India Festival in Kansas City por Xánath Caraza

India Festival in Kansas City por Xánath Caraza

Xanath Caraza

A Bountiful Fall of Books

Summer must be over -- publishers are hawking autumn books already.  Here are three that deserve a second look.  

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The Many Mothers of Dolores Moore

Anika Fajardo

Gallery Books - September 16

[from the publisher]
In the span of a year, Dolores Moore has become a thirty-five-year-old orphan. After the funeral of the last living member of her family, Dorrie has never felt more lost and alone. That is, except for a Greek chorus of deceased relatives whose voices follow her around giving unsolicited advice and opinions. And they’re only amplifying Dorrie’s doubts about keeping the deathbed promise she made to return to her birthplace in Colombia.

Fresh off a breakup with her long-term boyfriend, laid off from her job as a cartographer, and facing a daunting inheritance of her mothers’ aging Minneapolis Victorian and two orange tabbies, how can she possibly leave the country now? But when an old flame offers to housesit, the chorus agrees that there’s no room for excuses. Armed with only a scrap of a hand drawn map, Dorrie sets off to find out where—and who—she came from.

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Somebody is Walking on Your Grave: My Cemetery Journeys

Mariana Enriquez, translated by Megan McDowell
Hogarth - September 30

[from the publisher]
Mariana Enriquez—called by The New York Times a “sorceress of horror”—has been fascinated by the haunting beauty of cemeteries since she was a teenager. She has visited them frequently, a goth flaneur taking notes on her aesthetic obsession as she walks among the headstones, “where dying seems much more interesting than being alive.”

But when the body of a friend’s mother who was disappeared during Argentina’s military dictatorship was found in a common grave, Enriquez began to examine more deeply the complex meanings of cemeteries and where our bodies come to rest.

In this rich book of essays—“excursions through death,” she calls them—Enriquez travels through North and South America, Europe and Australia, visiting Paris’s catacombs, Prague’s Old Jewish Cemetery, New Orleans’s aboveground mausoleums, Buenos Aires’s opulent Recoleta, and more. Enriquez investigates each cemetery’s history and architecture, its saints and ghosts, its caretakers and visitors, and, of course, its dead.

Weaving personal stories with reportage, interviews, myths, hauntology, and more, Somebody Is Walking on Your Grave is memoir channeled through Enriquez’s passion for cemeteries, revealing as much about her own life and unique sensibility as the graveyards and tombstones she tours. Fascinating, spooky, and unlike anything else, Enriquez’s first work of nonfiction, translated by the award-winning Megan McDowell, is as original and memorable as the stories and novels for which she’s become so beloved and admired.

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This is the Only Kingdom
Jaquira Díaz
Algonquin Books - October 21

[from the publisher]
When Maricarmen meets Rey el Cantante, beloved small-time Robin Hood and local musician on the rise, she begins to envision a life beyond the tight-knit community of el Caserío, Puerto Rico – beyond cleaning houses, beyond waiting tables, beyond the constant tug of war between the street hustlers and los camarones. But breaking free proves more difficult than she imagined, and she soon finds herself struggling to make a home for herself, for Rey, his young brother Tito, and eventually, their daughter Nena. Until one fateful day changes everything.

Fifteen years later, Maricarmen and Nena find themselves in the middle of a murder investigation as the community that once rallied to support Rey turns against them. Now Nena, a teenager haunted by loss and betrayal and exploring her sexual identity, must learn to fight for herself and her family in a world not always welcoming. For lovers of the Neapolitan novels, This is the Only Kingdom is an immersive and moving portrait of a family – and a community – torn apart by generational grief, and a powerful love letter to mothers, daughters, and the barrios that make them.

Later.

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Manuel Ramos lives in and writes about Denver.

Chicanonautica: More than Echoes and Embers

by Ernest Hogan

Once upon a time it looked like I was the one and only Chicano science fiction writer. The thought terrified me. All that responsibility. I wasn’t sure if I could take it.

