Happy Birthday Jesus - Softcover

Ronald L. Ruiz

3.11

37 ratings by Goodreads

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1558853987 ISBN 13: 9781558853980

Publisher: Arte Publico Pr, 2003

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A gripping novel of madness and despair now available in paperback for the first time

Happy Birthday Jes�s chronicles the creation of a monster: Jes�s Olivas, a Mexican American boy raised by his grandmother in northern California. In a society where survival of the fittest is the key, young Jes�s Olivas’ shyness and sensitivity become a malleable and vulnerable disadvantage.

Transformed into the perfect victim by his grandmother, a religious fanatic, and the teachings of his parish priest, Jes�s is progessively abused and brutalized. At eighteen, he marks his coming of age with the savage rape of a prostitute, the only person who loved him, and an attack that maims the parish priest he both hated and feared. Jes�s is sentenced to thirty years behind prison walls in what becomes a labyrinth of unending horrors.

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From the Publisher:

Ruiz’s successful probing into the anatomy of madness and despair combines a lyrical rendition of the most abject aspects of the human situation with keen irony.

About the Author:

After college, RONALD RUIZ went to law school, "for all the wrong reasons," as he now says. In 1975, after ten years of practicing criminal defense law, Ruiz returned to writing and began working on his critically acclaimed first novel, Happy Birthday Jes�s (Arte P�blico Press, 1994). His second novel, Giuseppe Rocco (Arte P�blico Press, 1998), is the recipient of the national literary prize, the 1998 Premio Aztl�n. A graduate of the University of San Francisco Law School, Ruiz is a former prosecutor for the Alameda County Distric Attorney’s Office in Oakland, California. Ruiz currently practices criminal defense law in northern California.

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