Six Kinds of Sky: A Collection of Short Fiction [Paperback]

Luis Alberto Urrea (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0938317636 | ISBN-13: 978-0938317630 | Publication Date: February 1, 2002 | Edition: 1st

"Home isn't just a place, it is also a language."

Born in Tijuana, the son of an Anglo woman and a Mexican father, Urrea says that "Home isn't just a place, it is also a language." In these six stories—each wandering beneath different kinds of sky, from the thick Mazatlan starry night to the wide open spaces of the Sioux Nation in South Dakota—Urrea maps the spiritual geography of what he calls "home."

"I always thought Luis Urrea was six skies rolled into one (I mean that in a good way), and this book proves that he speaks with a multitude of passionate, powerful and hilarious voices. This book is a beautiful kind of crazy."—Sherman Alexie

"With this new collection of stories, Luis Urrea makes the short list of essential American writers. His glittering landscapes, which warp and ennoble the human spirit, bring to mind the work of Salman Rushdie. I found myself going back and rereading whole passages; Urrea's got a way with words that raises the bar for the rest of us. What a marvel of a book!"—Demetria Martínez

"Urrea goes in for the big picture, and there seems to be no world he cannot capture. He writes with wit and ingenuity, and the stories possess a powerful sense of acceleration. With each story I was transported to an intense and fully imagined world."—Robert Boswell

Luis Urrea is a novelist, essayist and poet. His books have received The American Book Award for non-fiction, 1998, and The Western States Book Award for Poetry, 1994, and The New York Times named his non-fiction Across the Wire a Notable Book of the Year, 1993. Luis lives in Chicago.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Urrea, best known for his hard-hitting nonfiction (Across the Wire; Nobody's Son), proves once again to be an eloquent and elegiac spokesman for the down-and-out and the disaffected in this collection of six stories whose settings range from Mexico to the Sioux nation in South Dakota. His protagonists are usually Hispanics and Native Americans whose struggles are documented most touchingly in one of the two longer stories, "A Day in the Life," which describes the plight of a poverty-stricken group of garbage pickers whose lives are torn apart by tragedy after they are forced to move from Mexico City to Tijuana. Urrea turns his attention to the brokenhearted in "Taped to the Sky," in which a man who takes to the road after his wife leaves him breaks down in the middle of Wyoming, where he learns the reason for his journey from the Native American man who helps him. He offers a different perspective on the Native American experience in "Bid Farewell to Her Many Horses," which describes the sorrow of a man who marries a Sioux woman who succumbs to alcoholism, while "Father Returns From the Mountain" is a touching story of a man's attempt to come to terms with his father's death in an auto accident. Urrea is a poetic writer who draws strong characters and wears his literary compassion on his sleeve, and he uses all of his gifts to full advantage here. (Feb.)Forecast: This is a minor outing for Urrea, whose fiction has made less of a splash than his nonfiction. A breakout may be in store for him soon, though Little, Brown is publishing his next novel, which it secured as part of a two-book, six-figure deal.

Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Review

An award-winning poet, fiction writer and essayist, Urrea should be required reading for anyone living in the Southwest. -- San Diego Union Tribune, April 14, 2002

Richard Rodriguez says we are writing the stories of a mixed race, code-switching America. Urrea is writing these stories. -- Foreword Magazine, May 2002

Short, direct sentences and pitch-perfect dialogue build into original studies of passion, restlessness or mischief, one detail at a time. -- San Francisco Chronicle, April 14, 2002

