Brady debuts with a resonant parallel narrative of a teen girl’s coming-of-age and the struggles of a migrant worker’s family. Hilde, 14, is upset when her mother, Janine, announces they are leaving Wisconsin and Hilde’s father to run a goat farm near San Francisco. Her older brother, Ethan, takes the news even worse, angrily defying Janie’s expectation that he help on the farm. Janine, overwhelmed by her new duties, hires day laborer Gabriel as a farmhand, though she soon grows suspicious of migrants due to the influence of her ultraconservative new boyfriend. Meanwhile, Hilde, who feels out of place at her new school, drifts toward a local pastor whose ministry efforts support the migrant community. Gabriel’s younger brother, Joaquín, is still in their native Mexcio, and Brady shifts from the California story line to Joaquín’s perilous attempt to join Gabriel. After Joaquín’s first illegal border crossing, he is swiftly caught and returned to Mexico. During his second attempt, his tenacity is tested by the grueling Texas desert. Though the stakes of the story lines are starkly different, Brady effectively explores how migration upends all of her characters’ lives. The result is a powerful story of dislocation. (Self-published)