Far from Gringo Land — Edward Myers

Rick Dresner is spending the summer with the Romero family, who live in a barrio in the hills of Santo Domingo, Mexico. He'll help them build a house on their land, and in return, they'll provide room and board and help Rick improve his Spanish. But the construction project turns out to be a lot tougher than Rick had imagined. Language and cultural differences lead to awkwardness and misunderstanding, especially when he falls for a rich American girl from a very different part of town. In this new twist on the classic fish-out-of-water story, it's a middle-class white boy who's out of his element and must change and grow to adapt to his surroundings.