The Madonnas of Echo Park

Chapter 8 is narrated from Aurora’s voice as she returns to Echo Park as an adult. She stays with her mother, Felicia, with whom she still has a tense relationship. Felicia seems bitter that Aurora has moved away from the old neighborhood (and her Mexican-American identity), even though she admits that Aurora could no longer afford to live in Echo Park. Felicia herself is a hold-out who refuses to sell to gentrifying residential developers, no matter how much money they offer. She tellingly named her daughter after Aurora Salazar, the woman who refused to be evicted from Chavez Ravine when Dodger Stadium was being built (152).

Aurora helps her mother clean her house, as she does each month. The two women argue back and forth with one another as Aurora examines the items accumulated in the house. These items include numerous family photos from which her father Hector’s image has been cut out, replaced with pictures of the musician Morrissey, whom Aurora idolized as a teenager.

In the midst of their arguments, Aurora accidentally forgets to close and lock the gate, and Felicia’s dog, Blackjack, gets loose. Aurora then spends the rest of the day looking around the neighborhood for Blackjack.