Over the last couple of decades, I’ve been delighted to discover that I’m not alone in my Quixotic, lifelong compulsion to commit acts of sci-fi while being Chicano. It’s also a great relief to feel that I'm not representing the entire Latioid continuum of the human race in the genre. I can have fun and be irresponsible. Yippie!

One of the best and most prolific one of my colleagues is Pedro Iniguez. Recently his Mexicans on the Moon: Speculative Poetry from a Possible Future won the Bram Stoker Award for Superior Achievement in Poetry. That’s right, poetry–he also writes horror. I had the pleasure of getting an advance copy of his latest, Echoes and Embers: Speculative Stories, and wow!

I’ve been a science fiction fan since I was watching Space Patrol on a tiny black and white TV and went to see Forbidden Planet at the Floral Drive-In in East L.A. back in the antediluvian 1950s. I’ve been reading the genre since Richard Nixon was in the White House.

This book took me back to when I was 12 years old reading every “sf” (as they were labeled back then) book and magazine I could get my hands on. Once again I was thrilling to adventures worthy of the pulp era. But this isn’t just a nostalgia trip, Iniguez is up to date on his science, and creates a wide variety of characters and future scenarios about peoples of backgrounds that were influenced by the Spanish empire intruding on their lands, cultures, lives. He also goes into more literary territory.

Back in the day, to appreciate science fiction hell, most fiction written in the English language–and movies and television -- you had to adjust to everything being from a caucasian, Anglo-American viewpoint. I was always aware that people like myself and my family weren’t included in these visions of other worlds.

It’s great to see books like this, opening up new worlds full of all kinds of people, and it isn’t all derived from what came out of one little island.

I heartily recommend Echoes and Embers to la Raza!

Those of you non-Raza out there should also find it to be fun, entertaining reading.

If I can read about Ray Bradbury’s strange, exotic midwesterners and Stephen King’s dwellers of far-off rural Maine, you surely can get into a little Xicanxfuturism.

And get used to it. There’s a lot more coming. To your town. Soon. 

Ernest Hogan and Pedro Iniguez will be in the upcoming two-volume anthology  Xicanxfuturism: Gritos for Tomorrow. Pedro will be in Codex 1. I will be in Codex 2. Pre-order now.

Ernest will be teaching “Gonzo Science Fiction, Chicano Style” at Palabras del Pueblo again in October.

María Mariposa

Written by Karla Arenas Valenti.

Illustrated by Ana Ramírez González.

 

*Publisher: ‎Chronicle Books

*Publication date: ‎July 16, 2024

*Language: ‎English

*Print length: ‎52 pages

*ISBN-10: ‎1797207938

*ISBN-13: ‎978-1797207933

From Pura Belpré Award–winning author Karla Arenas Valenti and New York Times–bestselling illustrator Ana Ramírez González comes a lyrical children's book about finding confidence, embracing identity, and recognizing that your unique self is more than enough.

A gift from Mexico alights on María Mariposa’s windowsill on her first day of school in a brand-new country: “¡Una mariposa!” / “A butterfly!” And with the butterfly, in comes magic. Filled from her toes to her new butterfly wings with memories of home, María knows exactly who she is. But when everything at school is different and strange, doubt begins to make María’s confidence fade away. The place she comes from, the community she loves, the magic inside her . . . does any of it really belong in her new life?

With courage and compassion, this picture book confronts the most difficult moments—and feelings—of being new, sweeping readers up in a powerful celebration of the magic we each contribute to the world.

 

Review

“Warm and compelling, sure to have hearts soaring.” ―Kirkus Reviews

“Come for the simple but important story of strength in cultural roots, stay for the gentle magic in the pictures, bursting with color and

framing the ordinary world as something brighter, better. Immigration and individualism in one gorgeous package.” ― School Library Journal

 

Karla Arenas Valenti was born and raised in Mexico City but has since put down roots in other places she now calls home: France, Germany, Japan, and the United States. The author of several children’s books, Karla lives and writes in the Chicago area.

