Status
Available
Publication
New York, New York : Riverhead Books, 2018.
Description
""A beautiful, fiercely honest, and nevertheless deeply empathetic look at those who police the border and the migrants who risk - and lose - their lives crossing it. In a time of often ill-informed or downright deceitful political rhetoric, this book is an invaluable corrective."--Phil Klay For Francisco Cantú the border is in the blood: his mother, a park ranger and daughter of a Mexican immigrant, raised him in the scrublands of the Southwest. Haunted by the landscape of his youth, Cantú joins the Border Patrol. He and his partners are posted to remote regions crisscrossed by drug routes and smuggling corridors, where they learn to track other humans under blistering sun and through frigid nights. They haul in the dead and deliver to detention those they find alive. Cantú tries not to think where the stories go from there. Plagued by nightmares, he abandons the Patrol for civilian life. But when an immigrant friend travels to Mexico to visit his dying mother and does not return, Cantú discovers that the border has migrated with him, and now he must know the whole story. Searing and unforgettable, The Line Becomes a River makes urgent and personal the violence our border wreaks on both sides of the line"-- "A former Border Patrol agent's haunting experience of an unnatural divide and the lives caught on either side, struggling to cross or to defend it"--… (more)
User reviews
LibraryThing member TexasBookLover
MEMOIR/IMMIGRATION
Francisco Cantú
The Line Becomes a River: Dispatches from the Border
Riverhead Books
Hardcover, 978-0-7352-1771-3, (also available as an e-book, an audio book, and on Audible), 256 pgs., $26.00
February 6, 2018
They come from Michoacán and Guadalajara, from Oaxaca and El Salvador.
The Line Becomes a River: Dispatches from the Border is the first book from Francisco Cantú, a former U.S. Border Patrol agent. His writing has appeared in Harper’s and Guernica, among other publications, and Cantú won a Pushcart Prize and the 2017 Whiting Award. The Line Becomes a River is a profoundly disturbing memoir of Cantú’s years in the Border Patrol during years of breathtaking violence, when Felipe Calderón was president of Mexico and challenged the cartels.
Cantú, whose family came from Mexico, spent time growing up in West Texas, his mother a park ranger. He left the desert for Washington, D.C., and earned a degree in international relations, studying the southern border. Seeking to add practical experience to his academic studies, Cantú entered the Border Patrol academy. “The government took my passion and bent it to its own purpose,” his mother warns him. “Stepping into a system doesn’t mean that the system becomes you,” he parries.
Divided into three parts, The Line Becomes a River is composed of a series of vignettes, sometimes approximating stream-of-consciousness. Cantú is conflicted and dreams of wolves and disintegrating teeth; Jungian psychology provides context. He alternates between the anecdotal and the empirical, fitting human faces to the facts and figures—all those numbers—and providing a history of the line—all those broken treaties. Cantú has read his Charles Bowden and Molly Molloy and Sara Uribe.
After Cantú left the agency to attend graduate school, he learns that a friend with whom he shared breakfast almost every morning, José, has been arrested re-entering the country after visiting his dying mother. It’s the first time Cantú visits anyone in detention, attends the court hearings, witnesses the slow-motion ripping apart of a family. The last part of The Line Becomes a River is related in José’s voice, a very effective technique, visceral and instructive: “The U.S. is making criminals out of those who could become its very best citizens.”
The Line Becomes a River seems an honest examination of conscious, a reckoning on Cantú’s part. Though he occasionally strays into melodrama, I admire Cantú’s writing and was moved by the stories he relates. Still, The Line Becomes a River leaves me unsettled, troubled by something I can’t quite put my finger on. Cantú wonders whether his shame can be redeemed, spiritual sickness healed. I wonder at the costs to human beings of what sometimes seems a personal experiment on the part of Cantú.
Originally published in Lone Star Literary Life.
Francisco Cantú
The Line Becomes a River: Dispatches from the Border
Riverhead Books
Hardcover, 978-0-7352-1771-3, (also available as an e-book, an audio book, and on Audible), 256 pgs., $26.00
February 6, 2018
They come from Michoacán and Guadalajara, from Oaxaca and El Salvador.
