America's Dream.

Everything is going wrong for America Gonzalez, the protagonist of Esmeralda Santiago's highly predictable new novel. A hotel maid on the Puerto Rican island of Vieques, America is on her knees scrubbing behind a toilet when she learns that her rebellious, fourteen-year-old daughter, Rosalinda, has run away with a boyfriend, just as America herself did at about the same age. America gets little help from her alcoholic mother, but Rosalinda's father, the irascible Correa, is instrumental in getting the girl back, then in luring her away from America and placing her with a relative. Such tactics are typical of Correa, who bullies, batters, and humiliates America constantly.

Although married to another woman, Correa has nevertheless been involved with America ever since he seduced her and got her pregnant. Now, fifteen years later, she is still subject to his jealous attacks, his insults, and his beatings. At one point he even rapes her in a hotel room where she is babysitting two children, who lie sleeping. Yet, America cannot bring herself to seek a remedy to her situation.

The turning point comes when an American couple invites her to work as a housekeeper in their suburban New York home. Don Irving, the hotel owner, makes the arrangements, and America makes her getaway. Without telling anyone her new address, she goes to work for Charlie and Karen Leverett, a workaholic couple with two children.

At this point, the story collapses. While Santiago's descriptions of Vieques are full of energy and exquisite detail, once America is on the mainland, the action becomes formulaic and the characters, stereotypical. Of course the Leveretts are egocentric and wealthy, and of course their children are spoiled brats. Worse still, America, who tends to wallow in self-pity from the beginning, becomes so whiny once in New York that the reader may lose interest in her.

At the hotel in Vieques America complained about her anonymity. She was convinced that guests looked right through her, while she gained in-depth knowledge of them by cleaning their rooms and familiarizing herself with their personal hygiene habits. In New York America does face problems adapting, yet her situation just isn't all that bad. The Leveretts are friendly and try to include her in family activities. She has a pleasant room and bathroom to herself, complete with her own television and phone line. She zips around in the Leveretts' nearly new Volvo, which she is allowed to use for...