The Afterlife by Gary Soto

This is the first book I read from the Georgia Peach Teen Award list for this year. It starts with a fast pace as Chuy describes his own murder! The rest of the book is Chuy's recounting of what happened to him after he died. It is an engaging story with vivid imagery of what could happen to a person upon their death. Soto's Mexican-American background is quite evident in the book.

Gary Soto has written poetry as well as fiction, picture books as well as young adult novels. If you want to check out other titles by Soto (some published in both English and Spanish) try Gary Soto's official web site is http://www.garysoto.com/ or this link: http://falcon.jmu.edu/~ramseyil/sotobib.htm.