Book Description

Home is a collection of memories. Home helps us understand who we were and who we are, and allows us to predict who we may one day become. Some leave home early in their lives and, thrill after thrill, struggle to get back to their emotional center. Without borders, these eternal wanderers never give up their search for life's next adventure, hoping that one day they will find a place that they can once again call home.

So begins the thoughtful journey of an extraordinarily sensitive autobiography from Jorge Ramos, a man who perfectly embodies this adventurous spirit, and who hopes to someday find that place where he may finally feel anchored.

Never before has Jorge Ramos, award-winning anchorman for America's top-rated Spanish-language nightly newscast, let readers into so personal a space. From the lovers he's had throughout his life to his passion for journalism to his own sense of fulfillment, Ramos allows us to personally know a man we've trusted to deliver the news for years. We realize that Ramos firmly grasps the idea that in order to live life to the fullest, one must take chances, and that risk is ultimately what leads one toward wisdom.

Ramos details his struggle as a student living in L.A. in the early 1980s, his first foray into American journalism, and the English-language establishment that told him he would amount to nothing if he didn't lose his accent. Ramos then invites us into the early days of Spanish-language news and media -- an industry that most early critics thought was useless and irrelevant -- whose now skyrocketing popularity has made it a powerful player in American culture.

From the many wars he has covered and the places he has seen to the world leaders he has interviewed, Jorge Ramos draws readers in with the powerful story of a man whose search and ambition for a career in journalism have led him to the country he would love to call home, but cannot. We come to know a man whose humor and sense of fearless adventure have simultaneously brought him close to, and saved him from death, and whose weekly Saturday soccer match is the closest he can get to a sure thing in a life layered with the trials of the unexpected.

A father, journalist, husband, and son, Ramos shows in No Borders that each of us can be a witness to history and that wandering may in fact be preferable to forever staying in one place.

Reviews (3)

Awesome
I truly enjoyed reading this book, Univision was always on my mom's television set and Mr. Ramos is my mom's favorite journalist, she loves him, and now I see why. Thank you Jorge for sharing your incredible story.

Absolutely Astonishing
This has to be one of the most astonishing and incredible memoirs of hispanics living in the United States. I loved Ramos's simplistic style, yet profound way of describing his thoughts. For those interested in journalism, this is a book to read.

Absolutely inspiring!
Having read The Other Face of America, I had to get my hands on Jorge Ramos's memoir. He has inspired me to pursue a career in journalism, which is why I have followed his career for years. In No Borders, Ramos gives the reader an inside look into the life of a young Hispanic male seeking the American Dream. He moved to the U.S. from Mexico at the age of twenty-five, with very little experience in the journalistic field. Twenty-years later, he is a seven-time Emmy Award winning anchorman for Univision. From his tale of how he became one of the most successful reporters to recaps of his biggest news assignments, No Borders is an inspiring memoir about a man who stopped at nothing to get to where he is today... ... Read more

Book Description

Reviews (2)

Very nice and easy to understand.
It was so good that when I received it, I could not put it down till the end. That night I went to bed at 4:33AM. Mr.Robert Walker, 2 thumbs up to a well documented piece of art. Again THANK YOU for this biography.

It was my favorite
He palyed for the Pittsburgh Pirates. He was the youngest in his family, just like me. His dad made alot of money compared to the others that lived around them. Roberto rode his bike to another town to try out for a softball team. It was only a couple of miles from his home. His school was trying to teach him to speak English, and he didn't do very good, but he tried. ... Read more

Book Description

Published in 1936, The Real Billy the Kid: With New Light on the Lincoln County War, is a landmark biography of the infamous Western outlaw William H. Booney, Jr.--his childhood, encounters with the Apache, entanglement in the murderous Lincoln County War, and his friendship with Sheriff Pat Garnett. ... Read more

Book Description

From her father's genteel Peruvian family, Marie Arana was taught to be a proper lady, yet from her mother's American family she learned to shoot a gun, break a horse, and snap a chicken's neck for dinner.

Arana shuttled easily between these deeply separate cultures for years. But only when she immigrated with her family to the United States did she come to understand that she was a hybrid American, an individual whose cultural identity was split in half. Coming to terms with this split is at the heart of this graceful, beautifully realized portrait of a child who "was a north-south collision, a New World fusion. An American chica."

Through Arana's eyes the reader will discover not only the diverse, earthquake-prone terrain of Peru, charged with ghosts of history and mythology, but also the vast prairie lands of Wyoming, "grave-slab flat," and hemmed by mountains.