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Product Details

• Paperback: 148 pages
• Publisher: Cinco Puntos Press; 1st edition (February 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0938317636
• ISBN-13: 978-0938317630
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #816,070 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Luis Alberto Urrea, 2005 Pulitzer Prize finalist for nonfiction and member of the Latino Literature Hall of Fame, is a prolific and acclaimed writer who uses his dual-culture life experiences to explore greater themes of love, loss and triumph.
Born in Tijuana, Mexico to a Mexican father and an American mother, Urrea has published extensively in all the major genres. The critically acclaimed and best-selling author of 13 books, Urrea has won numerous awards for his poetry, fiction and essays. The Devil's Highway, his 2004 non-fiction account of a group of Mexican immigrants lost in the Arizona desert, won the Lannan Literary Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the Pacific Rim Kiriyama Prize. An historical novel, The Hummingbird's Daughter tells the story of Teresa Urrea, sometimes known as the Saint of Cabora and the Mexican Joan of Arc. The book, which involved 20 years of research and writing, won the Kiriyama Prize in fiction and, along with The Devil's Highway, was named a best book of the year by many publications. It has been optioned by acclaimed Mexican director Luis Mandoki for a film to star Antonio Banderas.
Urrea's most recent novel, Into the Beautiful North, imagines a small town in Mexico where all the men have immigrated to the U.S. A group of young women, after seeing the film The Magnificent Seven, decide to follow the men North and persuade them to return to their beloved village. A national best-seller, Into the Beautiful North, earned a citation of excellence from the American Library Association Rainbow's Project. A short story from Urrea's collection, Six Kinds of Sky, was recently released as a stunning graphic novel by Cinco Puntos Press. Mr.Mendoza's Paintbrush, illustrated by artist Christopher Cardinale, has already garnered rave reviews and serves as a perfect companion to Into the Beautiful North as it depicts the same village in the novel.
Into the Beautiful North, The Devil's Highway and The Hummingbird's Daughter have been chosen by more than 30 different cities and colleges for One Book community read programs.
Urrea has also won an Edgar award from the Mystery Writers of America for best short story (2009, "Amapola" in Phoenix Noir). His first book, Across the Wire, was named a New York Times Notable Book and won the Christopher Award. Urrea also won a 1999 American Book Award for his memoir, Nobody's Son: Notes from an American Life and in 2000, he was voted into the Latino Literature Hall of Fame following the publication of Vatos. His book of short stories, Six Kinds of Sky, was named the 2002 small-press Book of the Year in fiction by the editors of ForeWord magazine. He has also won a Western States Book Award in poetry for The Fever of Being and was in The 1996 Best American Poetry collection. Urrea's other titles include By the Lake of Sleeping Children, In Search of Snow, Ghost Sickness and Wandering Time.
Urrea attended the University of California at San Diego, earning an undergraduate degree in writing, and did his graduate studies at the University of Colorado-Boulder.
After serving as a relief worker in Tijuana and a film extra and columnist-editor-cartoonist for several publications, Urrea moved to Boston where he taught expository writing and fiction workshops at Harvard. He has also taught at Massachusetts Bay Community College and the University of Colorado and he was the writer in residence at the University of Louisiana-Lafayette.
Urrea lives with his family in Naperville, IL, where he is a professor of creative writing at the University of Illinois-Chicago.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Nice collection of stories, May 18, 2002

By 

Kevin (Reno, NV USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Six Kinds of Sky: A Collection of Short Fiction (Paperback)

I've read other books of Urrea, both nonfiction, but his novels are always very entertaining so I did not hesitate to buy this book when I saw it. Most of Urrea's stories are spiritual and lead you into making out what the story means. One of his stories about the Tijuna dompes can be found in a previous work. Other then that the other stories were very well written and Urrea has learned to twist one's emotions while they are absorbed in his writing. I am a big fan of Urrea and would recommend to anybody to read this book and also his previous works.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Tender, Moving Stories Told From the Heart, August 7, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Six Kinds of Sky: A Collection of Short Fiction (Paperback)

If you believe Luis Urrea to be only a writer of nonfiction, you owe yourself a few nights with this book. A diverse collection of stories about real people, told with humor, feeling, and imagination, this book comes from the tender heart of a fine writer.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars a fine craftsman, January 19, 2008

By 

M. Littau-Mora (Chicago) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Six Kinds of Sky: A Collection of Short Fiction (Paperback)

Three knockout pieces ("First Light," "Bid Farewell to Her Many Horses," & "A Day in the Life") here show Urrea at his best. He writes from a personal sense of mission, and his work reveals a worldview that is acutely aware of the shortcomings of the human race but ultimately optimistic. At his best he can't write a bad sentence; his images and the words he chooses have a visceral impact. Urrea is also the most successful Latino-gringo hybrid ("latingo"?) I know; no one I've read is close to him in his ability to depict both sides of how Mexicans and North Americans see each other (his description of how the workers living at the Tijuana garbage dump perceive the visiting American missionary women is priceless). Also worth reading are The Devil's Highway and The Hummingbird's Daughter.