Twelve year old Sofia, her mother Nina and her younger brother Rafa are living in their car, since her abusive father let his new 21 year old girlfriend, who is expecting a baby from him, live in their house, and she took over Sofia's room. Since then, she hasn't been able to go to school either or has seen her friends. Live is hard and very challenging when you don't have a home or money. They go from parking lot to parking lot on the West Coast, not running but driving away while her mother also tries to work as a nurse. Sofia also tries to contact her mother's father (abuelo) who they haven't seen in years, without her knowing, for help.Later on after months of living in the car, they get help from a local church, which Sofia and Rafa also gives a scholarship to go to school again, and where they later on can stay for a short while in shelter homes and later on, in a social rental of their own. At school, Sofia makes a new friend, but also has to deal with bullying as people know of her personal situation. Things between her mother and abuelo are getting slowly better, but Nina has trouble adjusting to all the housing's rules and regulations, and is so late on rent that they are being evicted, Sofia tries to rescue this peculiar situation, but will she succeed before they get evicted?
Hungered is a story many families without a home find themselves in, especially after a divorce. The story is told from Sofia's perspective, and through her eyes you can feel the desperation of the situation they find themselves in. This takes a toll on their whole family unit, as her mother sometimes has a hard time finding solutions for her children while living from their car. The characters of Sofia, Nina and Rafa are portrayed very realistic. The author also portrays the Egyptian-Mexican background of Sofia, as her mother is Mexican and her father (baba) is Egyptian.The storyline is raw and till the half of the book the storyline is progressing, after that, I found that the story became a bit messy and the storyline lacked some progress and depth. But maybe the messy-ness of the second part of the book displays well what a family in that situation goes through in real llife, which was very well portrayed by the author. I had expected a bit more of this novel, though I enjoyed reading it as the writing was just amazing!
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