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Once More to the River: Family Snapshots of Growing Up, Getting Out and Going Back
In "Once More to the River," Erasmo Guerra writes a moving account of his boyhood on the Texas-Mexico border.
An award-winning novelist and journalist, Guerra explores present-day political and cultural realities, and recounts the shattering loss his family suffered when his teenage sister was murdered.
Told with lyrical prose and a reporter’s ear for the “Tex-Mex” language of the region, these stories capture the voices of South Texas. By turns humorous and haunting, powerful and tender, this collection is an intensely personal chronicle of tragedy and the triumph of survival.
*
From the Introduction:
Many nights my mom stood on the front porch and hollered at my sister, brother and me to get home after we spent the day wandering the neighborhood. She called us desvalagados. Not exactly lost, but loose.
She didn’t like us spending too much time in “borrowed houses.”
“There’s nothing like your own home,” Mom said. “No hay más como tu propia casa.”
And there never will be. Although I’ve lived in New York City for nearly two decades, when I sit down at my writing desk I still hear my mom’s echoes and return to that stretch of the Texas-Mexico border along the Rio Grande River where I grew up.
Each of these stories first appeared in magazines, online journals and literary anthologies, but this book gathers them together in a proper collection of their own.
An award-winning novelist and journalist, Guerra explores present-day political and cultural realities, and recounts the shattering loss his family suffered when his teenage sister was murdered.
Told with lyrical prose and a reporter’s ear for the “Tex-Mex” language of the region, these stories capture the voices of South Texas. By turns humorous and haunting, powerful and tender, this collection is an intensely personal chronicle of tragedy and the triumph of survival.
*
From the Introduction:
Many nights my mom stood on the front porch and hollered at my sister, brother and me to get home after we spent the day wandering the neighborhood. She called us desvalagados. Not exactly lost, but loose.
She didn’t like us spending too much time in “borrowed houses.”
“There’s nothing like your own home,” Mom said. “No hay más como tu propia casa.”
And there never will be. Although I’ve lived in New York City for nearly two decades, when I sit down at my writing desk I still hear my mom’s echoes and return to that stretch of the Texas-Mexico border along the Rio Grande River where I grew up.
Each of these stories first appeared in magazines, online journals and literary anthologies, but this book gathers them together in a proper collection of their own.
- GenresNonfiction
70 pages, Paperback
First published July 6, 2011
5 people are currently reading
221 people want to read
About the author
Erasmo Guerra
10 books33 followersERASMO GUERRA is a Lambda Literary Award winner. His nonfiction stories have appeared in The New York Times, Texas Monthly, The Texas Observer and aired on NPR.
He is a member of the Macondo Writers' Workshop, headed by Sandra Cisneros. Born and raised on the Texas-Mexico border, he now lives in New York City and drinks too much coffee.
Find me on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ErasmoGuerra...
Watch book excerpts and interviews on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/user/erasmogue...
Listen to book excerpts on SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/erasmoguerra
He is a member of the Macondo Writers' Workshop, headed by Sandra Cisneros. Born and raised on the Texas-Mexico border, he now lives in New York City and drinks too much coffee.
Find me on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ErasmoGuerra...
Watch book excerpts and interviews on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/user/erasmogue...
Listen to book excerpts on SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/erasmoguerra
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
January 12, 2013
Knowing she's in heaven doesn't bring her back or seal over the grief, ever, does it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkoeEj...
Followers across the intersection. She floated away in a violent way -- does the river take you closer?
Literary snapshots that evoke a keen sense of sadness.
Born on and returning to a border, both with mother along for the ride.
Many other borders to cross, all described in a beautiful and hauntingly familial context. True stories of love and life shared with us by a writer of gorgeous words.
An honor to read.
(Twice read by this reviewer -- paperback and e-reader. Will keep both forever, lovingly. Will handle both with great care.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkoeEj...
Followers across the intersection. She floated away in a violent way -- does the river take you closer?
Literary snapshots that evoke a keen sense of sadness.
Born on and returning to a border, both with mother along for the ride.
Many other borders to cross, all described in a beautiful and hauntingly familial context. True stories of love and life shared with us by a writer of gorgeous words.
An honor to read.
(Twice read by this reviewer -- paperback and e-reader. Will keep both forever, lovingly. Will handle both with great care.)