In these landscapes resides a fierce and colorful cast of family members who bring her historia vividly to life, among them Arana's proud paternal grandfather, Victor Manuel Arana Sobrevilla, who one day simply stopped coming down the stairs; her dazzling maternal grandmother, Rosa Cisneros y Cisneros, "clicking through the house as if she were making her way onstage"; Grandpa Doc, her maternal grandfather, who, by example, taught her about the constancy of love.

But most important are Arana's parents, Jorge and Marie. He a brilliant engineer, she a talented musician. For more than half a century these two passionate, strong-willed people struggled to overcome the bicultural tensions in their marriage and, finally, to prevail.
... Read more

Reviews (8)

A symphony of words
What a joyto read. Little pieces of information about characters, surroundings, history and culture are put in place like parts of a growing poetic jigsaw puzzle.Although no child this young could be so insightful, the framework enables the author to use the innocence of childhood to view the world in a questioning, accepting way, opening up her world in Peru to the reader like a flower opening slowly petal by petal in the morning.Very mature insights and descriptions of those around her are presented in a very gentle way.The vivid description of the depraved treatment by overseers of the Peruvian nativeswho were used to gather rubber from the trees tore at this reader's heart by the magnificence of the writing rather than by gory heavyhanded writing.

Fragments of the jigsaw puzzle of life are blended together asthe author moves between individual backgrounds, current insights, historical information, explanations of cultural patterns, vivid descriptions of personalities and a storyline that tells how a mother, father and three children see their ongoing lives as viewed thru the eyes of a very mature child.

The book whispers rather than shouts, a rare thing these days.

A stunning amount of critical acclaim
What drew my attention to this book was the critical acclaim it was receiving. I've not seen anything like this in a long time: A National Book Award Finalist, a PEN Memoir Award Finalist, winner of Books for a Better Life. The American Library Association (very picky people) chose it as one of the top ten nonfiction books of the year. Philadelphia News picked it as THE BEST book of the year. And then the New York Times, L.A. Times, Washington Post, and Chicago Tribune, not to mention lots of other newspapers around the country picked it as one of the best books of the year. As a book lover, and someone in the book business, I tend to keep an eye on this sort of thing, so, as I say, it drew my attention.
It took reading "American Chica" to make me see why it was so loved by so many readers and critics coast to coast. This is ground-breaking stuff. A marvelous mirror on the new America. More important, it captures something about all of us Americans: Us mutts, mongrels, multicultured people who live on bridges of our own.

An Important Work for Our Time
Without the prompting of my book club, I would not have read American Chica, and I would have missed this honest, thoughtful and absolutely captivating insight into a bicultural family. I would have missed one of the best books that I've read this year.

I was surprised to discover how much I related to Marie Arana's experiences even though I was the daughter of two white-bread American parents.Her lush descriptions of the Peruvian gardens revived memories of my early childhood in Puerto Rico.I remembered the difficult adjustment when we moved from Puerto Rico to Canada.I wanted to shout "I'm an American!" every time I would overhear teachers and other students referring to me as the "Puerto Rican girl." I remember being embarrassed when fellow students would ask me to "say something in Spanish" and then later the culture shock when we moved to Texas and I became known as "the Canadian."

As our world becomes smaller, travel more accessible, and bicultural families more common, Arana's work becomes meaningful to all of us.The only way to counter our human inclination toward prejudice is by learning about each other and sharing our stories, the priceless gifts of our culture and experiences.I applaud Arana for her beautifully written and engaging work and for sharing this gift with us.

Impostors
This wonderful bio of the author's early years in Peru and the States describes a situation that so many of us find ourselves in these days when we sense that we belong to more than one culture.It is a situation that makes the participant feel like an impostor, always having to somehow fake belonging to one or the other; but it also provides tremendous wealth for we are thus able to get more than just one puny opening to the universe.

The style is rich and the descriptions seem authentic.But what makes the book quite special are the situations the young Marie gets into as she tries with humor and imagination to penetrate the different worlds she comes into contact.

Bien vale la pena.

More than just a memoir
Marie Arana's story is so much more than her account of growing up between two continents--North and South America. She contextualizes herself within a particular historical time--both in Peru and in the United States, showing how the "goings on" in the wider culture of both continents affected her own particular development. How she navigates both worlds is what American Chica is all about.

