Locas: A Novel [Paperback]

Yxta Maya Murray (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 1, 1998

A plunge into Los Angeles gang life, Locas is the story of two girls under the pressure of urban warfare. "Murray perfectly captures the patois and fury of the Mexican women of the East L.A. neighborhood Echo Park." -- Publishers Weekly

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

This powerful, deft, and fast-moving first novel reads like a direct line to the hearts and lives of two young girls of Mexican descent living in the gang-dominated stratum of Echo Park, a tough Los Angeles neighborhood. The story is told alternately through the voices of Lucia and Celia, who through family and love are linked to the dangerous center of an emergent, fast-growing Latino gang dealing in guns and drugs. Celia watches her beloved older brother as he rises in power as gangbanger and changes in frightening ways, yet she herself struggles to find a way to live a life of goodness. Lucia, meanwhile, transgresses barriers in her own culture by forming her own female gang, the Fire Girls. Murray has a musician's ear for the language of these women, the first-generation children of immigrants coming of age in a violent place where the roles and rules of their mothers no longer obtain. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

Rather than simmer beneath the surface, anger boils over on the pages of this first novel. Murray perfectly captures the patois and fury of the Mexican women of the East L.A. neighborhood of Echo Park. Here, the gang hierarchy is set in stone. There are jefes, right hands, taggers, third raters and sheep, the last being the girls who shut up, pose prettily at rumblas and carry babies for the men. Narrators Lucia and Cecelia, however, do not fit this role: Lucia wants to be a grandola; Cecelia sees herself as ugly, a "dirt dark Indian" who can't hold on to a pregnancy or a girlfriend. At the outset, the gun-dealing Lobos gang prevails, led by Manny, who is Cecelia's brother and Lucia's lover. As cocaine supersedes guns and upstart rival G-4s challenge the Lobos, the two women struggle, exhibiting a depth of character that sets them apart from other women in Echo Park. In portraying Lucia's unrelenting criminal meanness and hunger for power and Cecelia's ultimate resignation to a life of praying and cleaning rich rubias' houses, Murray gives readers inner-city gang life from the eyes of women. Both narrators' voices are insistent, unvarnished, in-your-face tough. The reader equipped with a Spanish-English dictionary has the best chance to grasp all the nuances of this convincing, under-the-skin work. (May) FYI: Murray is an associate professor of law at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles. A chapter of this book appeared in Buzz.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Grove Press; 1st Pbk. Ed edition (April 1, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0802135641
• ISBN-13: 978-0802135643
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.5 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #343,822 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Realistic portrayal of life in a barrio., May 14, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Locas: A Novel (Paperback)

This book told a wonderful story of what it's really like for girls who live in the barrio and how they face problems. It realistically shows what two different girls choose to do and where they end up. This book gives you a palette of emotions changing throughout the story. It also gives you a lot to think about at the end. "Locas" changed my life by giving me a rude awakening of where I might end up if I continued with my gang activity.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Locas can chang your views on life in gang., September 2, 1998

By 

[e-mail] (Oklahoma) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Locas: A Novel (Paperback)

Locas takes you on a wild ride through the cold heart of Lucia and the confused, yet caring heart of Cecilia. It is one of the best books I have ever read dealing with your environment's effect on you. in any other situations or in any other area of the US you would not be able to feel power and pain along with our heroines. The trip through Echo Park is a long one, and it leaves no stone in anyone's life unturned. Too many lives are interwoven, and too many people know who you are in Echo Park. The small community of Echo Park is made to be the center of the universe for these locas, and the book should be in your mind. The drama of the lives of Lucia and Cecilia are set to make you worry and care about the two girls through their turbulent life in the 'hood. I would recommend this book to anyone, either as a reality check or a way to spend quality time.

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The best I have read on the life of gang girls!, September 2, 1997

By 

[e-mail] (Franklin, Nebraska) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Locas (Hardcover)

As a former Southern California high school teacher, I had the opportunity to know many gang girls. I visited their barrios, homes and families. Ms. Murray has truly captured not only the life of these girls but their outlook on life and way of thinking. It is another world