Lobo Reading Experience Fall 2009: Sam Quinones' Antonio's Gun and Delfino's Dream  Tags: lobo_reading_experience antonio's_gun quinones mexican_immigrants  

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Borrow Antonio's Gun and Delfino's Dream: 

• Search UNM Libraries catalog (LIBROS). Many copies are available, including 20 "reserve" copies for short-term loan. After searching, click on  for list of all copies and locations.
• The Albuquerque / Bernalillo County Library System is proud to partner with UNM to promote the Lobo Reading Experience. Multiple copies are available; search the Albuquerque / Bernalillo County Library catalog to find a copy in a library near you. NOTE: Public library card is required.

Buy Antonio's Gun and Delfino's Dream:

• UNM Press
• UNM Bookstore
• Amazon.com

Sam Quinones's first book, True Tales From Another Mexico, was acclaimed for the way it peered into the corners of that country for its larger truths and complexities. Antonio's Gun and Delfino's Dream, Quinones's second collection of nonfiction tales, does the same for one of the most important issues of our times: the migration of Mexicans to the United States.

Quinones has covered the world of Mexican immigrants for the last thirteen years--from Chicago to Oaxaca, Michoacan to southeast Los Angeles, Tijuana to Texas. Along the way, he has uncovered stories that help illuminate all that Mexicans seek when they come north, how they change their new country, and are changed by it.

Here are the stories of the Henry Ford of velvet painting in Ciudad Juarez, the emergence of opera in Tijuana, the bizarre goings-on in the L.A. suburb of South Gate, and of the drug-addled colonies of Old World German Mennonites in Chihuahua. Through it all winds the tale of Delfino Juarez, a young construction worker, and modern-day Huckleberry Finn, who had to leave his village to change it.

"Sam Quinones is a border legend. For those in the know, his reportage has been cause for celebration. Now, with Antonio's Gun and Delfino's Dream he takes us behind the lines and undercover. He puts a human face on 'illegal immigration,' and he gives us stunning stories of survival and dread. However, he accomplishes something more valuable than a mere parade of sensational set pieces--Quinones starts to put the complex issues in the light of understanding and hard-won wisdom."--Luis A. Urrea, author of The Devil's Highway and The Hummingbird's Daughter

"Antonio's Gun and Delfino's Dream is journalism that doesn't replay or expand on the cliched or stereotyped stories of the exotic border, of mystical or threatening mejicanos. Genuinely original work, what great fiction and nonfiction aspire to be, these are stories that stop time and remind us how great reading is."--Dagoberto Gilb, author of Hecho en Tejas

Acclaim / Reviews

"Quinones layers with the sociological, economic, and historical context of 60 years of immigration . . . ."--Publishers Weekly, starred review

"Quinones approaches [Mexican immigration] with his eyes and ears open and with his mind not already made up."--New Mexico Historical Review

"Quinones' book humanizes a political issue that has become sloganized into meaninglessness . . . "--Santa Fe Reporter

"Sam Quinones has a remarkable ability to put a human face on the controversial issue of immigration..."--Magill's Literary Annual 2008

"...ideally suited for undergraduate classes in borderlands, US West, and California history."--Southern California Quarterly

"Quinones is a hell of a storyteller."--Tucson Weekly

"...solidifies its author's membership in an elite fraternity of border journalists...."--Texas Observer

Biographical

Sam Quinones lived in Mexico for ten years writing freelance for a variety of U.S. publications. In 1998 he was a recipient of the Alicia Patterson Fellowship. In 2001 he published a highly acclaimed collection of stories about contemporary Mexico, True Tales from Another Mexico: The Lynch Mob, the Popsicle Kings, Chalino, and the Bronx (UNM Press). He now lives in Los Angeles with his wife, Sheila, and daughter, Kate, and is a staff writer for the Los Angeles Times. He can be contacted through www.samquinones.com.

YouTube interviews

Additional interviews

Author Puts Faces on the Immigration Debate (with Ray Suarez, Jim Lehrer News Hour, PBS)