April 19, 2013
This is one sensetive book. It made me smile and broke my heart. Such gentle writing style Guerra has. Although it has socio-political elements, like what it was like (for him) having to straddle between being an American and a Mexican, it also has a slight touch of feminism, like a diminutive butterfly perching on one's finger but doesn't demand. I particularly remember the glowing pages that detail the tragedy that shook the core of his life and his family, and how deep a wound it really was.
January 1, 2018
First book of 2018! I was expecting a full blown book but it was a compilation of short stories about a Mexican-American kid who grew up in Mission, Texas. I wish their was a bit more character development instead of random snippets of sayings from the mom. There was no background about the dad in the story or the other brother in the family. However, considering it was a collection of short stories it is somewhat understandable. This book has inspired me to write down my own stories of growing up in South Texas!
January 5, 2020
Memories
Wow. I almost cried. I grew up in Mission and reading this was like riding next to him on the streets of home.
Wow. I almost cried. I grew up in Mission and reading this was like riding next to him on the streets of home.
August 22, 2016
Once More to the River: Family Snapshots of Growing Up, Getting Out, and Going Back is a collection of short non-fiction stories by Erasmo Guerra, a former Rio Grande Valley native. The five stories included in the collection are told from an adult point of view and recall his personal experiences in the Rio Grande Valley as both child and adult. Moreover, they are a tribute to the hardships of Rio Grande Valley life and present a stock typing of the people who reside there.
The first story in the collection “Childhood’s End,” relates the dreams of every child, male and female alike, who desires to know more than what the Rio Grande Valley has to offer and how those dreams can be deferred. It presents an overview of overprotective parental expectations for children to stay close to the family and the limitations placed on females, specifically in regards to his older sister Michelle who was brutally murdered one summer, creating an angst for the author never to return home during the summer to enjoy the typical sights of crop-dusters, raspas, garbage bag swimming pools, and mesquite trees. This recollection also explores the sense of connection that the Rio Grande Valley people have to the land where they live as laborers…one that assures them of belonging with their hands in the dirt.
“Freedom Ride,” the second, explores the underlying and unspoken sense of fear of Rio Grande Valley residents (both legal and undocumented) with regards to the violence in Mexico concerning bus-jackings and being caught by Border Patrol. This story chronicles a Texas bus ride from the McAllen to San Antonio where Guerra presents a caricature of people commonly seen in the Rio Grande Valley, the “Vaquero,” “la comadre,” “la madre,” the “vet,” the bus driver, “Jesus,” and the “tortilla lady.” Amidst the camaraderie among females on the bus, there is still a segregation of sexes and a refusal to sit next to an unknown man. Guerra aptly uses the “Spanglish” of the region to describe the scene and give life to his character types.
The third story in the collection, “Tex-Mex Express,” grapples with identity, what it means to be a Texas – Mexican, from food choices – pig cookies and panaderías to the routine of crossing the border to visit family. It explores the adaptability of the people of the Rio Grande Valley, jerry-rigging bus doors, putting aluminum foil on windows to reflect the heat, and making enchiladas with government cheese. Guerra depicts the people in both face and voice, presenting the older, more polite, generation (Mexican-Mexican) with a hardworking, wrinkled and sun-baked image and the younger generation as “chiflada.” He contrasts this “broken” image of the people with an indomitable spirit with the media/TV image of outlaws.
“Once More to the River,” the fourth, characterizes the Los Ebanos ferry, otherwise known as El Chalán to Rio Grande Valley residents, and the everyday scenes typical on the Mexican side of the river in contrast with the American side. On the one side you had tarot readers, games of capture the flag with greased poles, vendors of carta blanca beer, topo chico, tamarind juice and chicharrones, dances, and lack of air conditioning. On the other, you have Christians, movie theatres, toll booths, Migra boats, and Border Patrol shacks. Guerra refers to historical happenings of drownings, funerals with glass-topped caskets, restaurants closing due to economy and robbery, reports of murderous cab drivers, and family sorrows while describing the border between and the idea that there is always someone waiting for you on the other side.
The final story, “Recuerdo: My Sister Remembered,” begins with a description of his deceased sister’s quinceañera picture, characterizing the members of his family. He then uses a type of collective memory experience of different family members’ participation in quinceañeras to contrast with that of hers and his own. This memory is also compounded with the pain of his sister’s murder which forever tainted the Fourth of July for him. Guerra ends this story with a letter to his deceased sister as he tells her about how their mother took him to visit her gravesite and the church where her both her quinceañera and funeral had been held. The author questions who will remember the Guerra family when there are no living heirs.
