Antonio's Gun and Delfino's Dream: True Tales of Mexican Migration

by Sam Quinones

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 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.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Essays

326 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2007

About the author

Sam Quinones is a long-time journalist and author of 3 books of narrative nonfiction.

He worked for the LA Times for 10 years. He spent 10 years before that as a freelance journalist in Mexico.

His first book is True Tales from Another Mexico: The Lynch Mob, the Popsicle Kings, Chalino and the Bronx, published in 2001, a collection of nonfiction stories about drag queens, popsicle-makers, Oaxacan basketball players, telenovela stars, gunmen, migrants, and slain narco-balladeer, Chalino Sanchez.

In 2007, he published Antonio's Gun and Delfino's Dream: True Tales of Mexican Migration. In this volume he tells stories of the Henry Ford of velvet painting, opera singers in Tijuana, the Tomato King of Jerez, Zacatecas, the stories of a young construction worker heading north, and Quinones' own encounter with the narco-Mennonites of Chihuahua.

His third book was released in 2015. Dreamland: the True Tale of America's Opiate Epidemic recounts twin tales of drug market in the 21st Century. A pharmaceutical company markets its new painkiller as "virtually nonaddictive" just as heroin traffickers from a small town in Mexico devise a system of selling heroin retail, like pizza. The result is the beginning of America's latest drug scourge, and the resurgence of heroin across the country.

The book has received rave reviews in Salon.com, Christian Science Monitor, Wall Street Journal, American Conservative, Kirkus Review, and National Public Radio.

Amazon readers gave Dreamland 4.7 stars and called it "a masterpiece" and "a thriller."

"I couldn't put it down," said one. Said another: "This book tells one of the most important stories of our time."

Following Antonio's Gun, the San Francisco Chronicle called Quinones "the most original American writer on Mexico and the border out there."

He has done numerous Skype sessions with book groups that have chosen his books to read.

Quinones also writes True Tales: A Reporter's Blog, at his website, http://www.samquinones.com.

For several years, he has given writing workshops called Tell Your True Tale. Most recently the workshops have taken place at East Los Angeles Public Library, from which have emerged three volumes of true stories by new authors from the community.

For more information, go to http://www.colapublib.org/tytt/.

Reviews

[brian · Rating 3 out of 5]

damn good. kind of reads like a collection of New Yorker articles (minus the smugness) about a single subject matter: the lives of mexicans once they've snuck over the border... here we encounter drag queens, construction workers, velvet painters, the most crooked politicians ever (yes, even by american standards), fruit pickers who work their way up to becoming ranch owners, etc... very interesting stuff.

[Gilesslade · Rating 5 out of 5]

There seems to be very little in English about the Great Mexican Migration to the United States that occurred in the decades following 'la crisis' in 1982. Here is a series of really beautiful, stirring narratives that take you directly into the lives of Latin immigrants to America, by Sam Quinones whose mastery of style and storytelling are spare yet novelistic and completely engaging. After a long frustrating search for material in English about the demographic transformation taking place in America, this book just fell into my hand. It is delicious and completely unexpected.

[bella dominguez · Rating 4 out of 5]

a beautiful collection of stories about mexican migration and how strong the mexican people and spirit is, also i will never stop talking about velvet painting

[Nick · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is a relief to read a book about the border in which drug traffickers wait until the last chapter to make an appearance (and even then, they are Mennonite descendants living in Chihuahua). Instead, Quinones introduces us to opera enthusiasts in Tijuana, chases down the painters of all those black velvet paintings from the seventies (it was a sizable industry in Ciudad Juarez at the time), traces the journey of the title's Delfino from his remote town in the Veracruz mountains to Mexico City to Los Angeles. He covers politics in both South Gate, California and Zacatecas and finds South Gate more vicious and corrupt. He covers a soccer league in Kansas and explores what it means for the demography and economics of the area without losing sight of the joy of the sport. Quinones must be one of those reporters who can convince anyone to talk to him (except a Mennonite meth king). The border has more than its share of outsized personalities. Quinonez' gift to us is meeting some lesser-known royalty: among them, Mercedes Quinonez, the queen of TIjuana opera, Chuy Morin, the king of velvet paintings, and Delfino Juarez, the break-dancer of the Alameda in downtown Mexico City.

