A Peculiar Kind of Immigrant's Son

A Peculiar Kind of Immigrant's Son PDF Author: Sergio Troncoso
Publisher: Cinco Puntos Press
ISBN: 1947627341
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 135

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Book Description
Texas Institute of Letters, Kay Cattarulla Award for Best Short Story Reading the West Award Nominee How does a Mexican-American, the son of immigrants, a child of the border, la frontera, leave home and move to the heart of gringo America? How does he adapt to the worlds of wealth, elite universities, the rush and power of New York City? How does he make peace with a stern old-fashioned father who has only known hard field labor his whole life? With echoes of Dreiser’s American Tragedy and Fitzgerald’s Gatsby, Troncoso tells his luminous stories through the lens of an exile adrift in the 21st century, his characters suffering from the loss of culture and language, the loss of roots and home as they adapt to the glittering promises of new worlds which ultimately seem so empty.

A Peculiar Kind of Immigrant's Son

A Peculiar Kind of Immigrant's Son PDF Author: Sergio Troncoso
Publisher: Cinco Puntos Press
ISBN: 1947627341
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 135

Get Book Here

Book Description
Texas Institute of Letters, Kay Cattarulla Award for Best Short Story Reading the West Award Nominee How does a Mexican-American, the son of immigrants, a child of the border, la frontera, leave home and move to the heart of gringo America? How does he adapt to the worlds of wealth, elite universities, the rush and power of New York City? How does he make peace with a stern old-fashioned father who has only known hard field labor his whole life? With echoes of Dreiser’s American Tragedy and Fitzgerald’s Gatsby, Troncoso tells his luminous stories through the lens of an exile adrift in the 21st century, his characters suffering from the loss of culture and language, the loss of roots and home as they adapt to the glittering promises of new worlds which ultimately seem so empty.

From This Wicked Patch of Dust

From This Wicked Patch of Dust PDF Author: Sergio Troncoso
Publisher: University of Arizona Press
ISBN: 0816530041
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 239

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Book Description
Mexican-born Cuauhtemoc and Pilar Martinez came to America so that their children Julia, Francisco, Marcos and Ismael could make something of themselves. While the children experience different journeys, at the center lay all the love and teachings from their parents that bind them together. With El Paso and Ysleta as the backdrop (though family members also find themselves in Boston, New Mexico, Jerusalem, Iraq...), this book offers a blend of short stories in chronological form to showcase the struggles of the Martinez family and explore issues of assimilation, immigration, religion, politics and war.

Nobody's Pilgrims

Nobody's Pilgrims PDF Author: Sergio Troncoso
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781947627413
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 264

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Book Description
A coming-of-age novel of literary fiction with a thriller twist, from preeminent Mexican American author Sergio Troncoso.

Nepantla Familias

Nepantla Familias PDF Author: Sergio Troncoso
Publisher: Texas A&M University Press
ISBN: 162349964X
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 300

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Book Description
"A deeply meaningful collection that navigates important nuances of identity."—Kirkus Reviews, starred review 2021 Texas Book Festival Featured Book Nepantla Familias brings together Mexican American narratives that explore and negotiate the many permutations of living in between different worlds—how the authors or their characters create, or fail to create, a cohesive identity amid the contradictions in their lives. Nepantla—or living in the in-between space of the borderland—is the focus of this anthology. The essays, poems, and short stories explore the in-between moments in Mexican American life—the family dynamics of living between traditional and contemporary worlds, between Spanish and English, between cultures with traditional and shifting identities. In times of change, family values are either adapted or discarded in the quest for self-discovery, part of the process of selecting and composing elements of a changing identity. Edited by award-winning writer and scholar Sergio Troncoso, this anthology includes works from familiar and acclaimed voices such as David Dorado Romo, Sandra Cisneros, Alex Espinoza, Reyna Grande, and Francisco Cantú, as well as from important new voices, such as Stephanie Li, David Dominguez, and ire’ne lara silva. These are writers who open and expose the in-between places: through or at borders; among the past, present, and future; from tradition to innovation; between languages; in gender; about the wounds of the past and the victories of the present; of life and death. Nepantla Familias shows the quintessential American experience that revives important foundational values through immigrants and the children of immigrants. Here readers will find a glimpse of contemporary Mexican American experience; here, also, readers will experience complexities of the geographic, linguistic, and cultural borders common to us all. Includes the work of David Dorado Romo Reyna Grande Francisco Cantú Rigoberto González Alex Espinoza Domingo Martinez Oscar Cásares Lorraine M. López David Dominguez Stephanie Li Sheryl Luna José Antonio Rodríguez Deborah Paredez Diana Marie Delgado Diana López Severo Perez Octavio Solis ire'ne lara silva Rubén Degollado Helena María Viramontes Daniel Chacón Matt Mendez