With the recollections contained within Once More to the River, Guerra characterizes the people of the Rio Grande Valley and weaves both a beautiful and sad tribute to the Guerra family and their personal experiences of border life in Texas. He leaves a lasting memory for the family which has no younger generation to tell their tales of life on the Rio Grande.
Nianna E. Gustovich
The first story in the collection “Childhood’s End,” relates the dreams of every child, male and female alike, who desires to know more than what the Rio Grande Valley has to offer and how those dreams can be deferred. It presents an overview of overprotective parental expectations for children to stay close to the family and the limitations placed on females, specifically in regards to his older sister Michelle who was brutally murdered one summer, creating an angst for the author never to return home during the summer to enjoy the typical sights of crop-dusters, raspas, garbage bag swimming pools, and mesquite trees. This recollection also explores the sense of connection that the Rio Grande Valley people have to the land where they live as laborers…one that assures them of belonging with their hands in the dirt.
“Freedom Ride,” the second, explores the underlying and unspoken sense of fear of Rio Grande Valley residents (both legal and undocumented) with regards to the violence in Mexico concerning bus-jackings and being caught by Border Patrol. This story chronicles a Texas bus ride from the McAllen to San Antonio where Guerra presents a caricature of people commonly seen in the Rio Grande Valley, the “Vaquero,” “la comadre,” “la madre,” the “vet,” the bus driver, “Jesus,” and the “tortilla lady.” Amidst the camaraderie among females on the bus, there is still a segregation of sexes and a refusal to sit next to an unknown man. Guerra aptly uses the “Spanglish” of the region to describe the scene and give life to his character types.
The third story in the collection, “Tex-Mex Express,” grapples with identity, what it means to be a Texas – Mexican, from food choices – pig cookies and panaderías to the routine of crossing the border to visit family. It explores the adaptability of the people of the Rio Grande Valley, jerry-rigging bus doors, putting aluminum foil on windows to reflect the heat, and making enchiladas with government cheese. Guerra depicts the people in both face and voice, presenting the older, more polite, generation (Mexican-Mexican) with a hardworking, wrinkled and sun-baked image and the younger generation as “chiflada.” He contrasts this “broken” image of the people with an indomitable spirit with the media/TV image of outlaws.
“Once More to the River,” the fourth, characterizes the Los Ebanos ferry, otherwise known as El Chalán to Rio Grande Valley residents, and the everyday scenes typical on the Mexican side of the river in contrast with the American side. On the one side you had tarot readers, games of capture the flag with greased poles, vendors of carta blanca beer, topo chico, tamarind juice and chicharrones, dances, and lack of air conditioning. On the other, you have Christians, movie theatres, toll booths, Migra boats, and Border Patrol shacks. Guerra refers to historical happenings of drownings, funerals with glass-topped caskets, restaurants closing due to economy and robbery, reports of murderous cab drivers, and family sorrows while describing the border between and the idea that there is always someone waiting for you on the other side.
The final story, “Recuerdo: My Sister Remembered,” begins with a description of his deceased sister’s quinceañera picture, characterizing the members of his family. He then uses a type of collective memory experience of different family members’ participation in quinceañeras to contrast with that of hers and his own. This memory is also compounded with the pain of his sister’s murder which forever tainted the Fourth of July for him. Guerra ends this story with a letter to his deceased sister as he tells her about how their mother took him to visit her gravesite and the church where her both her quinceañera and funeral had been held. The author questions who will remember the Guerra family when there are no living heirs.
With the recollections contained within Once More to the River, Guerra characterizes the people of the Rio Grande Valley and weaves both a beautiful and sad tribute to the Guerra family and their personal experiences of border life in Texas. He leaves a lasting memory for the family which has no younger generation to tell their tales of life on the Rio Grande.
Nianna E. Gustovich
May 3, 2012
Guerra's stories of his upbringing as the middle child in a Mexican American family in Texas made me laugh, cry, and grind my teeth. The most impressive aspect of the collection is his ability to share the hilarity and heartaches without falling prey to self-pity. Highly recommended.
January 5, 2016
I kind of had a mild attack when his sister's murder was announced.
September 6, 2011
I grew up in Mission, TX...these stories are authentic and I wanted more
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews