Novel Review of the Tortilla Curtain (Book Review Sample)

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The Tortilla Curtain
The Tortilla Curtain is a thrilling novel written by the renowned American writer T.C Boyle in 1995. The novel mainly analytically addresses the social problems ranging from illegal migration, extreme poverty, middle-class values, and environmental degradation. The author Boyle employers various literal components to reach his intended meaning and goals in the book. The book's background is primarily based on a family that migrated from Mexico to get a better life upon reaching the USA, which is a tragic journey and experience. Boyle creatively uses different characters to establish other literal frameworks and make the novel more attractive to potential readers. Additionally, Boyle employs critical literal analysis tools such as imagery and comparison to descriptively and analytically discuss the vital themes in the book. In the novel The Tortilla Curtain, Boyle analytically uses the symbol of Coyote throughout the story to descriptively analyze the different aspects and themes in the novel.
The symbol of the Coyote appears throughout the novel and offers multiple interpretations. What is the most significant meaning of this symbolic representation, in your opinion?
In the novel The Tortilla Curtain, Boyle creatively used the symbol coyotes metaphorically to represent or stand for the Mexican or intruders in the American land. They came to look for better lives and opportunities (Boyle, 18). Boyle has used characters such as Delaney and Kyra to explain the symbolic meaning of the Coyote in the Arroyo Blanco estate. According to Delaney's suggestions, the estate was supposed to be fenced and protected from the Coyote. The direction analytically insinuates the thoughts of Delaney to fence the whole estate to be driven from a discriminatory perspective where he did not want to associate with the Mexicans who were living in huts around the Arroyo Blanco estate. Although Mexicans and not the coyotes surrounded the Arroyo Blanco estate, Delaney suggests that for the sake of their safety and protection from the Coyote, the estate should be fenced (Boyle, 14). This indicates that Delaney referred to the immigrant Mexican society as the dangerous coyotes. Coyote as an imagery style has been used by the author, Boyle, to illustrate the sufferings and the social problems the Mexican immigrants were facing in the strange American land.
In his description, Boyle analytically describes the coyotes as very cunning and unruly animals whose main aim was to invade America and steal their privileges and properties. The report indicates Delaney's stand and perspective about the Mexicans and their growing society around the Arroyo Balco, a specially designated estate for the few wealthy white individuals. Additionally, Delaney consistency in demanding to create a wall between the gated American estate and the immigrant Mexican was an illustration of the need to develop a substantial border to avoid the influx of the Mexican refugees who were very destructive, unruly causing a lot of troubles in the USA (Boyle, 19).
In the novel, the natural Coyote's population is tiny around the Arroyo Blanco estate and has caused no harm to both the American and the Mexican people. Throughout the novel, Delaney spends most of his time discussing the implications and dangers of coyotes around the human and American populations. This depicts and explains the symbol coyote used to describe the Mexican immigrants metaphorically. Additionally, in novel America, the wife of Candido meets a female coyote (Boyle, 23). Candido feels excellent sympathy for the harmless mother coyote. This scene illustrates the excellent relationship between the Coyote and the Mexican, which analytically represents the excellent relationship between Mexican immigrants staying around the Arroyo Blanco estate (Boyle, 25). The good relation between the Coyote and the Mexican is one of the reasons Delaney insinuates the Mexicans are very dangerous and unruly. Hence, there is a need to build a protective wall between the Americas and the Mexican immigrants (Boyle, 12).
The author of the novel T.C Boyle significantly uses coyotes as imagery factors to link animal rights to human rights, which is the rights of the Mexican immigrants in America. In American society, Mexican migrants are considered very unruly, destructive, and dangerous scavengers in the American land (Boyle, 19). In other words, the Mexican immigrants are almost the same as the coyotes in the American perspective. Delaney's destructive nature of the coyotes is witnessed after a customer gives Candido a turkey at a local restaurant. Candido and America set out a big fire that turned out to be very destructive to the local Mexican shanties and the Americans living in the gated estate, forcing everybody to evict their homestead to rescue their life from the fire set