Particularly enlightening to me was Arana's discovery of a theory at the British University of Hong Kong "claiming that bilingualism can hurt you...The bicultural person seems so thoroughly one way in one language, so thoroughly different in another. Only an impostor would hide that other half so well." Since I also grew up "bilingual," Arana's discovery at the British University resonated with my own experience. Just exactly who am I and where is it that I belong? Language is so much more than a vehicle to transmit information. With language we create the "self" and name our environment. That "self" and that environment will look different depending on what language I use.Sometimes the footing is as unsteady as walking the earth after one of those Peruvian earthquakes.

Great job! ... Read more

Reviews (7)

A Taste of Communism
This seems like a pretty good idea for a book: adventures of a twenty-something in three Communist capitals. Throw in the kicky title and a punchy attitude and it can't lose.

I enjoyed Griest's stories. Her writing style is light. I can understand the criticisms of one earlier reviewer here who thought Griest was too superficial and didn't learn anything. I'm not sure that's really the case, but Griest does keep her narrative in the moment, without spending too much time analyzing what it all meant. This makes for a smoother telling of the story.

Griest spends the most time in Moscow and knew years ahead of time that she would go to Russia someday. This section was not surprisingly the best part of the book. The part about Beijing was okay, in which Griest works for an English-language Chinese newspaper. She never fits in and is constantly reminded of the fact. Her journey to Havana is a spur-of-the-moment trip, and it is more fun than Beijing. She doesn't have to worry about upsetting the boss or embarrassing her friends. Even though she's there for only a short time, she falls in love. She also falls in love in Russia, but only after she has been there quite awhile. And she never gets close to having a serious relationship in Beijing.

Around the Bloc is a good first book. It isn't as good as Almost French by Sarah Turnbull, another book about a journalist who finds adventures halfway around the world. Although it's more revealing, somehow it isn't as personal. But I suspect that Griest will only get better and I look forward to more from her.

Breezy Summer Read
Our 21 year-old author takes us to Russia, China and Cuba, and shares with us her 21 year-old perspective. While there is nothing earth-shattering or enlightening here, this is a good breezy summer read. Perhaps the author's most interesting comparison of these three cultures is this: The Russian bond by drinking vodka together, the Chinese by eating lavish meals, but the Cubans by dancing. And that's the level of analysis the book leaves us with, for better or worse.

Travels with Stephanie
The chief thing wrong with this book is that it was written by a journalist. Throughout, our author displays naivete, gullibility, superficiality, and ignorance - the ever-recurring stigmata of Grub Street. Compounding her faults is her extreme youth and an oddly stubborn resistance to education. She repeats what she hears at second and third and fourth hand, displaying no sophistication about sources and (apparently) no inclination to check facts. She appears to know very little about history. Perhaps a 21-year-old (her age when she started her travels) couldn't help some of this - but she was a lot older by the time she published, and it's not too much to expect more balance, more sophistication, in a word more intelligence from the Miss Griest of today.

It's not her fault that I don't much care about fashions in clothes, makeup, pop music, dating, or the bar scene, but it -is- her fault for filling so many pages with her quite real and sincere concerns with these things.

Early on, she brings up her very personal concerns with her ethnic identity, and returns to them repeatedly throughout her book. This might make an interesting topic as a separate memoir (although I can't really make out what she's so exercised about), or even if she could relate it in some significant way to her travels. But it feels dragged in; it looks in places too much like padding. Or a big ego chewing a pretty small bone.

Miss Griest thanks a number of people for editorial help. She shouldn't. Her style is potholed with clichés, malapropisms, and faulty syntax. Even newspaper scribblers should be able to do better than this, especially when they sit down years later to compose at leisure.

In sum, it's just not a grownup's book.

Travel by book
As someone who has always planned/thought/meant to travel and have lots of adventures of my own (but never actually had the means or time to travel), I can really appreciate all the detail and descriptions in Ms. Griest's Around the Bloc. I may not always agree with her conclusions, but I actually am grateful for them. I would so much rather hear opinions that cause me to think than feel affirmed or bored. It is almost as if she is an incredible, funny, and lively travel companion throughout this journey around the "Communist Bloc" and I get to hear her end-of-the-day assessment of her adventures and then begin to form my own. Her openness throughout the book about her experiences and mistakes help to endear and make her experiences much more "real" than a flat newspaper-style book. I have learned SO MUCH from this book about places that I will likely never visit and very much enjoyed having my eyes open to new perspectives on some very old issues.