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Men, women, children, entire families. Some are heroin mules, “coyotes,” and cartel scouts; some are pregnant women, children escaping gangs, and fathers who want to feed their kids. One man offers to clean up around the station while he waits for the bus that will return him to Mexico. Sometimes the migrants’ backpacks are dumped on the desert floor, the water drained, the clothes and food burned. Other times, the migrants’ blistered feet are washed and bandaged. There are abandoned drug loads and abandoned people, extraordinary cruelty and ordinary kindness, paranoia and compromising situations, kidney failure and the comatose and the dead. The Southwestern desert is a vast graveyard. A Texas sheriff notes, “For every one we find, we’re probably missing five.”The Line Becomes a River: Dispatches from the Border is the first book from Francisco Cantú, a former U.S. Border Patrol agent. His writing has appeared in Harper’s and Guernica, among other publications, and Cantú won a Pushcart Prize and the 2017 Whiting Award. The Line Becomes a River is a profoundly disturbing memoir of Cantú’s years in the Border Patrol during years of breathtaking violence, when Felipe Calderón was president of Mexico and challenged the cartels.
Cantú, whose family came from Mexico, spent time growing up in West Texas, his mother a park ranger. He left the desert for Washington, D.C., and earned a degree in international relations, studying the southern border. Seeking to add practical experience to his academic studies, Cantú entered the Border Patrol academy. “The government took my passion and bent it to its own purpose,” his mother warns him. “Stepping into a system doesn’t mean that the system becomes you,” he parries.
Divided into three parts, The Line Becomes a River is composed of a series of vignettes, sometimes approximating stream-of-consciousness. Cantú is conflicted and dreams of wolves and disintegrating teeth; Jungian psychology provides context. He alternates between the anecdotal and the empirical, fitting human faces to the facts and figures—all those numbers—and providing a history of the line—all those broken treaties. Cantú has read his Charles Bowden and Molly Molloy and Sara Uribe.
After Cantú left the agency to attend graduate school, he learns that a friend with whom he shared breakfast almost every morning, José, has been arrested re-entering the country after visiting his dying mother. It’s the first time Cantú visits anyone in detention, attends the court hearings, witnesses the slow-motion ripping apart of a family. The last part of The Line Becomes a River is related in José’s voice, a very effective technique, visceral and instructive: “The U.S. is making criminals out of those who could become its very best citizens.”
The Line Becomes a River seems an honest examination of conscious, a reckoning on Cantú’s part. Though he occasionally strays into melodrama, I admire Cantú’s writing and was moved by the stories he relates. Still, The Line Becomes a River leaves me unsettled, troubled by something I can’t quite put my finger on. Cantú wonders whether his shame can be redeemed, spiritual sickness healed. I wonder at the costs to human beings of what sometimes seems a personal experiment on the part of Cantú.
Originally published in Lone Star Literary Life.
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LibraryThing member Dreesie
Cantú worked as a border patrol agent for 4 years. In this book he discusses the job--what he did, why he did it, his co-workers, the migrants, the boredom that the job often was, the stress and worry and dehumanizing nature of the job. The nightmares and worry that he was losing himself, and the
A few years later, a friend he knew from work went home to his mother's funeral in Mexico. And could not get back. Cantú did not realize he was an illegal immigrant. He was a regular guy--solid worker, husband, father, involved in his church and his sons' lives.
Cantú does not pretend to offer solutions. This book is thoughtful, and examines who is trying to get across, why, and looks at those who prey upon them.
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questioning looks from family over why he, a man with Mexican grandparents, would even want the job. And while he felt like he was a kind agent, he was still deporting people and sending them to try to get across the dangerous desert again.A few years later, a friend he knew from work went home to his mother's funeral in Mexico. And could not get back. Cantú did not realize he was an illegal immigrant. He was a regular guy--solid worker, husband, father, involved in his church and his sons' lives.
Cantú does not pretend to offer solutions. This book is thoughtful, and examines who is trying to get across, why, and looks at those who prey upon them.
