Four interpretations of Urrea's House of Broken Angels

It's obvious that Luis Alberto Urrea's novel The House of Broken Angels is a timely book, as it's about the assimilation, over some 50 years, of a Mexican-American family of four generations. As noted in many previous posts, it's challenging to the reader to keep all of the characters straight - who's the patriarch? which are the sons and daughter? which are the cousins and of what generation are they? who are the many young people introduced in the final section of the novel? - but as also previously noted maybe it's best not to worry about all of the secondary characters and just imagine yourself as an interloper and Big Angel's birthday celebration in the final section and figure that some of the people you "know" and some you don't - just like the characters themselves! (Many of the young people wonder which of the guests is a cousin and which a neighbor or friend.) An interesting thought experiment would be to imagine how different readers would react to this Rohrschach Test of a novel, such as, what about DJT (if you can bring yourself to imagine him reading a book, much less a literary novel)? Clearly, he would see the saga of the de la Cruz family as a story of illegal immigration leading to a life of crime and violence (2 or maybe 3 of the sons get involved in drug trad and gang shootings) imported for the lawless states of Mexico (there are some pretty brutal scenes of abuse and violent confrontation among family members before emigration). Other readers - most, I would hope - would see this as a moving and inspiring story of successful adoption of American values and customs while retaining strong family ties; Big Angel in particular is an example of success, a proud white-collar employee raising a large family and, through his faith, coming to terms w/ his life and death as he recognizes that he has been blessed with a great marriage. Still others might see it as a novel of assimilation and loss of family - as the youngest generation knows little or no Spanish and live a life of screen time and video games with little sense of the wit and wisdom of their elders. Still others might find in this novel evidence that almost any family - or at least any that immigrated over the past century - could construct a similar tale of struggle and adaptation; had I the skill, the will, and the imagination I could imagine the same kind of story in my family, either side, with various aunts, uncles, cousins, et al gathered at a grandfather's birthday or funeral: This novel shows us the richness and variety of all families.