Ana Ramírez González is an artist and filmmaker at Pixar Animation Studios by day and a New York Times–bestselling illustrator by night. Born and raised in Guanajuato, Mexico, Ana attended art school in France and now divides her time between San Francisco, Paris, and Guanajuato.

Love, Horror, Evil, A Dementia Caregiver's Story

Review: Hiroko Falkenstein. Sinking Together. Honorable Acts with Love. Dallas: USA Book Services, 2025. ISBN (paper) 978-1-967178-32-2

Michael Sedano

I am living After Alzheimer's. Dementia books provide valuable insight for spouses or families. When undertaking caregiving for a person living with dementia, it's like taking on a new career. Reading and research provide valuable insight into what's to be. Here is such a story.

Sinking Together brings readers a horror story of unadulterated evil people exploiting an elderly couple. Sinking Together is also a story of the power of cultural mores, and above all, a story of love and character, reflecting the book’s subtitle, Honorable Acts With Love.

Haruko is a Japanese-born daughter-in-law whose cultural norms demand she be caregiver to her estranged husband’s parents. Bill, Jr., doesn’t visit his parents and grows to resent Haruko’s presence in their lives. “You’re in it for their money,” he whimpers. 

Marriage difficulties create a parallel world of misery and resentment even as caregiving provides joy and fulfillment. Life continues its pace irrespective of the singular importance of caregiving.

The old couple, Bill and Mary, are easy prey to a series of daytime caregivers. One after another enters the home and begins stealing and conducting themselves in brazen, shameless, manners. One moves her husband and kids into the main house while Bill and Mary live in a smaller studio. Instead of paying bills, caregivers write themselves generous checks. One takes an “all-expenses paid” vacation to Hawaii on her employers’ money. When confronted, the thief lies and gets away with all sorts of crap because finding caregiving is difficult.

These are not isolated, nor rare,  occurrences. My own in-laws hired a caregiver who, like Mary and Bill’s caregiver, started feeding her husband and kids in the home. Rosemary and her husband cleaned out my in-laws’ checkbook. "I had their permission," she said. And that was so. I hired a caregiver for my wife who inflated her hours to three-times the hours she’d actually performed. Did she think I didn’t notice? I discharged her and the agency repaid the theft. 

It's not just caregivers who spot easy prey. Haruko rescues Mary and Bill—she calls them Daddy and Mother—by relocating them to their mountain cabin. It’s a two and a half hour drive, but Haruko visits regularly and responds to calls for help with frequent unplanned drives out and back again. Bill hires a “carpenter” to build a greenhouse. The thieving louse buys wood for his other jobs, expensive tools, and the greenhouse never gets finished. Haruko confronts them while they're eating Mary's lunch, one of the bennies of the job. 

A reader turns the pages wondering how this evil exploitation can happen, not just once, but caregiver following caregiver does this stuff. At first the caregiver is all nice and considerate. When no one’s around, Bill gets punched and bruised. Another uses psychological torture to terrorize helpless Bill, who’s by that time, blind in both eyes.

Mary is a domineering woman whose Alzheimer’s Dementia hasn’t been diagnosed as the book opens. Mother’s behaviors reflect symptoms of dementia but, like many families, the behaviors are attributed to other causes. A former dancer, Mary’s strength challenges Haruko and the caregivers. Mary’s behavior is dangerous, not to herself alone but Bill.

Mary demands to see Bill’s eye under an eyepatch. The surgeon instructed Bill to keep the eye covered, and he refuses Mary’s demand to see the wound. Irate, Mary punches Bill in that eye and he loses that eye.

Mary’s dementia doesn’t incapacitate her. She wants to be Bill’s caregiver. But she burns the food when she cooks, and leaves the house unkempt. Caregivers complain to Haruko that Mary interferes with their work caring for Bill.

