Always Running: La Vida Loca: Gang Days in L.A. [Paperback]

Luis J. Rodriguez (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 6, 2005

The award-winning and bestselling classic memoir about a young Chicano gang member surviving the dangerous streets of East Los Angeles, now featuring a new cover.

Winner of the Carl Sandburg Literary Award, hailed as a New York Times notable book, and read by hundreds of thousands, Always Running is the searing true story of one man’s life in a Chicano gang—and his heroic struggle to free himself from its grip.

By age twelve, Luis Rodriguez was a veteran of East Los Angeles gang warfare. Lured by a seemingly invincible gang culture, he witnessed countless shootings, beatings, and arrests and then watched with increasing fear as gang life claimed friends and family members. Before long, Rodriguez saw a way out of the barrio through education and the power of words and successfully broke free from years of violence and desperation.

Achieving success as an award-winning poet, he was sure the streets would haunt him no more—until his young son joined a gang. Rodriguez fought for his child by telling his own story in Always Running, a vivid memoir that explores the motivations of gang life and cautions against the death and destruction that inevitably claim its participants.

At times heartbreakingly sad and brutal, Always Running is ultimately an uplifting true story, filled with hope, insight, and a hard-earned lesson for the next generation.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

As the preface of this admirable but ultimately disappointing memoir states, Rodriguez, an award-winning poet and publisher of the small press Tia Chucha, decided to document his youth as an East Los Angeles gang member in an effort to steer his teenaged son, Ramiro, away from the gang that he recently joined. A member of various Latino gangs based in and around the South San Gabriel Valley during the late 1960s, Rogriguez participated in random acts of violence, and was imprisoned on several occasions for the crimes he committed. Unfortunately, he offers frustratingly little detail behind the facts of his life and activity in the gangs. Rodriquez presents colorful characters and highly charged events, such as shootings, Mexican funerals, rapes and arrests, but his writing style renders much of that rich material forgettable.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

"An absolutely unique work: richly literary and poetic, yet urgent and politically explosive at the same time...A permanent testament to human courage and transcendence."

-- Jonathan Kozol, author of Savage Inequalities

"Rodriguez's account of his coming of age is vivid, raw...fierce, and fearless...Here's truth no television set, burning night and day, could ever begin to offer."

-- Gary Soto, The New York Times Book Review

"Every spiky anecdote from a life of guns, razors, uppers, downers, glue, heroin, sex, and early death supports this former gang member's view of the violence as collective suicide. That Rodriguez's memoir takes place...before the '92 L.A. riots only makes this beautifully written and politically astute account more compelling."

-- Suzanne Ruta, Entertainment Weekly

"Extraordinarily haunting and evocative."

-- Paul Ruffins, The Washington Post Book World

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 262 pages
• Publisher: Touchstone (September 6, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0743276914
• ISBN-13: 978-0743276917
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (198 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,883 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #1 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > Ethnic & National > Hispanic & Latino
  • #2 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Crime & Criminals  > Gangs
  • #7 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > Specific Groups > Criminals

More About the Author

The son of Mexican immigrants, Luis J. Rodriguez began writing in his early teens and has won national recognition as a poet, journalist, fiction writer, children's book writer, and critic. Currently working as a peacemaker among gangs on a national and international level, Rodriguez helped create Tia Chucha's Café & Centro Cultural, a multiarts, multimedia cultural center in the Northeast San Fernando Valley.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

27 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Still Running, April 6, 2002

By 

Daniel Olivas (West Hills, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Always Running: La Vida Loca: Gang Days in L.A. (Paperback)

So much has been written about this powerful, truthful and inspiring memoir by Luis J. Rodriguez that I doubt that I could offer anything to add to the book's understanding and appreciation. But of all the professional reviews, the most telling critiques come from the high school students and teachers some of which are printed in the first two pages of the most recent edition of "Always Running." One student, Johnny Mendez, offers the chilling but hope-filled words: "History repeats itself and we must make some changes." These words are chilling because Rodriguez writes of events from the 60s and 70s yet a high school student of today sees the same despair, neglect and fear that existed a generation earlier. The hope we see is in the high school student's resolve: "[W]e must make some changes." Rodriguez has just opened a bookstore in Sylmar, California, named after his wonderful and misunderstood aunt, Tia Chucha, where he hopes to reach out to Latino youth to help them find a path towards full and productive lives. The fight continues. And this book still speaks the truth, eloquently and to all.

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Compelling and Moving Memoir of A Former Gang Member's Life, March 13, 2001

By 

Melissa (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Always Running: La Vida Loca: Gang Days in L.A. (Paperback)

Luis Rodriguez's autobiographical account of a gang member's life in Watts, East Los Angeles was the most expressive, powerful, and vivid depiction ever to be told. Through his novel, Always Running he has opened my eyes to the realism of gang life. I mean you see it in movies, the news, sometimes even on the streets, but to read about it and visualize it in your mind is like being there and living it. Through Rodriguez's novel he has shared his life with us, and in hopes of deterring younger generations of turning over to "la vida loca", the crazy life.

Rodriguez joined his first gang at age eleven, and by age eighteen, he was a veteran of gang warfare, killings, police, drug overdoses, rapes, Mexican funerals, and suicides. He has watched his friends die one by one at such early ages as he waits his turn of his finalty. The turning point of Rodriguez's life turns out to be when he killed an innocent man as his initiation to a new gang. Because of this he was sentenced to jail where he was able to think hard about what he wanted to do with his. And now look at him he is an award winning journalist and author. but despite his successful transition he later experienced the karma of his childhood when his son Ramiro falls into the wrong crowd in their home Chicago, and joins a gang. Always Running is a novel dedicated to Ramiro Rodriguez and all the other lost children in the world who has lost hope and turned to the hellish streets of gangster life. Through his novel Luis not only shares his life experiences, but he also shares with us how he saved his son. So waste no more and read this very compelling, moving story of a father and son reunion.

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars LA Vida Loca: "The Wrong Life"ÿ, December 2, 1999

By 

Nathan (California, U.S.A.) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Always Running: La Vida Loca: Gang Days in L.A. (Paperback)

Always Running is a book into one man's life and his constant movement away from Mexico, drugs, gangs and relationships. Although a tough young thug schooled on the streets of Los Angeles, Louis T. Rodriguez is a promising young man, all he needs to do is look into his soul to find out who he really is. Rodriguez' unique writing style take's leaps and bounds throughout his life highlighting all of his mishaps and accomplishments. Each page draws you in with a new story each one more interesting than the last. He doesn't bore you with small detail and foreshadows a life taking turns for the worst with each new episode. From a young age he is on the move hardly able to get settled in one place with his family. He's forced to live a life of poverty on the streets where he seeks companionship. He finds it in many different gangs and men who decide to run his life for him. In gangs he learns how to use a gun, run from the cops and indulge in many elicite drugs. He's caught up in a battle between his family and the one's he's met on the street. Dropping in and out of school he's confronted by many teachers who give him direction, if he choses to accept. It's a lot like the movie Blood in Blood Out, with all the gang affiliations and subtle cries for help from young men with no where to run. Leading a crazy lifestyle Louis tries to convey a message of morality to a son who is slowly slipping into a life he has often seen.

I was so intrigued by this bookl that I hardly ever put it down. I finnished it in a matter of hours it seemed and went back over it to find new insights. I thought it grasped a much deeper side of me that wanted to know why people chose gangs. The novel painted a picture of greatness through all the trials and tribulations brought forth by an inteligent street smart man, wanting to bring hope to those like himself. I couldn't beleive how captivating it was as I could hardly wait to read about each next encounter. It had my eyes glued to the text and mind racing with enjoyment. I would recommnend the book to anyone who enjoys reading something which will change your outlook on everything. It will make you see the real person behind an iron mask of a gang lifestyle.