[Josh · Rating 3 out of 5]

Quinones' writing style can occasionally be too cutesy, neat, and pedestrian for my taste and his idealistic faith in the American dream (though he doesn't ignore the problems, either) seems a bit naive at this point in history, but these are fascinating journalistic pieces about the lives of Mexicans who have immigrated to the United States (and sometimes back to Mexico, by choice or otherwise) or who live in border towns. It's also a retroactively depressing read in a time when both major parties in this country demonize immigrants and when the majority of voters are anti-immigrant. We live in a nation with too many easily manipulated cowards who are incapable of understanding the work and sacrifices made by the people covered in this book.

[Alf · Rating 5 out of 5]

Damn, Quinones knows how to do the whole micro-to-macro thing really, really well. This is a super enjoyable read, a bunch of stories focused on individuals from various paths and backgrounds, but Quinones uses these as a vehicle for making a larger point and describing behaviors and patterns about Mexican migration. The story revolving around the politics of Maywood, CA was particularly interesting, but every single story has a catchy hook that leaves you wanting to learn more.

[Maria Nelson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Honestly outdated and out of touch. Simplifies immigration across the southern border to nothing more than a decision to make money and build big houses which, if it was ever true, surely isn’t now. Some powerful and touching stories but largely disconnected from the actual issue at hand.

[Virginia Walter · Rating 4 out of 5]

A penetrating and beautifully written look at the lives of some Mexicans living on both sides of the border with the U.S. Quinones clarifies the economic and personal motivations behind the migrants' life-changing decisions. I especially loved the chapter about the Tijuana Opera Company.

[Sally Duffy · Rating 5 out of 5]

excellent

This book opened the door to a culture I did not really know. I have met hardworking Hispanic immigrants but knew very little about their lives, where they were from, or what drove them to Norte America. I plan to read this author’s first book on this subject now.

[Shannon · Rating 5 out of 5]

KSKS

[Richard Drake · Rating 5 out of 5]

No one--and I mean no one--should presume to speak with authority on Mexican migration and diaspora (whether within or crossing international borders) or on native or immigrant culture and community (indigenous or Mestizo) without having read Sam Quinones’s two excellent books, "True Tales From Another Mexico: The Lynch Mob, The Popsicle Kings, Chalino, and The Bronx" (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2001) and "Antonio’s Gun and Delfino’s Dream: True Tales of Mexican Migration" (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2007). Don’t look for partisan advocacy or polemics here; instead, find, and delight in, fascinating “true tales” (emphasis on “true”) of displaced Oaxacans harvesting strawberries and artichokes in San Quintín, Baja California; of telenovelas, narcocorridos, and campesinos; of valientes, maquiladoras, and oyster divers; of entrepreneurs and evangelists; of assembly-line velvet painters in Juárez, Atolingan restaurateurs in Chicago, and Zapotec hoopsters, Chicano ward heelers, and Zacatecan agronomists in Santa Monica, South Gate, and Stockton.

A large part of what makes it all so good is that Quinones _doesn’t_ write about such broad, abstract, disembodied generalizations, concepts, and constructs as “demographics” and “ethnicities.” He writes about people: every character in every one of the True Tales has a name, a face, a voice, a vision unique unto himself. If there exists any reader who can remain unmoved by “Delfino II: Diez in the Desert,” Quinones’s poignant account of the ill-fated odyssey of ten Veracruzanos beset by scorpions, snakes, heatstroke, and hopelessness beneath the pitiless Arizona sun, I don’t want to meet him.

Though undeniably journalism of the highest order--evincing, as they do, the enterprise, intrepidity, and indefatigability of the reporter--Quinones’s True Tales are much more than that (not that reporting of this quality is in and of itself any mean feat). This is brilliant writing, period.

[Jogar01 · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book is more of a collection of vignettes involving immigrants and Quinones as observant/participant. Of especial interest to me was the contrasting of politics in Jerez, Zacatecas and South Gate, California. Both communities has to deal with populist and corrupt politicians. It is of interet to note how the communities organized for and against the politicians. In Mexico, it was the middle classes and status quo that rallied against "El Rey del Tomate", a caricaturesque patriarchical figure that seeked to erradicate poverty by turning the almost desertic lands of Jerez into "a mini United States". Of course, he didn't have a plan as to how to govern having had little education. He expected to administer the town as if it was a business, just as Mexico has been governed since what appears as time immemorial.
On the other side of the border, in South Gate, occurred what could be called the "Mexicanization of city goverment" with the election of a corrupt Mexican American 20-something man. This guy ran the town as if he was The Father of the inhabitants of South Gate. Corruption was rampant and as a result, money disappeared from the city coffers.
These two characters are an archetype of Shakespere's Richard III.