Move over Bryson
I rarely buy into the "so good you can't put it down" rhetoric when talking about books to read. Stephanie Griest's Around the Bloc is an exception. Reminiscent of my favorite, Bill Bryson, she has an amazing combination of detail, brilliant humor, and historical research that both teaches and entertains. This is a book that can profoundly change the way young people look at foreign travel or foreign study. I would recommend it to anyone wanting to study abroad as a guidebook for how to truly capture the essense of cultural immersion. Griest's re-discovery of her own culture through learning about others is an inspiring gem of a lesson. ... Read more

Book Description

personal essays ... Read more

Book Description

In his critically acclaimed bestseller Rain of Gold, Victor Villase-or brought his mother's family vividly to life. In Wild Steps Of Heaven, he turns to his father's family, the Villase-ors. Against a vivid backdrop of love and war, magic and heroism, the author breathes life into his father's people--and in particular, the Villase-or women*Margarita, the indomitable matriarch who was swept away by Don Juan Jesus Villase-or on the eve of the Mexican revolution*their beautiful daughters, who find strength and endurance in their mother's faith, and searing passion amidst the turmoil of war. But it is little Juan, the youngest son, through whose eyes this tumultuous saga unfolds. Juan would learn from his brother Jose, a hero of the revolution, how to be a man; and from his beloved mother, how to live and love con gusto y amor.

A story of madness and miracles, rage and redemption, In Wild Steps Of Heaven creates a riveting portrait of an extraordinary family and the country whose earth gave them roots. ... Read more

Reviews (4)

Wild Steps of Heaven
Read this book before you read "Rain of Gold". "Wild Steps of Heaven" is a short read and actually the paternal part of the family story. I wish Villasenor had included the info in Wild Steps of Heaven" in "Rain of Gold". Both books are a wonderful patchwork of history,and genuine family integrity. Excellent summer read!

Wild steps of heaven is magic
This is a wonderful book. This book is about a family living during the Mexican Revolution.His writing just takes into this magical world and even though you know that he has made a little piece of history into this great big piece of fiction, he does it so as a matter-of -fact that you just can't believe that it's not true.

Epic Tale of Family Loyalty, Love, and Making of Heroes
In times of hardship heroes are needed and none moreso than in Mexico as revolution rages. The Villasenor family patriarch, an exiled red-haired Spaniard, has married an Indian woman. The first ten years of the marriage are a time of great love and passion, and the children born first are fair and favor Don Juan Villasenor. Later children are dark like their mother. One of the dark ones, Jose, from age 12 must live in the barn because he defied his father and gentled a stallion to rescue his baby brother holding onto the leg rather than shoot the horse. In his exile and solitude a hero begins his training with Grandfather Don Pio Castro who knows Jose understands the power of love and gentleness. This will be the son who defends la familia during the revolution from the soldiers who time and again attach the village. The colonel commanding the troops more particularly desires Jose's true love Mariposa and destroys her. Ultimately, the younger brother Juan (author Villasenor's father) begins to show heroic tendencies himself and will be the one to defend his mother and the remaining family against the colonel. Villasenor moves the tale along with a powerful, songlike cadence. Notable characters are the giant cousins, Basilio and Agustin, who strip naked and race the lightning and then Halley's comet on January 17, 1910, a night of magic and love, the day before el colonel begins shooting up the home village, el paraiso de Los Altos de Jalisco. Each chapter begins with epigrams featuring "Great Father Sun" that provide a sense of power from above, as in "the heavens smile . . . as all around him the gods and serpents did battle." When the final epigram tells us "and out of these children of the earth and of the stars would now come a glorious new gente in all their wonder and fire," we realize that while we have been traveling through an exciting story with more twists and turns than fiction, we also have been participating in something approximating a creation myth. Highly recommended is Villasenor's first tale of the family Villasenor, Rain of Gold.

Fast-paced, enjoyable reading
After reading Rain of Gold, an exceptional story, I couldn't wait to read this one. Wild Steps of Heaven tells more of Victor Villasenor's ancestral history, this time focusing on his grandfather's life as a young boy in Mexico. The book is very fast-paced and full of stories that are shocking in their violent imagery, yet show the importance of faith in God, love, and la familia. ... Read more

Book Description

From the mean streets of the barrio to the house on Mango Street, from the Mambo Kings to the Garcia Girls, the authors who contribute to this volume transport us across geographies and through cultures in an attempt to articulate the joys, struggles, defeats, and triumphs of the Latino experience in the United States. Growing Up Latino offers, for the first time, a comprehensive collection of classic and recent Latino writing in English, converging in sometimes shocking, often funny, and always stirring memoirs and stories. Religion, sex, love, language, and family are some of the topics explored in this compelling anthology of fiction and nonfiction. With its laughter and tears, its beauty and power, it is a thoroughly enjoyable book and an unforgettable contribution to the Latino tradition of letters. This diverse collection shatters the myth of a singular U.S.- Latino experience, proving the existence of a rich tradition whose writers, active for more than forty years, are only now being recognized by a rapidly growing audience. ... Read more

