What do you think?
Rate this book
The Magic of Blood
Dagoberto Gilb is a powerful and important new talent in American fiction. Fresh, funny, relentless, beautifully crafted, his writing possesses that rare Chekhovian ability to perfectly capture the nuances of ordinary life–and make it resonate with unexpected meaning. The Magic of Blood is his unforgettable first book.
304 pages, Paperback
First published June 4, 1994
9 people are currently reading
381 people want to read
About the author
Dagoberto Gilb
38 books44 followersDagoberto Gilb was born in the city of Los Angeles, his mother a Mexican who crossed the border illegally, and his father a Spanish-speaking Anglo raised in East Los Angeles. They divorced before he began kindergarten. He attended several junior colleges until he transferred to the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he studied philosophy and religion and graduated with both bachelor'
s and master's degrees. After that, he began his life as a construction worker, migrating back and forth from Los Angeles and El Paso. A father, he eventually joined the union in Los Angeles; a member of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners, he became a class-A journeyman carpenter, and his employment for the next twelve years was on high-rise buildings.
s and master's degrees. After that, he began his life as a construction worker, migrating back and forth from Los Angeles and El Paso. A father, he eventually joined the union in Los Angeles; a member of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners, he became a class-A journeyman carpenter, and his employment for the next twelve years was on high-rise buildings.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 27 of 27 reviews
May 16, 2011
If Raymond Carver got stoned and had a love child with a plate of fajitas and a twelve back of Budweiser, that love child would call itself Dagoberto Gilb and then punch you in the face for making such a stupid analogy.
Dagoberto Gilb is a tough dude. He writes about tough dudes. And he writes about tough dudes being tough dudes, and only does the reader get to know that these tough dudes aren't so much tough as they are pretty damn hopeless. It's quite a trick he pulls off (see Parking Places or Love in L.A.), and I believe if anyone wants to know what exactly the word "Machisimo" means, save yourself the academic jargon and BS courses taught by a cultural studies expert and just read this collection. These stories will kick you in the ass. They will bully you. They will buy you a beer and then tell you to stay the hell away from their girlfriends and then ask you for a ride home in the same breath. Seriously.
So if you like Carver's prose, if you like stories that read more like snapshots of the down and out falling only deeper and deeper, get yourself some Gilb. This collection draws from his earliest stories and so it's nice to see Gilb's prose get tighter and tighter as it reads on. Good stuff, cabron!
Dagoberto Gilb is a tough dude. He writes about tough dudes. And he writes about tough dudes being tough dudes, and only does the reader get to know that these tough dudes aren't so much tough as they are pretty damn hopeless. It's quite a trick he pulls off (see Parking Places or Love in L.A.), and I believe if anyone wants to know what exactly the word "Machisimo" means, save yourself the academic jargon and BS courses taught by a cultural studies expert and just read this collection. These stories will kick you in the ass. They will bully you. They will buy you a beer and then tell you to stay the hell away from their girlfriends and then ask you for a ride home in the same breath. Seriously.
So if you like Carver's prose, if you like stories that read more like snapshots of the down and out falling only deeper and deeper, get yourself some Gilb. This collection draws from his earliest stories and so it's nice to see Gilb's prose get tighter and tighter as it reads on. Good stuff, cabron!
May 30, 2019
2003 notebook: Stories of Mexican-American workmen and drunks in border towns. Lovely stuff.
February 11, 2017
No one does human failing and dangerous friends quite like Gilb. Beers are drunk and fights are had, but most of the drama stays in the realm of subtle slights and miscommunication. Like Jim Shepard, who thankfully has another collection coming, I am sad to be out of his stories.
October 24, 2019
I read about 150 short stories a year, and have done so for about 10 years. Dagoberto is as good a short story writer as you will find IF you think about what he is saying. He doesn't intentionally include motif, theme, characterization, dialogue, etc., into a unique blend of storytelling. It just comes out that way. His stories are deceptively simple. They have deep roots and important meanings. Try reading The Death Mask of Pancho Villa, about the best 'coming of age' story you will ever read (about a man, anyway). Dagoberto got interested in short story writing when he was working construction at a college, where Raymond Carver happened to be teaching. He heard about the course, signed up, and the rest is history. Also, you want a sensible, sensitive, magical understanding of Latino, LatinoX or whatever the F--K you want to call it, read his work. He gets it. He gets it so profoundly, you need to read the stories several times until you get it. And maybe best of all, he isn't an overeducated, upper middle class, highly verbal schmuk who focuses on the atavars of dullness among the boring social groups. Reminds me of Bernard Malamud and Isaac B. Singer. Magical down to earthness
April 1, 2008
I really enjoyed this book. I had never heard of the author, I picked the volume up for a steal at a thrift store and was generally blown away. I don't for the most part generally go in for collections of short stories. I often feel that the ones I like end when I wish them to be a novel, only to be replaced by a story I like less. I don't find that to be the case with this book. While it contains a variety of characters it has a consistent believable realness to each voice that sustains the interest from one story to the next. Nearly all the stories end at a satisfactory point of conclusion as well.
