The Beast: Riding the Rails and Dodging Narcos on the Migrant Ttrail

Oscar Martinez, with an Introducdtion by Francisco Goldman, translated by Daniela Maria Ugaz and John Washington

ISBN 10: 1781681325 / ISBN 13: 9781781681329

Published by Verso, London, New York, 2013

About this Item

Numbers are printed inside, 1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2. The first printing of the first English Language edition.

Seller Inventory # 092609

Bibliographic Details

• Title: The Beast: Riding the Rails and Dodging Narcos on the Migrant Ttrail
• Publisher: Verso, London, New York
• Publication Date: 2013
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1781681325
• ISBN 13: 9781781681329
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: First English Language Edition
• Condition: Very Good
• Dust Jacket Condition: Very Good

About this title

Synopsis

ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR, The Economist and The Financial Times
 
“Harrowing” true stories from two years of immersion reporting on the migrant trail from Chiapas to Arizona—an “honorable successor to enduring works like George Orwell’s The Road to Wigan Pier” (New York Times)
 
One day a few years ago, 300 migrants were kidnapped between the remote desert towns of Altar, Mexico, and Sasabe, Arizona. A local priest got 120 released, many with broken ankles and other marks of abuse, but the rest vanished. Óscar Martínez, a young writer from El Salvador, was in Altar soon after the abduction, and his account of the migrant disappearances is only one of the harrowing stories he garnered from two years spent traveling up and down the migrant trail from Central America and across the US border. More than a quarter of a million Central Americans make this increasingly dangerous journey each year, and each year as many as 20,000 of them are kidnapped.

Martínez writes in powerful, unforgettable prose about clinging to the tops of freight trains; finding respite, work and hardship in shelters and brothels; and riding shotgun with the border patrol. Illustrated with stunning full-color photographs, The Beast is the first book to shed light on the harsh new reality of the migrant trail in the age of the narcotraficantes.

About the Author

Óscar Martínez writes for ElFaro.net, the first online newspaper in Latin America. The original edition of his book Los migrantes que no importan was published in 2010 by Icaria and El Faro and a second edition by Mexico’s sur+ Ediciones in 2012. Martínez is currently writing chronicles and articles for El Faro’s project, Sala Negra, investigating gang violence in Latin America. In 2008, Martínez won the Fernando Benítez National Journalism Prize in Mexico, and in 2009, he was awarded the Human Rights Prize at the José Simeón Cañas Central American University in El Salvador.