THE AFTERLIFE is the story of a teenage by who is stabbed and killed in the restroom of a dance hall, and the events of the next few days.  After Chuy, a Mexican American teenager, is killed in the first few page, he drifts around Fresno, California as a spirit who is slowly disappearing.  Along the way, he visits his parents, his primo Eddie, and his friends and schoolmates to see how they are coping with his death.  He also meets another girl who has just died, Crystal, and a homeless spirit, Robert.  Many things happen and plot lines are opened, but most go nowhere, just being replaced by another event.  For instance, Chuy keeps randomly running into the cholo who killed him.  Soto reveals a little bit about this character’s life, and then leaves him dangling.  Chuy’s mother wants Eddie to exact revenge on her son’s killers, even going so far as to deliver the gun to Eddie.  However, neither character is sufficiently developed for the reader to really care what happens with them.  Eddie gives the gun back, and nothing more is said.  The romance between Chuy and Crystal seems forced at best.

The use of Spanish in the book is the most authentic element of the story.  For the most part, the way that Chuy thinks or speaks mixing his languages seems realistic.  The gist of most of the words can be determined by the context, but Soto has included a helpful glossary of terms at the end of the book.  This may be particularly useful as many of the Spanish words used are slang.  During the times when Soto directly defines the Spanish words, the result seems artificial.  Chuy is thinking most of the narration; why would he think the word in Spanish, then think the explanation in English?  The words are set off in italics, which is sometimes helpful, but mostly distracting in a young adult book such as this.  Even some of the words, like moscosos, defined as “snot-nosed kids” by Soto, which seem authentic at first, lose some of that credibility as they are repeated many, many times.

The images of the life going on around Chuy are mostly depressing, but maybe realistic in Fresno, California.  Overweight cops frisk teenagers; children play unsupervised out on the street late at night, kids steal items at the corner store.  Other cultural markers such as rosaries make appearances throughout the story.  He talks of the rancheras coming out of the radios, but then goes on to point out the borrachos (drunks) and deadbeat dads in the neighborhood.

THE AFTERLIFE is an interesting idea that is weighed heavily by its slow, meandering plot and underdeveloped characters.