Reviews (3)

Views of Latinos
I thought that Growing Up Latino really showed different views of Latino life. They do not come in all the same way. I was glad that to see some of my favorite authors were in this book. I also found new authors that I never knew I was interested in until I read this book. The book showed us through the victories and struggles that follow with the Latino culture. I really enjoyed this book and even recommended it to my friends.

Excellent
This is a marvelous anthology. I've given it to friends and want students to read. It is cleverly thought out and has a wonderful preface by Stavans and a solid introduction. The contributors are all first-rate.

well organized anthology that keeps the reader interested.
This book is an anthology of works of various hispanic writers and their experiences in the united states. It provides each reader with a sence of being because in a strange way you are able to relate to each story. Its a great book! ... Read more

Book Description

Biography of New York Yankee first baseman, Tino Martinez ... Read more

Book Description

Ybor City, Florida, was once a thriving factory town populated by cigar-makers, mostly emigrants from Cuba and Spain. Growing up in Ybor City (now Tampa) in the early twentieth century, the young Evelio Grillo experienced the complexities of life in a horse-and-buggy society demarcated by both racial and linguistic lines: Life was different depending on whether one was Spanish- or English-speaking, a white or black Cuban, a Cuban American or a native-born U.S. citizen, well-off or poor. (Even American-born blacks did not always get along with their Hispanic counterparts.)

Grillo recaptures in prose this unique world that slowly faded away as he grew to adulthood during the Depression. He relates his increasing assimilation into black American society, and then tells of his adventures as a soldier in an all-black unit during World War II. Booklovers may have read of Ybor City in the novels of Jose Yglesias, but never before has it been portrayed from this unique and vital perspective. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

Lively, superbly written and presented autobiography
Black Cuban, Black American is the informative and engaging memoir of Evelio Grillo's life growing up in Ybor City (now part of Tampa, Florida). Evelio experienced the complexities and difficulties of life in a horse-and-buggy society demarcated by both racial and linguistic lines. Evelio goes on to reveal how he was absorbed into the African-American community as he grew to adulthood during the Great Depression. He then relates his experiences as a solider in an all-black unit serving in the China-Burma-India theater of operations during World War II. This lively, informative, superbly written and presented autobiography is enhanced with an eight-page photo insert. ... Read more

Book Description

The story and legend of Pancho Villa electrified Mexico with the wild tales of his outlaw life that people told about him. Now students can learn the truth of Pancho Villa, a larger than life character of Mexico's past. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

The man behind the legend of the "bandit" Pancho Villa
The cover photograph for "Pancho Villa: Mexican Revolutionary Hero" will undoubtedly challenge the expectations of any young writers who have heard of the legendary figure. But one of the points of R. Conrad Stein's volume for this series, A Proud Heritage: The Hispanic Library, is to talk about the man behind the legend. Within these pages you will find more traditional photographs of Villa, wearing a sombrero and bandoliers of ammunition, but you will also find a solid juvenile biography of the man who should be remembered for his military leadership and the role he played in the Mexican Revolution.

Stein confronts the legends and stories that have grown up around the life of Pancho Villa in the book's first chapter, such as the story of why he became a bandit; a sidebar considers the question of whether this story if "Fact or Fiction?" Stein also explains that in Mexico a "bandit" has a touch of Robin Hood in him. The second chapter covers the beginning of the Mexican Revolution and how Villa led the people of northern Mexico during that time, including the Battle of Ciudad Juarez. The next chapter looks at Mexican at War with Itself and how Villa was portrayed in the American press. Death of a Hero, the final chapter, tells of Villa's assassination in 1923, and a sidebar points out that between 1 and 2 million Mexicans died as a direct result of the war, versus 500,000 Americans killed during the Civil War.

Given all that usually appears in American history textbooks about Pancho Villa is how General John J. Pershing pursued him into Mexico during the Wilson administration (although he might be referred to as the "George Washington of Mexico"), Stein provides a very informative book. I was surprised to learn that I knew so little about the real Pancho Villa. This volume is illustrated mostly with historic photographs of Villa and his contemporaries. The back of the book includes a Time Line of not only Villa's life but the history of the nation of Mexico, a Glossary of terms from "assassination" to "tortillas," and a list of books and web sites that provide Further Information.

