The No1 Ethical retailer for Books, CD’s, DVD’s & Games
30 Day Refund Guarantee

The Beast: Riding the Rails and Dodging Narcos on the Migrant Trail

The Beast: Riding the Rails and Dodging Narcos on the Migrant Trail

by Francisco Goldman (Introduction), Francisco Goldman (Introduction), Daniela Maria Ugaz (Translator), Óscar Martínez (Author), John Washington (Translator)

  • Used

    Illustrated 2013

    $8.90
Synopsis

One day a few years ago, 300 migrants were kidnapped betweenthe remote desert towns of Altar, Mexico, and Sasabe, Arizona. A local priest got120 released, many with broken anklesand other marks of abuse, but the restvanished. Oscar Martinez, a youngwriter from El Salvador, was in Altarsoon after the abduction, and his accountof the migrant disappearances is onlyone of the harrowing stories he garneredfrom two years spent traveling up anddown the migrant trail from CentralAmerica and across the US border. Morethan a quarter of a million CentralAmericans make this increasinglydangerous journey each year, and eachyear as many as 20,000 of them arekidnapped. Martinez writes in powerful, unforgettable prose about clinging tothe tops of freight trains; finding respite, work and hardship in shelters andbrothels; and riding shotgun with theborder patrol. Illustrated with stunningfull-color photographs, The Beast is thefirst book to shed light on the harsh newreality of the migrant trail in the age ofthe narcotraficantes.

$8.90

Save:$10.97 (55%)

Quantity

1 in stock

More Information

Format: Illustrated
 Pages: 224
 Edition: Illustrated
 Publisher: Verso Books
Published: 08 Oct 2013
ISBN 10: 1781681325
ISBN 13: 9781781681329

Media Reviews
NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The Economist & The Financial Times Harrowing The graceful, incisive writing lifts The Beast from being merely an impressive feat of reportage into the realm of literature. Mr. Martinez has produced something that is an honorable successor to enduring works like George Orwell s The Road to Wigan Pier or Jacob Riis s How the Other Half Lives. New York Times The most extraordinary (and harrowing)book I read this year. Beautiful and searingand impossible to put down. Junot Diaz The world that Oscar Martinez, a Salvadoran journalist, set out to report on five years ago is so violent, depraved and hellish, you can hardly believe he survived to tell the tale... rugged prose, beautifully translated. The Economist Martinez is a powerful storyteller and his approach to investigative journalism is closerto anthropological immersion: He walks with migrants through bloody forests, eats with them atspartan shelters, and rides with them atop speeding trains. Columbia Journalism Review The Beast, like so many great books, lands on you with a revelatory frisson, the arrival of astory we didn t know we were waiting to hear. Los Angeles Review of Books Martinez s debut is the hard-won result of immersive journalism. Kirkus This searing account of the hardships suffered by Central American migrants headed through Mexico to the United States comes from true shoe-leather reporting. Publisher's Weekly To understand the dramatic realities faced by the migrantswho flee northwards to find work in the United States, Oscar Martinez literally jumped trains and dodged killers.He deserves praise not only for his efforts, and for what hewrites about, but because he writes so very well. Jon Lee Anderson, staff reporter for the New Yorker A heartbreaking book about the world s most invisiblepeople. A revelatory work of love and hair-raisingcourage. Alma Guillermoprieto, Latin America correspondent for the New York Review of Books, author of Dancing with Cuba Oscar Martinez is a journalist of uncommon bravery anda writer of prodigious talent. The Beast is a powerful, necessary book, one of the finest pieces of journalismto emerge from Latin America in years. Daniel Alarcon, author of At Night We Walk in Circles An extraordinary account of Central American migration to the US New York Times Book Review
Author Bio
Oscar Martinez writes for ElFaro.net, the first online newspaper in Latin America. The original edition of his book Los migrantes que no importan was published in 2010 by Icaria and El Faro and a second edition by Mexico s sur+ Ediciones in 2012. Martinez is currently writing chronicles and articles for El Faro s project, Sala Negra, investigating gang violence in Latin America. In 2008, Martinez won the Fernando Benitez National Journalism Prize in Mexico, and in 2009, he was awarded the Human Rights Prize at the Jose Simeon Canas Central American University in El Salvador.