A reader will wonder why Haruko doesn’t hire better people? Haruko relies upon recommendations that so-and-so is a good Christian woman the recommender knows from church. These good Christians emerge as brazen thieves and elder abusers.

When Mary begins to wander—a typical Alzheimer’s behavior—Bill can only call police when Mary’s “escaped.” Why not move Mary to a memory care facility? Out of the question; the couple’s Will specified they would not be placed in nursing homes. Not many families can afford Memory Care, so in-home is their only option. I told my wife that I'd find us assisted living but Barbara told me she wanted to remain in her home. Of course, I acceded to my wife's desire and it was the right thing to do. I am so relieved my story is not Sinking Together.

Haruko is trapped by her Japanese culture. Bill, Jr., wants nothing to do with her parents and wants Haruko to obey his commands and find other people to care for the parents. In the middle of the book, they divorce. Haruko, however, remains dedicated to her culture and her commitment to Daddy and Mother.

Culture doesn’t fully explain why Haruko does the right thing. This is character. Faced with onerous demands, Haruko complies without complaint. A late-night phone call for help summons Haruko’s presence. Bill and Mary live only a few blocks away. But when they’re up in the mountains, that call obligates the loving daughter-in-law to make that two and a half hour drive up to Idylwild and back to Laguna.

Haruko is the nom de plume of the author, Hiroko Falkenstein. The author wrote the book thirty years ago and only this year, 2025, has the experience and memory bubbled up to the surface driving Falkenstein finally to tell this story.

Dementia of the Alzheimer’s type is a growing health issue in the world, not just the U.S. Falkenstein’s/Haruko’s experiences are neither rare nor unexpected. Sinking Together, Honorable Acts With Love, offers a cautionary message for spouses or families beginning their own careers as caregivers to a loved one stricken with this uncurable, untreatable disease.

Vetting caregivers comes first. No one can be a full-time caregiver without help. A spouse has to find respite hours, if not daily, regularly. This subject is not entirely absent from Falkenstein’s narrative. Haruko takes a European vacation and feels guilty about leaving her in-laws to the hands of such strangers.

Consequences come into demand when a thief is discovered, but only one gets jailed. Haruko accepts feeble excuses, in part because she is “nice” and in part because firing a caregiver without a replacement puts the onus on Haruko to devote 24/7 to Mary and Bill, while still working to please that resentful husband. Jail time would be a suitable reward to elder abusers of the ilk whom we encounter in Sinking Together. My mother's elder abusing, thieving, caregiver was a family member whose crimes go unpunished to this day. 

Dementia behaviors are unique to the individual. Mary’s outlandish behaviors were particular to her personality, the book is not a prediction of anyone else’s Alzheimer’s Dementia experiences. There is only one Mary, only one Bill, in the world.

Much of the narrative, however, is universal to all dementia caregivers. Adult diapers. Bathing. Diarrhea covering the floor and person’s body. Impatience and anger both from the cared-for and the caregiver.

And death. Mary dies with Alzheimer’s but Bill won’t learn the fact until later. An ugly later, as a caregiver torments Bill telling him Mary’s dead.

Falkenstein ends the story with tenderness.For his 90^th birthday, Haruko locates several of Bill’s former friends and employees. These people celebrate their memories of a generous, kind and giving, boss. Bill’s gratitude to be reminded of who he used to be provides a boost to his spirit. It’s that Bill, not the weak exploited abused husband, who lies on his futon on his final day.

 Readers will be aghast at the depths of human depravity, reading about the bad caregivers. But there’s respite for readers, tenderness as Falkenstein closes the story with Bill’s death. He lies on a futon with Haruko and another caregiver holding his hands. “It’s OK to go, Bill.”

Falkenstein keeps her focus on behaviors without moralizing on the depths of depravity she witnesses. The book reflects the work of a talented story-teller. Despite the awful events, readers will keep turning pages, led by the writer’s foreshadowing of events at the ends of chapters and the arresting details of living with dementia and old age.