This made me want to dig deeper into the Dagaberto's body of work.
This made me want to dig deeper into the Dagaberto's body of work.
October 8, 2016
Since book preferences are a very subjective thing I don't wanna go into detail. however, I find the shortness of the stories somewhat dissaüointing since the content is cut out out of everyday situations that - at least that's how I feel - I had a hard time getting into it. However u can relate to one or two stories
October 14, 2023
I've been poking around the PEN Hemingway winners and I decided to check this short story collection out. What do you do with a guy like Dagoberto Gilb? He DOES have talent. I particularly liked "Nancy Flores," an elegy for adolescent crushes and the fun dialogue in "Franklin Delano Roosevelt Was a Democrat." The problem here is that Gilb HAS a voice, but he's muzzled himself with MFA bullshit and a good deal of these stories come across as inauthentic dirty realism and Raymond Carver knockoffs. When it's clear that Gilb has experiences about Hispanics in Los Angeles to tell us. So this is a frustrating reading experience. Many of the stories about working stiffs in the second part tend to be fairly indistinguishable from each other. In other words, it seemed to me that Gilb PULLED his punches and NEUTERED his voice to get published. And, hey, it worked. Because he landed the PEN Award as well as attention from high-profile members of the literati (all white). But I really despise writers who sanitize themselves like this.
March 28, 2021
The stories in this book feel close to home. Gilb lays out the would-be mundane scenery in such a vivid and memorable manner. He helps you see and feel what the narrator is experiencing in a way that makes it feel nostalgic.
October 11, 2011
Vato 101: The Magic of Blood, by Dagoberto Gilb
You have to feel never married. You have to wear an almost new football jersey. It has to take place in East L.A. You have to think about the possibility before it happens.
– from “Recipe”, by Dagoberto Gilb. The Magic of Blood.
One time I asked my moms whatever happened to Pops and she slapped the shit out of me and was like, “Eddie Vato, don’t you ever ask about that culo maricon ever again!"
But lemme tell you, fools, if I ever did have a pops then his name is most DEFINITELY Dagoberto Gilb, and he’s a puro motherfucker who writes some puro-ass short stories like the ones collected in The Magic of Blood (University of New Mexico Press).
Shit’s crazy. I mean, for real. Dude writes stories about some down-and-out vatos. Some beer-drinkin, dope-smokin, child-ditchin, rrruca-pokin, wife beater-wearin eses living in L.A. and my own hometown of El Paso, Texas (oh wassup, Tigre and Chanate and Baby Dice and toda mi gente en Delta y Concepcion!). But seriously. My man Dago writes about shit that’ll make you go, “Whaaat, bitch…that’s a story? That ain't a story!”
But trust me, fool. It is.
Like “Parking Places”, por ejemplo—one of the first short stories that Dago ever got published when he was just some cabron living off food stamps. The story’s about two couples, right—the Veloz’s and the Carillos—and they share a duplex and soon this dude John Veloz is all pissed off at his boy Vic Carillo because Vic be taking up all the damn parking spaces outside. The whole thing, fool! That’s what it’s about!
But that shit’s true. That’s how it is. One time my Uncle Rudy took a baseball bat to this fool’s windshield ‘cause dude parked in the handicap spot that belonged to him. And Uncle Rudy ain’t handicapped or nothing but it’s just that he been parking there for DAYS. So I can understand pinche John Veloz in this story, who gets all mad when the Carillos not only take up all the spaces but one night they even dis his wife’s home cooking and that shit’s too far, you know? But that’s what Dago’s good at. Because everyone knows a Vic Carillo and you ain’t gotta have a degree in literature to appreciate this shit.
So hook yourself up. Dago’s writing is real quick, too—some short ass sentences—and this one dude at the bookstore was like, “Yo, Eddie Vato, that’s minimalism, fool.” And I was like, “Yo, bookstore dude, your pito's minimalism, fool,” and he was like, "That's not what your moms said," and that night me and Baby Dice waited for dude to get off work and then beat the fuck out of him.
