The House on Mango Street (Vintage Contemporaries)

Here is Sandra Cisnero's greatly admired and best-selling novel of a young girl growing up in the Latino section of Chicago. Acclaimed by critics, beloved by children and their parents and grandparents, taught everywhere from inner-city grade schools to universities across the country, and translated all over the world, "The House on Mango Street" has entered the canon of coming-of-age classics even as it depicts a new American landscape.

Sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes deeply joyous, "The House on Mango Street" tells the story of Esperanza Cordero, whose neighborhood is one of harsh realities and harsh beauty. Esperanza doesn't want to belong - not to her run-down neighborhood, and not to the low expectations the world has for her. Esperanza's story is that of a young girl coming into her power, and inventing for herself what she will become. "The San Francisco Chronicle" has called "The House on Mango Street" "marvelous... spare yet luminous. The subtle power of Cisnero's storytelling is evident. She communicates all the rapture and rage of growing up in a modern world." It is an extraordinary achievement that will live on for years to come.

Told in a series of vignettes--sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes joyous--Cisneros's masterpiece is a classic story of childhood and self-discovery and one of the greatest neighborhood novels of all time. Like Sinclair Lewis's Main Street or Toni Morrison's Sula, it makes a world through people and their voices, and it does so in language that is poetic and direct. This gorgeous coming-of-age novel is a celebration of the power of telling one's story and of being proud of where you're from.

Author: Sandra Cisneros

Binding: Paperback

Prefer Audiobook? Listen Here

A TODAY SHOW #ReadWithJenna BOOK CLUB PICK

NATIONAL BESTSELLER - A coming-of-age classic about a young girl growing up in Chicago - Acclaimed by critics, beloved by readers of all ages, taught in schools and universities alike, and translated around the world--from the winner of the 2025 Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Book Critics Circle.

"Cisneros draws on her rich [Latino] heritage...and seduces with precise, spare prose, creat[ing] unforgettable characters we want to lift off the page. She is not only a gifted writer, but an absolutely essential one." --The New York Times Book Review