The first eight volumes in The Hispanic Library were published last year and this one on Villa is one this year's eight new volumes. The others are devoted to "Christopher Columbus: Opening the Americas to European Exploration," "Emiliano Zapata: Revolutionary and Champion of Poor Farmers," "Frida Kahlo: An Artist Celebrates Life," "Hernando Cortés: Conquistador and Empire Builder," and "Mario Molina: Chemist and Nobel Prize Winner," as well as volumes on "The Changing Face of America: Hispanic Roots, Hispanic Pride" and "The Conquistadores: Building a Spanish Empire in the Americas." Since Hispanics are now officially the second largest ethnic group in the country this series should be a source of pride for some young Americans and a font of information for the rest. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

Raised my consciousness as a whole, as a people.
This is just a fantastic book. It will be one of my classics from here on. I appreciated where he started, "the plan of the book and the name of the people", from that moment on - I was hooked. It really raised my consciousness of which we are as a whole, as a people.
I have recommended this book to everyone I know to have as part of his or hers library or on coffee tables.

muy buena biografia de un pueblo
esta historia es instructiva, me ayudo aenterarme de cosas que ignoraba y cosas que no queria admitir. el llama a los latinos las personas que muerieron dos veces y nos muestra una radiografia historica de nuestros origenes y de nuestra presente adaptacion al medio norteamericano. algunos conservan restos de su cultura, los mas viejos conservan su lenguaje y sus tradiciones, los mas jovenes son absorbidos por la cultura que las trasnforma en seres sin raices ni tradiciones, que no son ni de aqui ni de alla. es un buen libro para conocernos y saber que no importa cuantos anos permanezcamos fuera no es bueno olvidarnos completamente de nuestros origenes.

LUIS MENDEZ luismendez@codetel.net.do ... Read more

Book Description

This is the Hispanic Roots, an all-American story of poverty, immigration, struggle and success. It focuses on three generations of Villaseñor's kin, their spiritual and cultural roots in Mexico, their immigration to California and their overcoming the poverty, prejudice and economic exploitation. It is the warm-hearted, humorous and tragic, true story of the wily, wary, persevering forebears of Villaseñor. ... Read more

Reviews (75)

An exquisitely told tale!
When I was an English Literature major in college in the early 1990s, I wrote my senior thesis on the significance of Chicano literature. "Rain of Gold" was included in my study. It is a beautifully written book and a tremendously valuable contribution to American literature.

In Victor Villasenor's "Rain of Gold," the dominant theme or metaphor is the struggle for survival. The mythic structure provides a rich and meaningful context for the characters and their inner struggle for identity and survival. "Rain of Gold" is the story of two parallel lives -- those of Juan Salvador and Lupe Gomez, characters delineated from Villasenor's real-life mother and father, who grow up with their respective families in two distant towns in Mexico and meet as young adults in California.

The novel can be divided into three parts: the families trying to survive in Mexico, but opting to find a better life in the U.S.; their harsh and harrowing journeys through the rough terrain of the Mexican deserts; and finally, their miraculous arrival and struggle in the U.S. The novel challenges the reader to experience the harsh realities of the characters' hardships and triumphs. Their struggle is internal and personal. Villasenor's adherence to myth, religion and a little of the magical paints a vivid image of a people -- survivors not only of physical challenges, but spiritual ones as well. His story is well detailed and well developed. It is truly an epic in every sense of the word.

The Best I've Read!
Rain of Gold is a book written by Victor Villaseñor an author of Mexican Heritage. Villaseñor wrote this book when he felt the urge to pas down to his children the history behind their name. Villaseñor traveled to Mexico and after years of hard work and several conflicts he published "Rain of Gold", the biography of his family. In "Rain of Gold" Villaseñor describes with full detail the lives of his ancestors in Mexico and later in the United States. More than just a story, Villaseñor gives a vivid image of life during the Mexican Revolution {the times of Pancho Villa}. He explains how his family was forced as well as other families to abandon their beloved country because of the violence and danger the Mexican Revolution brought to its citizens. Villaseñor also explains the hardships his family had to got through to adapt and survive prejudice, hunger and unfair work in the states. Not only does Villaseñor capture the struggles of his family but also the exciting and glorious moments his ancestors lived. This book has a vivid message to everybody of Mexican background. Especially to teenagers who usually don't get the chance to be taught their history with out somebody making fun or putting down their culture. This is the first book that I have truly related to, because of my Mexican background and hardships I've faced in this country. This is a book you just can't stop reading because you get so close to the characters. By the end of the book I assure you that not only will you know all of the people in the book but you will also respect and consider them part of your family! More importantly, I recommend this book to everybody who has parents or somebody who has immigrated to this country in search of opportunities and better life.