Anyway, whether you can read or not, you’ll get something out of these stories and you ain’t even got to be a vato to understand them. You just gotta be someone who’s been so down in life that you just wanted to scream at something and punch a hole through the wall and then say sorry and repair the damn thing.
But if you only read one story in this collection, make it “Desperado”, which is about this dude who pisses off his wife so much that she leaves his ass one night with their baby and the whole story is about this piece of shit kid crying and crying and meanwhile this dude has no idea how to hang out with his own son and by the end of the story it says, “He wanted to know where the fuck [his wife] was, how she could leave knowing the boy needed his mama.”
And that pretty much sums up all the broke ass fools in all these stories. Kickin and screamin like good vatos do. Always in need of their damn mamas.
So you can read this collection of short stories. Or, you can just eat a plate of fajitas and drink a six pack of Budweiser and take a hit from some stank ass Mexican weed and blast some Hank Williams Jr. and the effect is probably the same. It’s up to you, fool. But don't do both, or the border might implode, creating a black hole that will suck up every last remaining vato out there and don't get too excited, pinche gringos, because you better believe people like me and Dagoberto Gilb are taking you with us.
VATO RATING: 10/10 fajita platters
You have to feel never married. You have to wear an almost new football jersey. It has to take place in East L.A. You have to think about the possibility before it happens.
– from “Recipe”, by Dagoberto Gilb. The Magic of Blood.
One time I asked my moms whatever happened to Pops and she slapped the shit out of me and was like, “Eddie Vato, don’t you ever ask about that culo maricon ever again!"
But lemme tell you, fools, if I ever did have a pops then his name is most DEFINITELY Dagoberto Gilb, and he’s a puro motherfucker who writes some puro-ass short stories like the ones collected in The Magic of Blood (University of New Mexico Press).
Shit’s crazy. I mean, for real. Dude writes stories about some down-and-out vatos. Some beer-drinkin, dope-smokin, child-ditchin, rrruca-pokin, wife beater-wearin eses living in L.A. and my own hometown of El Paso, Texas (oh wassup, Tigre and Chanate and Baby Dice and toda mi gente en Delta y Concepcion!). But seriously. My man Dago writes about shit that’ll make you go, “Whaaat, bitch…that’s a story? That ain't a story!”
But trust me, fool. It is.
Like “Parking Places”, por ejemplo—one of the first short stories that Dago ever got published when he was just some cabron living off food stamps. The story’s about two couples, right—the Veloz’s and the Carillos—and they share a duplex and soon this dude John Veloz is all pissed off at his boy Vic Carillo because Vic be taking up all the damn parking spaces outside. The whole thing, fool! That’s what it’s about!
But that shit’s true. That’s how it is. One time my Uncle Rudy took a baseball bat to this fool’s windshield ‘cause dude parked in the handicap spot that belonged to him. And Uncle Rudy ain’t handicapped or nothing but it’s just that he been parking there for DAYS. So I can understand pinche John Veloz in this story, who gets all mad when the Carillos not only take up all the spaces but one night they even dis his wife’s home cooking and that shit’s too far, you know? But that’s what Dago’s good at. Because everyone knows a Vic Carillo and you ain’t gotta have a degree in literature to appreciate this shit.
So hook yourself up. Dago’s writing is real quick, too—some short ass sentences—and this one dude at the bookstore was like, “Yo, Eddie Vato, that’s minimalism, fool.” And I was like, “Yo, bookstore dude, your pito's minimalism, fool,” and he was like, "That's not what your moms said," and that night me and Baby Dice waited for dude to get off work and then beat the fuck out of him.
Anyway, whether you can read or not, you’ll get something out of these stories and you ain’t even got to be a vato to understand them. You just gotta be someone who’s been so down in life that you just wanted to scream at something and punch a hole through the wall and then say sorry and repair the damn thing.
But if you only read one story in this collection, make it “Desperado”, which is about this dude who pisses off his wife so much that she leaves his ass one night with their baby and the whole story is about this piece of shit kid crying and crying and meanwhile this dude has no idea how to hang out with his own son and by the end of the story it says, “He wanted to know where the fuck [his wife] was, how she could leave knowing the boy needed his mama.”
And that pretty much sums up all the broke ass fools in all these stories. Kickin and screamin like good vatos do. Always in need of their damn mamas.
So you can read this collection of short stories. Or, you can just eat a plate of fajitas and drink a six pack of Budweiser and take a hit from some stank ass Mexican weed and blast some Hank Williams Jr. and the effect is probably the same. It’s up to you, fool. But don't do both, or the border might implode, creating a black hole that will suck up every last remaining vato out there and don't get too excited, pinche gringos, because you better believe people like me and Dagoberto Gilb are taking you with us.
