Coyotes: A Journey Across Borders With America's Illegal Aliens [Paperback]

Ted Conover (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This first title in the Vintage Departures series ("devoted to exploring the vastness of the world, of one's life, or even of one's own backyard") focuses on the world of illegal aliens. Conover, author of Rolling Nowhere, posed as an immigrant, crossing the border twice and learning first-hand about "coyotes"those who sneak Mexicans and other Latin Americans across the border, often under murderous conditions. Menaced by hoods, arrested, freed, forced to dodge spotter planes, Conover spent a year, as he puts it, "working, drinking, smoking, driving, sleeping, sweating and shivering with Mexicans." His conclusion: "It is urgent that we know more about these people who ask little more than to wash our dishes, vacuum our cars, and pick our fruit." This well-written, anecdotal account offers an intimate glimpse of the United States from a perspective few citizens are aware of.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From School Library Journal

YA The title refers to the name given to those people who smuggle illegal aliens into the United States. Conover lived among the people who pay ``coyotes'' enormous sums of money to be brought into this country secretly under condi tions that are full of physical threat. The most touching part of the book is the description of Conover's visit to Ahua catlan, the province from which many of the men he has met come. Here he wit nesses what has happened to the families left behind. While the money the men have earned has resulted in some im provement, there is still enormous pov erty in their lives, and their home life is drifting toward disintegration. There is humor, too, including a hilarious episode in which several men pool enough mon ey together to fly from Mexico to Los Angeles but must find the appropriate clothing and behaviors to avoid arousing suspicions by ``La Migra.'' Conover has done a good job of capturing the difficult lives of these men who want only to earn a decent wage to support their fami lies. Barbara Weathers, Duchesne Academy, Houston

Copyright 1988 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 264 pages
• Publisher: Vintage; 1st edition (August 12, 1987)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0394755189
• ISBN-13: 978-0394755182
• Product Dimensions: 5.2 x 0.6 x 8.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (37 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #51,654 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #21 in Books > Business & Investing > Economics > Labor & Industrial Relations
  • #22 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Politics & Government > Specific Topics > Labor & Industrial Relations
  • #30 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Social Sciences > Emigration & Immigration

More About the Author

Ted Conover is the author of several books including The Routes of Man and Newjack: Guarding Sing Sing (winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize). He also wrote Coyotes, Whiteout, and Rolling Nowhere: Riding the Rails with America's Hoboes. His writing has appeared in The New York Times Magazine, The Atlantic Monthly, The New Yorker, and National Geographic. The recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, he is Distinguished Writer-in-Residence in the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute at New York University. He lives in New York City.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

22 of 23 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Exciting and suspenseful. March 1, 1999

By A Customer

Format:Paperback

Conover travels with various groups of illegal immigrants and immerses himself in their world. His firsthand accounts cover an impressively broad set of immigrant experiences--the small Mexican towns filled with adventure-seeking youth, journeys to the border, negotiations with smugglers, run-ins with police, finding work in the U.S., and adjusting to a new life. Through it all, Conover maintains his point of view as a middle-class American Everyman, making the book accessible to the average Joe. Yet he always keeps his eyes and ears open to the people and events he encounters.

The book makes it apparent that a criminal industry of smugglers, thieves and corrupt cops has sprung up to take advantage of cash-carrying immigrants before they even leave Mexico. Meanwhile, the relatively small Border Patrol is spread too thin to turn back all but a few crossers, who with a little persistence can try their luck the next night.

Though the media tends to portray illegal immigrants as simply the latest generation of noble achievers looking for the American Dream, Conover's work shows how the current wave of immigration from Mexico is different. The new immigrants are often more loyal to their homeland than to their adopted country, travel back and forth with ease, and can find ethnic comfort zones where they can make American dollars but never have to learn American culture. The book describes events that happened in the mid-1980s, but it's more timely than ever as continued high immigration levels keep this issue on the front burner.

28 of 31 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars REAL LIFE DRAMA AND ADVENTURE January 11, 2001

By Gerard T. McGuire

Format:Paperback

Having recently read NEWJACK: GUARDING SING SING, I was motivated to look into other Conover works. The impression he left with Newjack was to be reinforced by the flawless COYOTES.

Conover, the authour, goes where no American would dare. He befriends and lives along side Mexican immigrants who cross the border every year to find agricultural jobs. He details several occassions of crossing the border, a series of hardships and dangers. In his tales the reader is given first hand accounts of brutal mexican police, pesky immigration officers, and the ruthless and dangerous coyotes who smuggle illegals over the border and throughout the border territories. For Conover, interviews were not enough, he walked more than a few miles in their shoes.

Not only does Conover do the adrenaline pumping crossings but he lives life on both sides of the border. He spends season in citrus groves in Arizona, California, and Florida. He spends the offseason in a mountainous Mexican ranchero, among what most of us would consider poverty. Through it all he does a moving and mesmorizing job of painting the picture of the migrant worker.

The book is more than investigative non-fiction, it is a flowing story, encompassing a struggle few have accurately documented. The book reads fast, simultaneously entertaing and interesting the reader. This stands as a favorite in any non-fiction collection. Five stars and then some.

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Moving & Thought Provoking October 12, 1999

By A Customer

Format:Paperback

This book was both moving & thought provoking as it explains just a few illegal immigration stories. What you realize by the end of the book is that these are more than stories...these are people's lives. Filled with all the feeling and emotion that REAL PEOPLE experience, the reader comes to know that these experiences aren't just another immigration story filled with all its hardships and obstacles. It's about loss, yearning, looking forward to the future, friendships, and the upstanding of people you have no reason to trust. A definite good read.