Protagonists
Marcela
Marcela Alvarez is a twenty-seven-year old woman who is a successful animator at a famous Hollywood studio. She is initially disinterested in her Mexican-American roots, until she discovers that she is the product of a one-night stand between her mother and a white man. From there, she goes through a list of tasks that she must do in order to become a "proper" Mexican. Drama and Hilarity Ensues.
- Attempted Rape: Marcela falls victim to Spike, the cholo she briefly dates.
- Clashing Cousins:
- She has an antagonistic relationship with her younger cousin, Sonya, who goes out of the way to be a bitch to Marcela by announcing to the whole family that the latter is the daughter of white man. Thankfully, they make up at the end.
- Marcela's older cholo cousin "disowns" her when he is kicked out of his gang after she had called the cops on his friend Spike for trying to rape her.
- You're Not My Father: Marcela repeatedly denies her biological connection to Paul, partly because Juan was the one who raised her all these years, and she doesn't want to have a connection to a white man. By the end of the book, she uses the destroyed DNA test Juan had done on her as an excuse to completely dismiss Paul as her father.
- Innocently Insensitive: Her advise to Lupe borders along this, as she repeatedly advising the youngster to simply leave behind her life circumstances, seemingly ignoring that Lupe doesn't have the privilege of a middle-class status, a home, a high-paying job, or even a loving family the way Marcela does. And she's a minor, to top it off.
Lupe
Lupe Perez is a thirteen-year-old girl (later nineteen in the sequel) from the slums of L.A. who lives with her neglecful parents and her rapist, drug-dealing older brother. She initially gets off on getting in trouble with law to cool off her frustrations with living in an abusive household, and being mistreated by white society for being Mexican. That is, until Marcela takes takes her under her wing after she catches the former tagging her car. From there on the end, Lupe fights tooth and nail to leave the hood and make something of herself.
- Big "NO!": Lupe lets out one of these after Nash is fatally shot during a shoot-out between Carlos and the police.
- Precocious Crush: She's had a crush on her older manager, Nash since she was thirteen. Her feelings only grew stronger over the next six years.