VATO RATING: 10/10 fajita platters
April 8, 2012
In this collection of short stories, Dagoberto Gilb made a compelling case for why i felt the need to add some American literature to my reading list. His characters, mainly working-class Hispanic men, were incredibly real and compelling.
Reviewing a collection of short stories is more challenging for me than reviewing a novel - because each story is unique, but too short to merit its own time. So here I will discuss some of the stories I found stayed with me long after I put the book down. The first story that made me sit back and sigh with enjoyment was Al, in Phoenix, in which an impatient and suspicious younger traveler encounters Al, a diligent and thorough auto mechanic. With Al, the reader slowly comes to a place of deep respect for Al, and his attention to detail, quality, and perfection. Al is the kind of person we would all like to meet, and his type seems to be endangered in the fast-paced modern world .
In The Prize, a man discusses fate and winning with his barber Chino - who has a lucky streak. The narrator strikes a bargain with Chino that if Chino wishes or prays for good luck to come to the narrator, he the narrator will share some of his fortune with Chino. As soon as the deal is struck, the narrator begins to back out of his deal in his head - defining which types of winning he would credit to Chino - and which he would still believe he had "earned" himself. When he ultimately does not receive a prize he has been anticipating, is it because he was contemplating screwing Chino out of his reward? The complex internal workings of our narrator in this story were so real - who hasn't struck bargains with luck or fate in their own mind?
Several of the stories are about life's little disappointments, that seem bigger at the time. In Parking Places, a Hispanic family moves into a nicer neighborhood, and attempts to bond with their new neighbors. But a slow boiling dispute over street parking spaces taints a new friendship, and when the family moves due to changed economic circumstances, it seems natural and partially because of that relationship. In another story, a couple are disappointed when their babysitter, the mother of a friend of their son's, does not show up for date night. Gilb's characters are poor, working class men and families. They are construction workers who take pride in their trade, families in various stages of brokenness. The stories feel like true snapshots of Americana, told through a particular view that was new, different, and wonderful for me. This series of stories earns an unexpected high recommendation from me
Reviewing a collection of short stories is more challenging for me than reviewing a novel - because each story is unique, but too short to merit its own time. So here I will discuss some of the stories I found stayed with me long after I put the book down. The first story that made me sit back and sigh with enjoyment was Al, in Phoenix, in which an impatient and suspicious younger traveler encounters Al, a diligent and thorough auto mechanic. With Al, the reader slowly comes to a place of deep respect for Al, and his attention to detail, quality, and perfection. Al is the kind of person we would all like to meet, and his type seems to be endangered in the fast-paced modern world .
In The Prize, a man discusses fate and winning with his barber Chino - who has a lucky streak. The narrator strikes a bargain with Chino that if Chino wishes or prays for good luck to come to the narrator, he the narrator will share some of his fortune with Chino. As soon as the deal is struck, the narrator begins to back out of his deal in his head - defining which types of winning he would credit to Chino - and which he would still believe he had "earned" himself. When he ultimately does not receive a prize he has been anticipating, is it because he was contemplating screwing Chino out of his reward? The complex internal workings of our narrator in this story were so real - who hasn't struck bargains with luck or fate in their own mind?
Several of the stories are about life's little disappointments, that seem bigger at the time. In Parking Places, a Hispanic family moves into a nicer neighborhood, and attempts to bond with their new neighbors. But a slow boiling dispute over street parking spaces taints a new friendship, and when the family moves due to changed economic circumstances, it seems natural and partially because of that relationship. In another story, a couple are disappointed when their babysitter, the mother of a friend of their son's, does not show up for date night. Gilb's characters are poor, working class men and families. They are construction workers who take pride in their trade, families in various stages of brokenness. The stories feel like true snapshots of Americana, told through a particular view that was new, different, and wonderful for me. This series of stories earns an unexpected high recommendation from me
January 15, 2013
I read this because Junot Diaz said that he was a big influence. I am not sure that Gilb is great, but I sure liked the El Paso/Los Angeles connection. I think my favorite stories had to do with construction (including the one guy everyone was afraid of, and the exposition of the class system on a job site -- I have some not much experience); the high school girlfriend sacrificed on the altar of a boy's preening fears of his homie's opinions; the mood of the late night visit of an old party buddy and his sketchy friend sporting an historical artifact of dubious provenance; and best of the bunch because of its currency in my life, the way parking spots in a neighborhood ruin good will. That was probably the purest in balance of aggression and remorse...that one was five star, I think. I can recommend, although for some reason it took me forever to read. More dense than you might think.
