The Farolitos of Christmas

Rudolfo Anaya, widely recognized as the foremost author of New Mexican Hispanic culture and folkways, gives us this heartwarming story of a small rural community preparing for Christmas amid the deprivations of World War Two. The spunky heroine, a young girl named Luz, worries that with her grandfather too sick to chop wood and her father wounded in the war, the family cannot have their traditional Christmas luminarias made of small bonfires. So Luz instead cleverly devises a way to make “farolitos,” lighted candles in paper bags weighted with sand. These beautiful little lanterns light the path for the Christmas pilgrims, “Las Posadas,” and for Luz’s homecoming father. In a luminous and touching finale, the community comes together to celebrate in dance and song the love, hope, and magic of the Christmas season.