Reliving events like these brings profound trauma. I admire Falkenstein’s strategy. Hiroko Falkenstein maintains a safe perspective on the developments by turning her first-person story into the third-person story of Haruko. I have not yet been able to write extensively about my five-year career as a dementia caregiver. It took Falkenstein thirty years to get this story into public.

  

“Brota vida” por Xánath Caraza

“Brota vida” por Xánath Caraza

 

En las desnudas

puntas de los árboles

rojos arabescos renacen

la vida insiste en latir.

 

Árbol, satura

con las áureas

ramas la mirada.

Báñame de luz.

 

Vida desbordada

no te esfumes

muévete entre

las células de mi sangre.

 

Brota vida desde

la carmín memoria

dorada sombra

eras.

 

Xanath Caraza

Emerge Life

 

On naked

treetops

red arabesques are reborn

life insists on beating.

 

Tree, saturate

my gaze with

golden branches.

Bathe me in light.

 

Overflowing life

do not slip away

move within

the cells of my blood.

 

Emerge life from

carmine memory

golden shadow

you were.

 

“Brota vida/ Emerge Life” is part of the collection Sin preámbulos / Without Preamble (2017). Sin preámbulos was originally written in Spanish by Xánath Caraza and translated into the English by Sandra Kingery. In 2018 for the International Latino Book Awards Sin preámbulos / Without Preamble received First Place for “Best Book of Bilingual Poetry”. 

 

In 2019 Sin preámbulos / Without Preamble / Fără preambul was translated into the Romanian by Tudor Serbănescu and Silvia Tugui.

 

 

 

 

 

Poetry Connection: Connecting with Teens and Typewriters

 

Melinda Palacio, Santa Barbara Poet Laureate 2023-2025

 

I had the pleasure of offering a writing workshop to teenaged poets who are part of Simon Kieffer’s Teen Arts Mentorship sponsored by the Arts Fund. All county students aged 13-18 are eligible for the teen mentorship. A wide variety of arts professionals are on hand to show youth the ropes of living an art-filled life. With typewriter mentorship in mind, I shared some writing exercises to help get the creative inspiration flowing. A popular questions remains, ‘how do I get started?’. I often find that it is easier to complete a poem, chapter or writing assignment when I come to the computer with words or ideas that are first written on paper. In this case, students were working on typewriters.

There’s an added challenge when composing on a typewriter. Most of the students had never used a typewriter. Unlike a computer, a typewriter requires physical force and effort just to type one letter, let alone a few words or entire poem. Simon showed the teens how to load the paper into the typewriter and how to return the carriage and use the backspace button. He suggested typing with two index fingers, think of Snoopy, the beagle author. We had a good laugh wondering how a beagle uses a typewriter; Charles Schulz somehow made it happen.

I recall a very different method for typing. This is where I date myself. When I was in Junior High School, I took a typing class and learned touch typing. I can still hear the teacher singing out the letters. You would hear, ‘J, J, J, J,’ over the clatter of 30 students pounding on typewriters, drowning out the teacher’s soprano voice that was somehow off key. The repetitive pressing of each key several times over helped our fingers memorize where the letters were on the typewriter’s keyboard. Speed and accuracy gave a student the better grade. Speed is no longer as important as it used to be, especially when composing poems.

Simon does a great job explaining the ins and outs of typewriters to the teens. I was impressed by how quickly they learned how to compose on the typewriters. While I spent a whole semester in Junior High learning how to touch type, the students were able to quickly get the hang of typing within minutes. Of course, knowing how to use devices, such as a computer and cell phone, with built in keyboards helped their swift learning. Even more impressive were the poems they came up with during our session together. How I wish I could share the wonderful poems they wrote in my workshop, but I respect their privacy. Although a few offered to send me their poems, I have yet to receive them. Maybe, next time. I am happy that they wrote on both paper and on typewriters. I look forward to seeing their future work. I could tell that they will all be wonderful poets. 

 

This post is also published in the Santa Barbara Independent.