This book needs an editor
This book deserves 1 star, not the 5-star rating it receives on Amazon. I can open up to any place in this 562-page novel that is 500 pages too long and find a poorly crafted paragraph. Jeez -- ever hear of an editor? The writing is so bad at times it's unintentionally funny ("Love was in the air, choking the atmosphere" -- "Their home was leaping in flames").

This is NOT a great book. It's not even a good book. It's an OK book, an historical account of one man's family history. The characters are colorful but not especially deep. The book jumps back and forth from believable family saga to trite Mexican soap opera stocked with cliched characters. Men are weak but lovable, women stoic and boundlessly loving, and gringos are all greedy, untrustworthy SOBs. The narrative has big wide seams that disrupt the flow. The author has an annoying way of jumping between past and present without any skill.

If Villasenor was trying to evoke the magical realism of Garcia Marquez' 100 Years of Solitude when he wrote this, he failed miserably. There's no magical realism here, just absurd realism. Anyone who gives this book five stars needs to read more.

Sadly, this book is required reading in some high schools
Political correctness has actually fooled people into thinking that this work is on par with Dickens.

This book is great literature like the participants in the Special Olympics are great athletes.

A Fun Thrilling Novel
Rain of Gold by Victor Villasenor is an excellent novel. Being an eleventh grader, I found this novel to be quite different from what I had expected. My first thought was that it would be boring because of course all non-fiction books are boring. It turned out to be fast paced with dramatic situations of starvation and the battle for life. Rain of Gold is truly an inspirational story and is worth the time to read. Looking at the novel itself is intimidating- the width is at least four inches long- but Villasenor has created an exciting historical vision, forcing audiences to be glued to the pages, desperately yearning for his words. At first the novel may push away some readers for the first chapteris focused on the provety of a little girl(Lupe) and boy(Juan/Salvador), but as they grow older danger seems to lurk in EVERY corner while death and rape stare down at them. ... Read more

Book Description

The Book of Latina Women, by award-winning Latina journalist Sylvia Mendoza, highlights the contributions of 150 fabulous women whose accomplishments in history, science, politics, art, and entertainment-past and present-have impacted the world.

From political leaders like Eva Perón-who ruled Argentina with flamboyance and an iron fist-to pioneers like France Anne Cordova-the youngest person to ever hold the Chief Scientist position at NASA-The Book of Latina Women provides a unique perspective on Latina women from all periods in history and all walks of life.

Features profiles on such influential Latinas as:

Book Description

This milestone collection gathers unpublished stories, essays, letters, poems and a teleplay written by Acosta (1935-1974), the Chicano attorney, political activist and writer, between the early 1960s and shortly before his misterious disappearance in Mazatlán, Mexico in 1974. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

work of literature
With this book the Brown Buffalo has established himself as a great writer of gonzo. ... Read more

Book Description

Everyone knows the flamboyant, larger-than-life Celia, the extraordinary salsasinger who passed away in 2003, leaving millions of fans brokenhearted. Now accomplishedchildren’s book author Veronica Chambers gives young readers a lyrical glimpse into Celia’schildhood and her inspiring rise to worldwide fame and recognition. First-time illustrator Julie Maren truly captures the movement and the vibrancy of the Latina legend and the sizzling sights and sounds of her legacy. ... Read more

Reviews (59)

A must-read for teachers of immigrant and minority students
I just finished reading Hunger of Memory as an assignment for a Language and Literacy class I'm taking in my teacher training program. I recommend this book to all teachers or to people like myself who are planning to be teachers. Rodriguez does a outstanding job of capturing the feelings of confusion and separation one feels when learning English. I liked how Rodriguez corelates language with intimacy. He talks a lot about how Spanish was for him a language of intimacy and family. When he learned English in school, however, he lost a lot of that intimacy in the home when he began to lose his language. One particularly sad part was when his grandmother died and he wasn't able to speak to her or say goodbye beforehand because his Spanish was so limited and his grandmother spoke only Spanish. Towards the end of the book, Rodriguez exhibits a lot of honesty and courage in writing about his feelings on affirmative action. As a result of assimilation and studying in England, Rodriguez no longer felt like he could be an effective role model for minority students. However, because he was a Mexican-American with a Phd in Renaissance Literature and because he was a "minority professor", he was expected by Berkley administrators (and students) to be such a role model. When some hispanic students ask him to teach a minority literature class at a community center, he declines. As a result, they treat him like a sell-out. All in all, I admire how Rodriguez is not afraid to take stances on issues like affirmative action and bilingual education that go against what is expected, considering his race. One would expect him to be in support of both programs, but he is not. Though I do not agree on his stances on these issues, I truly admire his ability to be true to his convictions in spite of being called a sell-out.