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

No one living in Mexico or America is unaffected by the issues of migration. Quinones's true accounts humanize an intensely political and economic predicament.

Each of these stories were touching in their own way. Some because of their hurt and loss; others for their success and beauty. Quinones gives a big picture perspective through aptly chosen personal experiences. Each vignette offers a view from the inside, which might be difficult for a Caucasian to obtain or understand without assistance.

Notably missing, however, are hard-hitting, pull-no-punches stories. This is the work of a free-lance journalist following his passion and curiosity, not an undercover super-cop. Questions about gangs, drugs, weapons and crime go largely unanswered.

After reading this book, I feel no better equipped to debate the larger issues involved, but I do have a better view of the driving forces.

[CabellCoLibrary]

ORFOB 2016

[LonewolfMX Luna · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have just finished reading this book these are a collection of immigrant stories such as Delfino's life in Mexico and his odyssey to the US in order to find a better quality of life. Other stories include the political battle against a corrupt politician in the city of Huntington Park, the story of Atolinga, Zacatecas and how many of it's people left it behind for Chicago and became successful entrepreneurs, a high school Futbol/Soccer team comprised of Mexican and Salavdorians in Kansas, the Tomato King Andres Bermudez, Opera in Tijuana, and Mennonites in Mexico as well many other stories that are incredible but true!

[Brendan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nine true stories about Mexican immigrants, well worth the read--some startling stories about the difficult realities of immigration. And humanizing for an all too often stereotyped group.

Starts with a good overview of the issues that push Mexicans to immigrate to the US. Interestingly, the author points out how the remittance money that is sent back to the families of immigrants in Mexico has allowed the Mexican govt. to put off the significant reform that is needed to curb the overall problem.

[William Crosby · Rating 5 out of 5]

Collection of true stories about Mexican immigration which focuses on individuals, but puts their personal lives into historical, political, and cultural context.

Fascinating reading and giving us much more than the surface politics of today (i.e. that immigrants are criminals) by talking about topics such as opera, Mennonite drug dealers, politics in U.S. cities with large Latino populations, soccer, and velvet paintings. We receive a much better idea of the interrelationships between Mexico and U.S.

[Lee Gargagliano · Rating 5 out of 5]

Sam Quinones has gathered a bizarre and fascinating collection of stories. Quinones again and again highlights the key background information to present a contextualized picture of Mexican migration and how it changes Mexico and the US. The writing is compelling and thought provoking. There were times when I wondered about some of the arguments, but even then I was left with questions to ponder.

[Ashley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this book for my ESL/immigration discussion group. The book paints the picture of Mexican/US migration through a series of true stories. While the writing wasn't my favorite, he did set out what he intended to do, and I came away both entertained and enlightened.

PS - I have a copy if anyone wants to borrow it.

[Kristenyque · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this since the University is really endorsing it, and now I understand why. It is a wonderful book written in a journalistic style. (The stories therein are true.) Each chapter has a main topic/storyline that leads into more subtle issues that help give a very wide, in-depth view of Mexican/American immigration issues.

[Henry · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a fascinating book about the reasons and causes for Mexican migration. In this age of people whining about "immigrants" this book shows them as people...and shows the reasons why they are doing what they are doing.

[Sarafia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent, detailed look at real immigration stories in the US.

[Maya · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quite good--now I need to read the author's first book.

[Christine Granados · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this book. Written in careful and intelligent way without racism or prejudice against the Mexican immigration and explains the immigration and how it'll never stop.

[Michael Andersen-Andrade · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book does a brilliant job of humanizing cross-border immigration and the growing interdependence of the U.S. and Mexico. I've ready many books on this subject and this is one of the best.

[Merrill Clark · Rating 3 out of 5]

It started out very strong, with some interesting albeit scattered observations of hispanics but seem to peter off.

[Olivia · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is destined to change the way I feel about and view Mexican immigration.

[C.M. Mayo · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you want to understand modern Mexico, you must read Quinones.

[Milo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another great piece of journalism by Quinones. One can learn more by reading his true stories of the lives of Mexicans than by studying for years. Kinda like Tony Hillerman and his Navajo tales.

[Michele · Rating 5 out of 5]

Must reading for those interested in the question of immigration and the Mexican-American population in the United States. Very raw and explicit-be prepared to learn!