, fortune, and romantic love. Despite a trundling life-story narrative that at times loses focus, and several flat passages, Urrea delivers a rich mix of Wild West and magic realism. (Dec.)