Show Less
LibraryThing member wagner.sarah35
I was unaware of how controversial the author was when I started this book & I'm glad of it because I likely would not have finished the book. The first half covers the author's time as a border guard, a portion of the book I found difficult (especially when the author recounts discovering
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migrants' supplies in the desert and destroying them) but it did give me a better understanding of what happens at the border and the challenges faced by those crossing the border. The second half of the book covers a time after the author left the border patrol and had a coworker who ran afoul of immigration. The book definitely added nuance and complexity to my understanding of the US-Mexico border. Show Less
LibraryThing member JosephKing6602
I wish every member of Congress would read this book before they vote on funding Trump's "Wall" !
Very moving, very relevant. The only improvement would have been to include a bit more on the history of US-border control issues and laws.
Very moving, very relevant. The only improvement would have been to include a bit more on the history of US-border control issues and laws.
LibraryThing member strandbooks
The Line Becomes a River is by Francisco Cantu who after graduating with an international studies degree worked as a Border Patrol officer for 4 years in TX and AZ. There are some very heartbreaking chapters and ones that will make you angry. At times he jumps from real life to his nightmares so I
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had to backtrack a few times to realize he was detailing a dream. Show Less
LibraryThing member EllenH
A very thought provoking book. I wished for him to be more conclusive about his ideas on the border issue, but if he was, then it wouldn't be as powerful as it is. This book really shows how there really isn't an easy solution to illegal immigration. But his reporting of the research into moral
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injury and how it relates to the drug, violence, and corruption problems in Mexico was incredibly sobering. "Moral injury is a learned behavior, learning to accept the things you know are wrong." This upending of beliefs is gradual, one that is difficult to perceive" but it has happened in Mexico. Show Less
LibraryThing member TNbookgroup
Luba. Francisco Cantú grew up the the grandson of a Mexican immigrant in the southwestern part of the United States. When he became an adult, Cantú joined the Border Patrol and saw firsthand the never-ending challenge of policing people on both sides of that line. Years after leaving his position
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with the patrol, his examination of his time in the job—and after—is an urgent, necessary view of an increasingly complex part of the country. Show Less
LibraryThing member BookConcierge
Audiobook read by the author.
Cantú studied international relations in college. He was raised primarily by his mother, a Mexican immigrant and U.S. Park Ranger, in the Southwest U.S. He joined the border patrol because, “I spent four years in college … learning about the border through policy
Cantú writes with a stream-of-consciousness style. He uses no quotations marks and there is little exposition. At times the change in time/setting is quite abrupt and made this reader feel a little off-balance. He begins with a visit to Mexico with his mother, covers his training at the Academy, his time in the field and in the office, and ends after he’s left the Border Patrol and is working at a coffee shop where he befriends the maintenance man, an undocumented worker who has been in the USA for about 30 years.
Cantú explains the policies and procedures of the Border Patrol and Immigration. He writes with brutal honesty about the realities of hunting humans, the horrors of finding bodies in the desert, the heart-breaking stories of women and children left to fend for themselves by coyotes who have taken their money (and what little water they had), the callous destruction of “caches” found by the agents (they put holes in water jugs, urinate on extra clothing, break tools). And he explores the dreams that plague him.
It’s raw and emotional and thought provoking.
The audiobook is read by the author. He sets a good pace and has a smooth delivery. And his Spanish pronunciation is perfect.
NOTE: There is occasional Spanish in the book, and Cantú rarely translates it.
Cantú studied international relations in college. He was raised primarily by his mother, a Mexican immigrant and U.S. Park Ranger, in the Southwest U.S. He joined the border patrol because, “I spent four years in college … learning about the border through policy
Show More
and history. I want to see the realities of the border day in and day out. I know it may be ugly. I know it might be dangerous, but I don’t see any better way to truly understand the place.” In this memoir he examines what he learned, what puzzled him, what distressed him, and what haunts him still. Cantú writes with a stream-of-consciousness style. He uses no quotations marks and there is little exposition. At times the change in time/setting is quite abrupt and made this reader feel a little off-balance. He begins with a visit to Mexico with his mother, covers his training at the Academy, his time in the field and in the office, and ends after he’s left the Border Patrol and is working at a coffee shop where he befriends the maintenance man, an undocumented worker who has been in the USA for about 30 years.