The Last Tortilla

The Last Tortilla PDF Author: Sergio Troncoso
Publisher: University of Arizona Press
ISBN: 081653215X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 236

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Book Description
"She asked me if I liked them. And what could I say? They were wonderful." From the very beginning of Sergio Troncoso's celebrated story "Angie Luna," we know we are in the hands of a gifted storyteller. Born of Mexican immigrants, raised in El Paso, and now living in New York City, Troncoso has a rare knack for celebrating life. Writing in a straightforward, light-handed style reminiscent of Grace Paley and Raymond Carver, he spins charming tales that reflect his experiences in two worlds. Troncoso's El Paso is a normal town where common people who happen to be Mexican eat, sleep, fall in love, and undergo epiphanies just like everyone else. His tales are coming-of-age stories from the Mexican-American border, stories of the working class, stories of those coping with the trials of growing old in a rapidly changing society. He also explores New York with vignettes of life in the big city, capturing its loneliness and danger. Beginning with Troncoso's widely acclaimed story "Angie Luna," the tale of a feverish love affair in which a young man rediscovers his Mexican heritage and learns how much love can hurt, these stories delve into the many dimensions of the human condition. We watch boys playing a game that begins innocently but takes a dangerous turn. We see an old Anglo woman befriending her Mexican gardener because both are lonely. We witness a man terrorized in his New York apartment, taking solace in memories of lost love. Two new stories will be welcomed by Troncoso's readers. "My Life in the City" relates a transplanted Texan's yearning for companionship in New York, while "The Last Tortilla" returns to the Southwest to explore family strains after a mother's death—and the secret behind that death. Each reflects an insight about the human heart that has already established the author's work in literary circles. Troncoso sets aside the polemics about social discomfort sometimes found in contemporary Chicano writing and focuses instead on the moral and intellectual lives of his characters. The twelve stories gathered here form a richly textured tapestry that adds to our understanding of what it is to be human.

Crossing Borders

Crossing Borders PDF Author: Sergio Troncoso
Publisher: Arte Publico Press
ISBN: 9781558857100
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
This collection of personal essays by a Mexican-American writer deals with crossing linguistic, cultural, and intellectual borders to provoke debate about contemporary Mexican-American identity.

American Like Me

American Like Me PDF Author: America Ferrera
Publisher: Gallery Books
ISBN: 1501180924
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 336

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Book Description
INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER From award-winning actress and political activist America Ferrera comes a vibrant and varied collection of first-person accounts from prominent figures about the experience of growing up between cultures. America Ferrera has always felt wholly American, and yet, her identity is inextricably linked to her parents’ homeland and Honduran culture. Speaking Spanish at home, having Saturday-morning-salsa-dance-parties in the kitchen, and eating tamales alongside apple pie at Christmas never seemed at odds with her American identity. Still, she yearned to see that identity reflected in the larger American narrative. Now, in American Like Me, America invites thirty-one of her friends, peers, and heroes to share their stories about life between cultures. We know them as actors, comedians, athletes, politicians, artists, and writers. However, they are also immigrants, children or grandchildren of immigrants, indigenous people, or people who otherwise grew up with deep and personal connections to more than one culture. Each of them struggled to establish a sense of self, find belonging, and feel seen. And they call themselves American enthusiastically, reluctantly, or not at all. Ranging from the heartfelt to the hilarious, their stories shine a light on a quintessentially American experience and will appeal to anyone with a complicated relationship to family, culture, and growing up.

