The time is the 1940s. Mary Helen Ponce, a little girl with big eyes, lives in a Mexican-American neighborhood in Pacoima, California. She schemes to earn dimes for candy, wonders why Dale Evans's hair looks so funny in the movies, longs for shiny patent leather shoes instead of clunky oxfords to match her Confirmation dress, savors the summer sun on her face during walnut-picking expeditions, and basks in the love of her family. Combining a child's freshness of vision with adult irony, Hoyt Street depicts growing up Mexican American as the norm, not as a sociological phenomenon. It will touch your heart and make you laugh out loud.