當邊境問題成為世界頭條
以血淚與生命構築的真實故事,帶領讀者親臨現場
Francisco Cantú──母親是墨西哥移民的女兒,並身為公園管理人──「邊界」向來就流淌在於他的血液中。懷著年幼時期對邊境風景的念想,他成為一名邊境巡警,不分炙陽罩頂與冷冽的夜晚,在美墨交界之處緝捕毒品、走私的非法人物。在過程中遇上死去的就運走,幸運活下來的,則把他們送往拘留所。他試著不讓自己去想像那些人之後的遭遇會是什麼。
被噩夢糾纏,並且日益意識到自己正為一個殘暴的組織效力,Cantú最終選擇離開了邊境巡警的職務,成為一個普通的公民。歸返平靜的日子卻沒有延續到底,當一位移民朋友前往墨西哥探訪病危的母親,再也沒有回來,Cantú發現自己被迫直面曾轉身避之的「邊界」,揭開所有的真相。在那條真實而虛擬、固定又飄忽的界線兩側,是人性的希望與絕望,暴力與救贖共在的地方。(文/博客來編譯)
The instant New York Times bestseller, "A must-read for anyone who thinks ’build a wall’ is the answer to anything." --Esquire
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. Searing and unforgettable, The Line Becomes a River goes behind the headlines, making urgent and personal the violence our border wreaks on both sides of the line