Cantú explains the policies and procedures of the Border Patrol and Immigration. He writes with brutal honesty about the realities of hunting humans, the horrors of finding bodies in the desert, the heart-breaking stories of women and children left to fend for themselves by coyotes who have taken their money (and what little water they had), the callous destruction of “caches” found by the agents (they put holes in water jugs, urinate on extra clothing, break tools). And he explores the dreams that plague him.
It’s raw and emotional and thought provoking.
The audiobook is read by the author. He sets a good pace and has a smooth delivery. And his Spanish pronunciation is perfect.
NOTE: There is occasional Spanish in the book, and Cantú rarely translates it.
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LibraryThing member NeedMoreShelves
I think perhaps Francisco Cantu' has an interesting story to tell about why he chose to join the border patrol and why he later chose to leave it - unfortunately, for me this book wasn't it. To me this felt a bit like a rough draft - like an author just starting to organize his thoughts, waiting
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for an editor to help shape it into a cohesive narrative. I wish I could have read THAT story, but what I was given was this one. I picked it up because I was interested in why someone with Cantu's Mexican-American heritage would choose to enter service as a border patrol agent. I never felt like we were given the real answer to that question. The narrative certainly had interesting moments, but as a whole it never came together for me. Show Less
LibraryThing member Narshkite
Extraordinary. Cantu has a unique perspective on immigration and an undeniable gift for writing. As a well-educated Mexican-American Cantu is not the person you expect to see working the border for ICE, and that is perhaps why he does it, over his mother's passionate objections and with full
The book is engrossing, informative and heartbreaking. I recently read The Men We Reap, and though I thought well of the book in general, I was bothered by the lack of support for the author's premises regarding this country's war on Black men. I feel like the author was right, but I wanted some hard information. I had a similar issue here, though to a lesser extent, but generally Cantu shied away from universal pronouncements, so it did not bother me as much. I might take off a half star for that, but honestly most of this is a six star read so it still gets a 5. Of course the people who should be reading this won't, but that does not negate its quality and importance.
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knowledge that he has other choices. The experience though, it breaks him. I have a feeling he might spend the rest of his life exorcising those experiences. His voice is precisely the voice we should be listening to when it comes to immigration policy, Of course that is not going to happen in America 2020.The book is engrossing, informative and heartbreaking. I recently read The Men We Reap, and though I thought well of the book in general, I was bothered by the lack of support for the author's premises regarding this country's war on Black men. I feel like the author was right, but I wanted some hard information. I had a similar issue here, though to a lesser extent, but generally Cantu shied away from universal pronouncements, so it did not bother me as much. I might take off a half star for that, but honestly most of this is a six star read so it still gets a 5. Of course the people who should be reading this won't, but that does not negate its quality and importance.
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LibraryThing member pivic
This is not a view of the persons trying to enter the USA from Mexico as it sees the cynicism and inherent capitalism that affects non-rich human lives. This is a first-person depiction of the war which rages from the USA against Mexicans, the group of nationality which is most abused in everyday
Cantú worked as a US border patrol agent between 2008 and 2012. As such, and seemingly being an open-minded humanitarian, he's seen a lot of shit happen. Everything from finding half-dead persons dying from thirst while trying to (illegally) entering the USA, to seeing border politics basically going from there not being a border, to capitalism of the 1980s entering the picture, to how Bush/Obama/Trump want it all to be, caused a state where US border patrol is made up of persons who want to protect their country with pride, while behaving like human beings towards those trying to get into the US.
Still, as such, violence and callous behaviour is often normalised, as is violence towards border patrol staff.
Cantú is a born writer. His level-headed style of description, rhythm, and laying out facts is both seldom seen and deeply valuable. I'm left with a sense of enrichment from having read this book, even though I have read a bunch of others that have been about trafficking around different parts of the globe; his human views and views on humans provide the reader with ample info.
The slightly bad side with this book is that the facts pile up almost like a kind of fact-after-fact recount, which novice writers can be prone to delve into. Still, considering how this is the author's first book, it is a veritable tour-de-force which should receive more press than it has.
Examples of the short and packed sentences:
Robles’s eyes seemed to detach from his surroundings, as if his gaze had turned inward. A year after that, he continued, I chased another man to the banks of the Colorado River. He ran out into the water and was swept away by the current like it was nothing. And I’ll tell you what I did. I swam into the river and I battled to keep him afloat even as I inhaled mouthfuls of water, even though I can’t remember ever having been more tired. I saved that man’s life, and still, there’s not a single day I don’t think about the one I took before it.
