The Line Becomes a River

Locations
Call Number: 363.28 Ca, Adult Book / Nonfiction / Biography / General / Cantu, Francisco
On Shelf At: Downtown Library, Malletts Creek Branch, Pittsfield Branch, Westgate Branch

Location & Checkout Length	Call Number	Checkout Length	Item Status
Downtown 2nd Floor 4-week checkout	363.28 Ca	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Downtown 2nd Floor 4-week checkout	363.28 Ca	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Downtown 2nd Floor 4-week checkout	363.28 Ca	4-week checkout	Due 05-20-2024
Malletts Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Nonfiction / Biography / General / Cantu, Francisco	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Pittsfield Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Nonfiction / Biography / General / Cantu, Francisco	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Westgate Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Nonfiction / Biography / General / Cantu, Francisco	4-week checkout	On Shelf

"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."-- Provided by publisher.
"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"-- Provided by publisher.

REVIEWS & SUMMARIES

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COMMUNITY REVIEWS

Great. submitted by MadMonkeyZ on June 23, 2018, 2:57pm The son of a park ranger, Francisco Cantú grew up in the southwest. When he joined the Border Patrol, he became witness to the stark realities of illegal immigration, and the obligations of his job weighed heavy against his sense of humanity. With its direct, stoic prose, The Line Becomes a River is a weighty and timely document on one of our most divisive arguments.

Interesting Read submitted by karenkay on July 8, 2019, 11:19am Francisco Cantu shares his experience with working on the Mexican border for four years. It provides a glimpse of what illegal immigrants face when crossing the border. It is a relevant, although depressing, story.

Dispatches from the Border submitted by howarde on June 16, 2020, 1:20pm This book was one of the two finalists for the 2019 Washtenaw Read, and although I have a great admiration for the book that one, Jose Antonio Vargas's Dear America, The Line Becomes a River deserves as much attention in its own right.

Fransisco Cantú is a US citizen, the descendent of Mexican immigrants. He wants to join the border patrol, essentially, as a research project to bolster his studies in foreign policy. During his four years on border patrol, he witnesses many upsetting and disturbing situations, from people bearing the harsh desert conditions to the cruelty of the coyotes and cartels who exploit border crossers. Cantú begins his job thinking that he will be one of the good guys on patrol and consistently treats the people he arrests as humanely as he can. However, the nature of the work begins to take its toll on him, raising one of the book's central questions: can someone join an organization whose methods are domination and violence without losing their own humanity?

After four years, Cantú leaves the border patrol but is soon drawn to the affairs of the border once again when his friend José, an undocumented man who has lived in the US for 20 years, is denied re-entry into the US after visiting his dying mother in Mexico. Cantú does what he can to help José and his family, but the outlook is bleak. The last several pages of the book are a monologue from José's perspective on the harm that the concept and reality of the border do to people and their families.

Cantú is a detailed and humane writer who discusses the beauty of the desert landscape in just as much detail as the broken bodies and hearts of people attempting to cross the border.