FOR USE IN SCHOOLS AND LIBRARIES ONLY. Traces the Chavez family as they leave their southern-Mexican town and embark on a perilous journey through the underground railroad to the tomato farms of Missouri, the strawberry fields of California, and the slaughterhouses of Wisconsin.

Crossing over (Turtleback School & Library Binding Edition)

Politics & Social Sciences

Martínez, Rubén

Social Sciences

Turtleback Books

Here is a convincing, often exhilarating vision of a new Latino culture that bubbles from San Salvador to L.A. and that embraces cumbia and hip-hop, anarchists and Catholic priests. The Other Side describes a future that--for some of us--has already arrived. Photographs throughout.

The Other Side: Notes from the New L.A., Mexico City, and Beyond

History

Americas

Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

Crossing Over: A Mexican Family on the Migrant Trail

A moving account of a family's odyssey by "one of the brightest voices of a new generation of Hispanic writers" (Washington Post) The U.S.-Mexican border is one of the most permeable boundaries in the world, breached daily by Mexicans in search of work. Yet the migrant gambit is perilous. Thousands die crossing the line and those who reach "the other side" are branded illegals, undocumented and unprotected. In Crossing Over, Ruben Martinez puts a human face on the phenomenon, following the exodus of the Chávez clan, an extended Mexican family with the grim distinction of having lost three sons in a tragic border incident. He charts the migrants' progress from their small south-Mexican town of Cherán through the harrowing underground railroad to the tomato farms of Missouri, the strawberry fields of California, and the slaughterhouses of Wisconsin. He reveals the effects of immigration on the family left behind and offers a powerful portrait of migrant culture, an exchange that deposits hip hop in Indian villages while bringing Mexican pop to the northern plains. Far from joining the melting pot, Martinez argues, the migrants--as many as seven million in the U.S.--are spawning a new culture that will alter both countries as Latin America and the U.S. come increasingly to resemble each other. Intimate, compelling, written with passion and engagement, Crossing Over tells the epic story of a family, a town, a world in motion.

Metropolitan Books

A brilliantly illuminating portrait of the twenty-first-century West―a book as vast, diverse, and unexpected as the land and the people, from one of our foremost chroniclers of migration
The economic boom―and the devastation left in its wake―has been writ nowhere as large as on the West, the most iconic of American landscapes. Over the last decade the West has undergone a political and demographic upheaval comparable only to the opening of the frontier. Now, in Desert America, a work of powerful reportage and memoir, Rubén Martínez, acclaimed author of Crossing Over, evokes a new world of extremes: outrageous wealth and devastating poverty, sublime beauty and ecological ruin. 
In northern New Mexico, an epidemic of drug addiction flourishes in the shadow of some of the country's richest zip codes; in Joshua Tree, California, gentrification displaces people and history. In Marfa, Texas, an exclusive enclave triggers a race war near the banks of the Rio Grande. And on the Tohono O'odham reservation, Native Americans hunt down Mexican migrants crossing the most desolate stretch of the border.
With each desert story, Martínez explores his own encounter with the West and his love for this most contested region. In the process, he reveals that the great frontier is now a harbinger of the vast disparities that are redefining the very idea of America.

Desert America: Boom and Bust in the New Old West

Stories from the front line of the war in El Salvador are juxtaposed with tales of Hollywood-mythological childhood, and the history of Los Angeles, the city-stage where today many of the world’s political, cultural and aesthetic battles take place—both symbolically and literally. The parade of characters ranges from Latin American revolutionaries in exile to hip-hop teens in the US inner city; the endless “changing of the guard” in a transitional generation which came too late for Che Guevara and too early for the fall of the Berlin Wall. In scenes from Mexico City, Havana, Tijuana and Los Angeles. Martinez profiles the young guerillas-turned-relief workers of the 1986 Salvadorean earthquake, devotees of an innovative Latino “rocanrol“, graffiti gangs and their nightly “bombing runs”, and the vibrancy of youth culture in the barrios.

The Other Side: Fault Lines, Guerrilla Saints, and the True Heart of Rock 'n' Roll (Haymarket Series)

Verso

"Desert America is an uninsulated wire running through the hard-bitten, right-now, rough-edged Southwest, a land still being born. Go ahead and grab hold: first comes shock―maybe of recognition, maybe alarm―then you keep buzzing for page after electric page. You can't let go."―William deBuys, author of A Great Aridness and River of Traps The economic boom―and the devastation left in its wake―was writ nowhere as large as on the American West. Over the past decade, the most iconic of American landscapes has undergone a political and demographic upheaval comparable only to the opening of the frontier. In Desert America, a work of powerful reportage and memoir, acclaimed author Rubén Martínez explores a world of extremes: drug addiction flourishing in the shadow of some of America's richest zip codes, an exclusive Texas enclave that coexists with bloodshed on the banks of the Rio Grande, and Native Americans hunting down Mexican migrants crossing the most desolate stretch of the border.
Desert America details Martinez's own love for this most contested region and reveals that the great frontier is now in the forefront of the vast disparities that are redefining the very idea of America.