Our Lost Border

Our Lost Border PDF Author: Sarah Cortez
Publisher: Arte Publico Press
ISBN: 9781558857520
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
In his essay lamenting the loss of the Tijuana of his youth, Richard Mora remembers festive nights on Avenida Revolución, where tourists mingled with locals at bars. Now, the tourists are gone, as are the indigenous street vendors who sold handmade crafts along the wide boulevard. Instead, the streets are filled with army checkpoints and soldiers armed with assault rifles. "Multiple truths abound and so I am left to craft my own truth from the media accounts--the hooded soldiers, like the little green plastic soldiers I once kept in a cardboard shoe box, are heroes or villains, victims or victimizers, depending on the hour of the day," he writes.With a foreword by renowned novelist Rolando Hinojosa and comprised of personal essays about the impact of drug violence on life and culture along the U.S.-Mexico border, the anthology combines writings by residents of both countries. Mexican authors Liliana Blum, Lolita Bosch, Diego Osorno and María Socorro Tabuenca write riveting, first-hand accounts about the clashes between the drug cartels and citizens' attempts to resist the criminals. American authors focus on how the corruption and bloodshed have affected the bi-national and bi-cultural existence of families and individuals. Celestino Fernández and Jessie K. Finch write about the violence's effect on musicians, and María Cristina Cigarroa shares her poignant memories of life in her grandparents' home--now abandoned--in Nuevo Laredo.In their introduction, editors Sarah Cortez and Sergio Troncoso write that this anthology was "born of a vision to bear witness to how this violence has shattered life on the border, to remember the past, but also to point to the possibilities of a better future." The personal essays in this collection humanize the news stories and are a must-read for anyone interested in how this fragile way of life--between two cultures, languages and countries--has been undermined by the drug trade and the crime that accompanies it, with ramifications far beyond the border region.

A Feather on the Breath of God

A Feather on the Breath of God PDF Author: Sigrid Nunez
Publisher: Picador
ISBN: 1429944943
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 194

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Book Description
From Sigrid Nunez, the National Book Award-winning author of The Friend, comes A Feather on the Breath of God: a mesmerizing story about the tangled nature of relationships between parents and children, between language and love A young woman looks back to the world of her immigrant parents: a Chinese-Panamanian father and a German mother. Growing up in a housing project in the 1950s and 1960s, she escapes into dreams inspired both by her parents' stories and by her own reading and, for a time, into the otherworldly life of ballet. A yearning, homesick mother, a silent and withdrawn father, the ballet--these are the elements that shape the young woman's imagination and her sexuality.

American Dirt (Oprah's Book Club)

American Dirt (Oprah's Book Club) PDF Author: Jeanine Cummins
Publisher: Holt Paperbacks
ISBN: 1250209781
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
"También de este lado hay sueños. On this side, too, there are dreams. Lydia Quixano Perez lives in the Mexican city of Acapulco. She runs a bookstore. She has a son, Luca, the love of her life, and a wonderful husband who is a journalist. And while there are cracks beginning to show in Acapulco because of the drug cartels, her life is, by and large, fairly comfortable. Even though she knows they'll never sell, Lydia stocks some of her all-time favorite books in her store. And then one day a man enters the shop to browse and comes up to the register with four books he would like to buy--two of them her favorites. Javier is erudite. He is charming. And, unbeknownst to Lydia, he is the jefe of the newest drug cartel that has gruesomely taken over the city. When Lydia's husband's tell-all profile of Javier is published, none of their lives will ever be the same. Forced to flee, Lydia and eight-year-old Luca soon find themselves miles and worlds away from their comfortable middle-class existence. Instantly transformed into migrants, Lydia and Luca ride la bestia--trains that make their way north toward the United States, which is the only place Javier's reach doesn't extend. As they join the countless people trying to reach el norte, Lydia soon sees that everyone is running from something. But what exactly are they running to? American Dirt will leave readers utterly changed when they finish reading it. A page-turner filled with poignancy, drama, and humanity on every page, it is a literary achievement."--