The Madonnas of Echo Park: A Novel

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The Blossoms of Los Feliz

Spring is here and it makes my joints ache. All those jacaranda blossoms on the walk outside to sweep up. Jacaranda trees thrive in Los Angeles, like blondes and Mexicans. There’s no getting away from them, not even in my dreams. They’ve haunted me from childhood, when I believed a jacaranda tree would save me. Can you imagine such a thing, a tree saving a life? A silly girl thought so once.

I’d been sent to my grandmother’s home in Chavez Ravine by a mother whose f...