Still Controversial--After All These Years
I'm an author of a mystery novel in current release that features a Stanford-educated detective of Latino heritage as its protagonist, an American government/economics teacher (for over twenty years) in a rural California high school with a student population that is over 98% Latino, and I have attended several lectures/discussions by Richard Rodriguez over the years. His HUNGER OF MEMORY remains one of the most controversial books in the community in which I work for a significant portion of every year. HUNGER OF MEMORY is viciously hated by some of the most gifted students I have ever had. Others love it. My fellow professionals argue over Mr. Rodriguez and his positions on assimilation and bilingual education. I respect this book and this man. I don't necessarily agree with all he writes, but I do agree he writes what he writes well. I admire what Richard Rodriguez has gone through in life, and I admire the courage of his positions. HUNGER OF MEMORY is an excellent book that anyone interested in the contemporary American Southwest should read. It is extremely educational.

SELLOUT
I wont purchase a book by Rodriguez because he is a sellout to himself and his people. The man has consistently come out against affairmative action when he himself is a product of it, and owes his success to it. We all make choices in life and Rodriguez chose to distance himself from his Mexican roots and wants us to validate his choices. Rodriguez is a sucess in the Anglo world but nothing is worth the cost of selling your soul to achieve success at such a high cost. The man is not Mexican he is best described as a pitiful soul that wrote a book trying to find redemption, but you cant have it both ways. Be what you are, take pride in your difference and you can still succeed in this country. I feel contempt not pity for the man.

Tio Tomas
Richard shed himself to become a white man. He defines himself by the success standards set by white people. Although I don't disagree with him on everything, he clearly has been white washed and it's really sad. HE rants about himself like his 'ethnic' look is so mesmerizing to people. He's got a big head that I really can't empathize with. He made a choice many people of color make, assimilation in most extreme way. If you need a reason to feel pride in your cultural, read this book and see how you cold turn out if you have no pride in your culture

Makes some good points but boring as hell
Indeed Richard makes some good points about bilingual education and affirmative action - and they ARE well worth noting (how affirmative action doesn't benefit those who need it the most)....but everything else about this book [is bad]. His writing style is very self-absorbed. His opinions are inserted after just about EVERY comment and EVERY action ANYONE (his family or the outside world) commits, it's like he's trying to beat his own opinion into your head. There's also very stuck-up tone lurking under his writing; he VERY often notes his own accomplishments endlessly (...at a cocktail party in Bel Air...entered high school having read 100s of books...), it's all fabulous but reading about his greatness gets very tedious after awhile (especially when he's describing how he started making lists of books he read...that alone is 6 pages - go look yourself: p.59-64.

Many advocates of this book say that they like it because of how he becomes "aware of his assimilation" and "recognizes that with all gain comes some loss." Well, unfortunetely, even though Ricahrd becomes AWARE and RECOGNIZES all these things - he lets everyone know he knows by portraying himself as a suffering hero and a "cosmic victim." By saying he's a "cosmic victim" implies some divinity "choose" him to suffer - as if! He chose to separate himself from his family the minute he decided he repected his teachers more.

And yes, Mr. Rodriguez dedicated his book to his parents - but it's funny how he wrote "For him and her-to honor them." To me, if he hadn't written the "to honor them", I would have though he was writing this book as almsot a cruel parody of them - of what they never could be anything else but what they already were in his world, that they are not as great as he because of their lack of education.

Overall, this book is nothing remarkable, if not very boring. Read for an opinion of affirmative action and biligual education (but ignore the fact HE frequently benefited from both, even he admits that!). Yes, he is educated, intelligent, and perhaps (I wouldn't know) a "provocative speaker"....but his image at the end is not of a strong, modest, "manly" man, but a pathetic figure of a person who wants to comfort himself in the glory of his accomplishments. The overall taste you walk away with this book is not respect for Richard Rodriguez, but pity. ... Read more