The writing that's not entirely about patrolling is also good:
After completing the course of fire, I shot at a smaller target with my own .22 caliber pistol. As I paused to reload, a yellow bird landed atop the target stand. I waited for it to fly off, but the bird continued hopping across the top. I started to walk downrange to scare it off, and then I stopped. I looked around. The range was empty. It occurred to me then that perhaps I should shoot the bird, that I should prove to myself that I could take a life, even one this small. I dropped the little bird with one shot. I walked over and picked up its body and in my hands the dead animal seemed weightless. I rubbed its yellow feathers with my fingertip. I began to feel sick and I wondered, for one brief moment, if I was going insane. At the edge of the firing range I dug a small hole beneath a creosote bush and buried the bird there, covering the fresh dirt with a small pile of stones.
I liked this bit, which probably best of all paragraphs in the book shows the weariness and paranoia that follows any line of work where one's colleagues and the work is congealed and one doesn't separate easily from that mess:
The dentist silently jotted his notes in my file. So why’d you leave the field? he asked. Won’t you be bored? I began to feel annoyed with his questions, concerned that I was somehow telegraphing cowardice or insecurity. It’s kind of a promotion, I said, it’s a chance to learn something new. Another side of the job, you know? The dentist looked at me and shrugged his shoulders. I used to have an office job, he told me, there’s only so much you can learn at a computer screen. I rolled my eyes and shook my head. Look, I finally said, I don’t know what else to tell you. I thought it would be nice to have a break from the field, to live in the city for a while. All right, all right, he said, holding up his hands. I feel you. I’m just trying to make sure you don’t grind your teeth out.
In summary: an easy read that may reveal more to life than you know where desperation meets bureaucracy in the most insane ways.
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northern America, and is being "thwarted" from entering the USA.Cantú worked as a US border patrol agent between 2008 and 2012. As such, and seemingly being an open-minded humanitarian, he's seen a lot of shit happen. Everything from finding half-dead persons dying from thirst while trying to (illegally) entering the USA, to seeing border politics basically going from there not being a border, to capitalism of the 1980s entering the picture, to how Bush/Obama/Trump want it all to be, caused a state where US border patrol is made up of persons who want to protect their country with pride, while behaving like human beings towards those trying to get into the US.
Still, as such, violence and callous behaviour is often normalised, as is violence towards border patrol staff.
Cantú is a born writer. His level-headed style of description, rhythm, and laying out facts is both seldom seen and deeply valuable. I'm left with a sense of enrichment from having read this book, even though I have read a bunch of others that have been about trafficking around different parts of the globe; his human views and views on humans provide the reader with ample info.
The slightly bad side with this book is that the facts pile up almost like a kind of fact-after-fact recount, which novice writers can be prone to delve into. Still, considering how this is the author's first book, it is a veritable tour-de-force which should receive more press than it has.
Examples of the short and packed sentences:
Robles’s eyes seemed to detach from his surroundings, as if his gaze had turned inward. A year after that, he continued, I chased another man to the banks of the Colorado River. He ran out into the water and was swept away by the current like it was nothing. And I’ll tell you what I did. I swam into the river and I battled to keep him afloat even as I inhaled mouthfuls of water, even though I can’t remember ever having been more tired. I saved that man’s life, and still, there’s not a single day I don’t think about the one I took before it.
The writing that's not entirely about patrolling is also good:
After completing the course of fire, I shot at a smaller target with my own .22 caliber pistol. As I paused to reload, a yellow bird landed atop the target stand. I waited for it to fly off, but the bird continued hopping across the top. I started to walk downrange to scare it off, and then I stopped. I looked around. The range was empty. It occurred to me then that perhaps I should shoot the bird, that I should prove to myself that I could take a life, even one this small. I dropped the little bird with one shot. I walked over and picked up its body and in my hands the dead animal seemed weightless. I rubbed its yellow feathers with my fingertip. I began to feel sick and I wondered, for one brief moment, if I was going insane. At the edge of the firing range I dug a small hole beneath a creosote bush and buried the bird there, covering the fresh dirt with a small pile of stones.