Desert America: A Journey Through Our Most Divided Landscape

Business & Money

Economics

Picador

"Beautifully written and important...Martinez shows us how 'America' is being reimagined by its uninvited, its disrespected, its invisible, and he shows us that they will change us, whether we like it or not."―Los Angeles Times 
In the decade since Crossing Over first appeared, immigration from Mexico has only become more fraught and more lethal, the rallying cry of nativist politics and a pawn in the war on terror. Yet the U.S.-Mexican border remains one of the most permeable boundaries in the world, breached daily by Mexicans in search of work. Thousands die crossing the line, and those who reach "the other side" are branded illegals, undocumented and unprotected. 
Following the emigration of the Chávez clan, an extended Mexican family who lost three sons in a tragic border accident, Rubén Martínez traces the migrants' progress from their small southern Mexican town of Cherán to California, Wisconsin, and Missouri. Far from joining the melting pot, Martínez argues, the seven million migrants who are now here are creating a new Hispanic-influenced culture that is dramatically altering both Mexico and the United States.
Hailed as "valuable," "passionate," and "terrific," Crossing Over puts a human face on the phenomenon of Mexican immigration and the vibrant Latino culture it introduces to the U.S., and remains a beautifully written classic of our time.

Literature & Fiction

United States

Cruzando la frontera / Crossing Over (Spanish Edition)

RECORDED BOOKS^

Spanning four continents and several years in the lives of seven immigrant families, The New Americans is at once the most globe-trotting and intimate introduction to the new American immigration. Emmy Award–winning journalist Rubén Martínez’s “powerful and perceptive chronicle” (Booklist) lyrically recounts the dramatic voyages and day-to-day experiences of a small group of families who were featured in the PBS documentary of the same name. They come from Mexico, Nigeria, Palestine, India, and the Dominican Republic, and wind up in Chicago, Montana, Silicon Valley, and the California badlands. Their stories—told with “enthralling” (Publishers Weekly) literary skill and illustrated with stunning portraits from award-winning photographer Joseph Rodriguez—paint a portrait of the new, multicultural America.
Martinez weaves his own family’s moving immigrant history into the book, and essays on the films of Indian American director Mira Nair, the contemporary corridos of Mexican border musicians Los Tigres del Norte, and other immigrant artists explore the ways the new immigrant culture is transforming the United States.

The New Americans

Rodriguez, Joseph

The New Press

"Fresh, nuanced and insightful….[A] thoughtful, readable contribution to the immigration debates. —Houston Chronicle Spanning four continents and several years in the lives of seven immigrant families, The New Americans is at once the most globe-trotting and intimate introduction to the new American immigration. Emmy award-winning journalist Rubén Martínez's "powerful and perceptive chronicle" (Booklist) lyrically recounts the dramatic voyages and day-to-day experiences of a small group of families who were featured in the PBS documentary of the same name. They come from Mexico, Nigeria, Palestine, India, and the Dominican Republic, and wind up in Chicago, Montana, Silicon Valley, and the California badlands. Their stories—told with "enthralling" (Publishers Weekly) literary skill, and illustrated with stunning portraits from award-winning photographer Joseph Rodriguez—paint a portrait of the new, multicultural America. Martínez weaves his own family's moving immigrant history into the book, and essays on the films of Indian American director Mira Nair, the contemporary corridos of Mexican border musicians Los Tigres del Norte, and other immigrant artists explore the ways the new immigrant culture is transforming the United States.

The New Americans: Seven Families Journey to Another Country

New Press, The

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Martínez, Rubén. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Martínez, Rubén

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Martínez, Rubén. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Crossing over (Turtleback School & Library Binding Edition)

The Other Side: Notes from the New L.A., Mexico City, and Beyond

Crossing Over: A Mexican Family on the Migrant Trail

Desert America: Boom and Bust in the New Old West

The Other Side: Fault Lines, Guerrilla Saints, and the True Heart of Rock 'n' Roll (Haymarket Series)

Desert America: A Journey Through Our Most Divided Landscape

Crossing Over: A Mexican Family on the Migrant Trail

Cruzando la frontera / Crossing Over (Spanish Edition)

The New Americans

The New Americans: Seven Families Journey to Another Country