[1] It is about a boy who loses most of his family and uses his uncle's hand made cayuco to sail from Guatemala to the United States to be free and tell his story.
12-year-old Santiago Cruz, a Kekcíhi campesinos indigenous, escapes from his destroyed village, Dos Vías, Guatemala, on May 18, 1981, with his four-year-old sister, Angelina, at midnight, after his mother pushes her into his arms and wakes him up.
His Uncle Ramos gives him a map and compass and instructs him to sail away in his cayuco to the United States, to escape the civil war and hopefully find a better life.
The boy and his sister (Angelina) find a horse and ride it into the nearby village of Los Santos, where everyone has also been killed and burned.
They encounter a river of garbage, which Santiago uses to make an amateur windshield among other spare parts to fix his cayuco, and finds Angelina a broken plastic doll.
They encounter a large storm, which causes the mast to fall directly on Santiago's head, and makes them lose the water pail.
"[3] Colleen M. Fairbanks of The ALAN Review wrote that the novel is "often gripping" and that readers "will appreciate his determination and resourcefulness in the face of great danger", although they "may find the occasional heavy-handed political commentary intrusive.