I liked this bit, which probably best of all paragraphs in the book shows the weariness and paranoia that follows any line of work where one's colleagues and the work is congealed and one doesn't separate easily from that mess:
The dentist silently jotted his notes in my file. So why’d you leave the field? he asked. Won’t you be bored? I began to feel annoyed with his questions, concerned that I was somehow telegraphing cowardice or insecurity. It’s kind of a promotion, I said, it’s a chance to learn something new. Another side of the job, you know? The dentist looked at me and shrugged his shoulders. I used to have an office job, he told me, there’s only so much you can learn at a computer screen. I rolled my eyes and shook my head. Look, I finally said, I don’t know what else to tell you. I thought it would be nice to have a break from the field, to live in the city for a while. All right, all right, he said, holding up his hands. I feel you. I’m just trying to make sure you don’t grind your teeth out.
In summary: an easy read that may reveal more to life than you know where desperation meets bureaucracy in the most insane ways.
Show Less
LibraryThing member reader1009
nonfiction (an academic takes a job as border guard to learn more about the nuanced repercussions of border policy)
LibraryThing member Castlelass
“One of my principal goals in The Line Becomes a River was to create space for readers to inhabit an emergent sense of horror at the suffering that takes place every day at the border. In narrating my own gradual participation in the various degrees of violence inflicted in the fulfillment of our
Francisco Cantú is of Mexican American descent and has lived and worked for many years along the US-Mexico border. In this memoir, he recounts his experiences as a former border patrol officer, an intelligence agent, and friend of an illegal migrant trying to return to his family in the US. This book provides a description of the issues related to the border from different perspectives. Along the way, the author provides historical context, humanizes the people involved, and brings it to a personal level by examining the dynamics within his own family.
He explores the actions of border agents, cartels, coyotes (guides), smugglers, and regular people looking for a better life. There are no easy answers to the border problems, and this book does not try to solve them. Rather, it offers insights to assist in understanding them. Highly recommended.
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nation’s immigration policies and enforcement practices, I sought to leave room for readers to construct their own moral interpretation of the events described.” – Francisco Cantú, The Line Becomes a RiverFrancisco Cantú is of Mexican American descent and has lived and worked for many years along the US-Mexico border. In this memoir, he recounts his experiences as a former border patrol officer, an intelligence agent, and friend of an illegal migrant trying to return to his family in the US. This book provides a description of the issues related to the border from different perspectives. Along the way, the author provides historical context, humanizes the people involved, and brings it to a personal level by examining the dynamics within his own family.
He explores the actions of border agents, cartels, coyotes (guides), smugglers, and regular people looking for a better life. There are no easy answers to the border problems, and this book does not try to solve them. Rather, it offers insights to assist in understanding them. Highly recommended.
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LibraryThing member juju2cat
A thought provoking memoir of Cantu's time with the Border Patrol. He was raised along this beautiful border but felt a great need to better understand it. I loved his dedication page: "To my mother and grandfather, for giving me life and a name, and to all those who risk their souls to traverse or
Well written!
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patrol an unnatural divide"; for that is what the border is, an unnatural divide between two amazing cultures who can only clash because of preconceived ideas and xenophobia.Well written!
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Subjects
Awards
LA Times Book Prize (Finalist — 2018)
National Book Critics Circle Award (Finalist — Nonfiction — 2018)
Indies Choice Book Award (Honor Book — 2019)
Orwell Prize (Shortlist — 2019)
Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence in Fiction and Nonfiction (Finalist — Nonfiction — 2019)
New Mexico-Arizona Book Awards (Winner — Political — 2019)
Southwest Books of the Year (2018)
Brooklyn Public Library Book Prize (Longlist — Nonfiction — 2018)
Spur Award (Winner — 2019)
Publishers Weekly's Best Books of the Year (Nonfiction — 2018)
Booklist Editor's Choice: Adult Books (Social Sciences — 2018)
NPR: Books We Love (2018)
Chicago Public Library Best of the Best: Adults (Selection — 2018)
New York Public Library Best Books: For Adults (Non-Fiction — 2018)