Finalist for the National Book Award!
In this beautifully wrought memoir, award-winning writer John Philip Santos weaves together dream fragments, family remembrances, and Chicano mythology, reaching back into time and place to blend the story of one Mexican family with the soul of an entire people. The story unfolds through a pageant of unforgettable family figures: from Madrina--touched with epilepsy and prophecy ever since, as a girl, she saw a dying soul leave its body--to Teofilo, who was kidnapped as an infant and raised by the Kikapu Indians of Northern Mexico. At the heart of the book is Santos' search for the meaning of his grandfather's suicide in San Antonio, Texas, in 1939.
Part treasury of the elders, part elegy, part personal odyssey, this is an immigration tale and a haunting family story that offers a rich, magical view of Mexican-American culture.
Places Left Unfinished at the Time of Creation
Family Trees
Testimonio
1. Tierra de Viejitas
2. Códices de los Abuelos
3. Valle de Silencio
Mexico Viejo
4. Cuento Mestizo
5. The Flowered Path
6. From Huisache to Cedar
Peregrinaje
7. Zona de Niebla
8. Aztec Theater
9. Rain of Stones
Volador
10. Exilio
11. La Ruta
12. Una Canción
Epilogue
Tent of Grief: An Afterword
Acknowledgments
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