April 17, 2010
When you think about describing Charles Bukowski (or me) as a misogynist, read some Gilb.
Women in Gilb's stories are owned objects to be treated properly or not (like good boots, or fancy hats). They are circumstances to be dealt with--endured, enjoyed, escaped (like a mean boss at a good-paying job, or a beautiful lover's rank breath).
But they're not characters, which is to say they are not presented as people.
It's human to hate and love other people. To be genuinely loved or hated is to be thought human.
Still, this is good stuff. The comparison to Bukowski goes beyond gender politics, but I'll leave it out.
Good, ruddy, working-class tales, written (and this is a feat, I think) for people who will empathize with Gilb's protagonists, and for those who can't.
Tight, gently-inflected prose. Yes, it's code-switchy, but not to the point of gimmickry or opacity.
Women in Gilb's stories are owned objects to be treated properly or not (like good boots, or fancy hats). They are circumstances to be dealt with--endured, enjoyed, escaped (like a mean boss at a good-paying job, or a beautiful lover's rank breath).
But they're not characters, which is to say they are not presented as people.
It's human to hate and love other people. To be genuinely loved or hated is to be thought human.
Still, this is good stuff. The comparison to Bukowski goes beyond gender politics, but I'll leave it out.
Good, ruddy, working-class tales, written (and this is a feat, I think) for people who will empathize with Gilb's protagonists, and for those who can't.
Tight, gently-inflected prose. Yes, it's code-switchy, but not to the point of gimmickry or opacity.
March 28, 2016
Southwestern grit lit. In some way, every story involves a male laborer battling unemployment and/or exploitation. Deals a lot with sickness, violence, pride, masculinity, addiction, prejudice, and desperation. Includes undocumented laborers from Mexico, but I'm especially interested in the characters who leave Texas and New Mexico looking for work in California. Everything here revolves around work or the lack of it. Some of these are just character experiments. All are pretty short, some so much so that they genuinely feel unfinished. Feels like Raymond Carver. Every story is told from the perspective of a man, a lot of whom of the very same type. Makes me wonder if, in writing about a population that isn't often written about, this collection had to ONLY be about that population. Gets pretty repetitive after a while.
Read
December 31, 2017This book gets in the way of itself. It's like sending the kids to the store with the request "get the ingredients for dinner." You'll just end up with everything, not the ingredients you need. There are some great stories in here, but I was *thankful* when I finally finished this book that deserved better editing (as far as length) than it got.
October 17, 2008
Utterly compelling. Wonderfully written, funny and very memorable. "Churchgoers" is one of my all time favorite short stories. Gilb writes about work and its meaning in a very unique voice all his own.
December 1, 2009
I loved this collection of short stories in graduate school. Dagoberto Gilb writes realistic stories of the struggles that working class Californians, presumably Mexican Americans, go through. The stories are provocative and passionately written.
June 3, 2017
I was hoping to use a story from this collection with freshmen. I found one which was clean enough, but a bit out of their reach as it turned out. A good collection of stories that focus on working class issues.
Want to read
November 27, 2007I read a few of these stories back in 2005 and then got to meet him a year later. From the few that I read, this book is really great. I'll give a better review when I read the rest of it.
March 18, 2008
For anyone living in the Land of Enchantment (although this takes place in AZ).
May 19, 2008
frequently powerful stories about working class mexican-american life, mostly in texas. recommended.
Want to read
November 14, 2008A professor (hi Rus, if you're out there) raves about this guy. Found it at an antique store, along with some old Star Wars memorabilia. Strangely, I only bought this.
June 20, 2009
Solid short stories about working class adventures and transformations. Definitely worth picking up. Gilb has a good ear for dialogue.
December 5, 2010
I'm not a huge short story fan, but I really enjoyed these. Short, plot-driven stories about working class Mexican-Americans in LA and the Southeast. Reminds me of Hemingway.
March 20, 2012
Read my review at my blog.
August 24, 2013
Gave it a try; he can depict with vividness Latin-American immigrant life in the southwest. I read it because Junot Diaz cited Gilb as an author he appreciates. I think Diaz is better.
April 19, 2015
Seemingly simple but profoundly insightful slice-of-life stories of blue-collar life in California and the southwestern United States.
August 9, 2014
I read this book years ago and still remember loving it. Catching up now on some of his other books.
Displaying 1 - 27 of 27 reviews