《芒果街上的小屋》 一本優美純凈的小書，一本“詩小說”。由幾十個短篇組成，語言清澈如流水，點綴著零落的韻腳和新奇的譬喻，如一首首長歌短調，各自成韻，又彼此鉤連，匯聚出一個清晰世界，各樣雜沓人生。所有的講述都歸于一個敘述中心：居住在芝加哥拉美移民社區芒果街上的女孩埃斯佩朗莎。生就對弱的同情心和對美的感覺力，她用清澈的眼打量周圍的世界，用美麗稚嫩的語言講述成長、滄桑、生命的美好與不易和年輕的熱望與夢想，夢想有一所自己的房子，夢想在寫作中追尋自我，獲得自由和幫助別人的能力。

　　Louie,His Cousin&His Other Cousin
　　Louie's girl cousin is older than us. She lives with Louie's family because her own family is in Puerto Rico. Her name is Marin or Maris or something like that, and she wears dark nylons all the time and lots of makeup she gets free from selling Avon. She can't come out _gotta baby-sit with Louie's sisters- but she stands in the doorway a lot, all the time singing, clicking her fingers, the same song:

　　Apples, peaches, pumpkin pah-ay

　　You're in love and so am ah-ay

　　Louie's has another cousin. We only saw him once, but it was important. We were playing volleyball in the alley when he drove up in this great big yellow Cadillac whitewalls and a yellow scarf tied around the mirror. Louie's cousin has his arm out the window. He honked a couple of times and a lot of faces looked out from Louie's back window and then a lot of people came out—Louie, Marin and all the little sisters.

　　　　　　　　　　　　
　　路易，他的表親以及他的其他表親
　　路易加的小表姐比我們大。她住在路易家里，因為她自己家在波多黎各。她好像是叫瑪琳或者瑪芮斯，或者跟這差不多的名字。她總是穿暗色的尼龍絲襪，化很多妝，那是她推銷雅芳的時候不花錢得來的。她沒法出門——得照看路易的小姐妹們，可她常常站在門道里，一直唱著歌，打著響指。她只唱一首歌：

　　蘋果桃兒南瓜派喲，

　　你在戀愛我也在喲。

　　路易還有一個表兄。我們只見過他一次，可那次很轟動。我們在巷子里玩排球，他開著一輛又大又氣派的黃色卡迪拉克過來了，白璧輪胎，鏡子上系著一條黃綬帶。路易的表兄把胳膊伸在車窗外面。他摁了幾下喇叭，許多張臉從路易加的后窗出來，接著，出來很多人——路易、瑪琳和所有的小妹妹們。