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The Devil's Highway: A True Story
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The Devil's Highway: A True Story
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The Devil's Highway: A True Story
Audiobook8 hours

The Devil's Highway: A True Story

Published by Hachette Audio

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

4/5

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Currently unavailable

About this audiobook

The author of "Across the Wire" offers brilliant investigative reporting of what went wrong when, in May 2001, a group of 26 men attempted to cross the Mexican border into the desert of southern Arizona. Only 12 men came back out. "Superb . . . Nothing less than a saga on the scale of the Exodus and an ordeal as heartbreaking as the Passion . . . The book comes vividly alive with a richness of language and a mastery of narrative detail that only the most gifted of writers are able to achieve.--"Los Angeles Times Book Review."
LanguageEnglish
Release dateJun 1, 2011
ISBN9781611135749
Unavailable
The Devil's Highway: A True Story

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Reviews for The Devil's Highway

Rating: 4.06488561832061 out of 5 stars
4/5

262 ratings27 reviews

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  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A non-fiction novel, The Devil’s Highway tells about 26 immigrants getting lost as they cross the desert into Arizona with only 12 surviving.I like listening to podcasts, and recently RadioLab had a three-part series on immigration. They began reading from a book and talking about how a man got interested in the people who die in the Arizona desert crossing the border. He wanted to help people learn what happened to their family members. The series also dealt with El Paso and why crossing the border changed, causing immigrants to choose the desert when it’s a place that is so inhospitable that humans cannot live there long. This book is the book they began their series with, quoting from it. Coincidentally, Audiobook Sync released it as one of their novels this summer. It was meant to be--I absolutely had to listen to it. I would recommend reading it because there’s a lot to remember and process. I would have done better reading it--I would forget something, and because it’s hard to backtrack on audio, I wouldn’t, so I know I missed some connections and some content.The author explains the history of the area, discusses the biological facts of the body in a desert, and tells the story from both points of view--the border agents and the immigrants. Only after the deaths could the story be pieced together--Urrea finds the missteps that caused the deaths of these men. It’s a fascinating tale of the coyotes who take advantage of the desperate who seek a better life, of the border agents who work day and night in remote locations risking their own lives to help and detain those who cross, and of the people who find their lives shortened by a planned, short outing in the desert. It’s brutal but a story to know about. No matter your opinion on immigration, this explains some of the history and the dangers involved.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This was such an intense and oftentimes painful read. I’m so glad to have read it, to have learned some dire truths about this issue that is rife with shades of gray, and that I believe everyone should be further educated upon. At a certain point, it’s not about what you believe regarding immigration, but that you be educated before forming your thoughts on the matter at all. We owe that to ourselves and each other, and Urrea’s book is a fantastic place to start.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I wish they'd picked a different reader for the audiobook. The "story" was wonderful and heartbreaking and infuriating and fascinating, but the narrator was SOOOO BAD. Stilted. Look Alberto, I get you wrote it and did all the research, but you CANNOT read aloud. Please don't try! It was like really bad spoken word poetry.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    An unforgettable, moving account of the plights of the immigrants who steal over the U.S./Mexico border in the desert. We often forget - or don't think very long and hard about - the sacrifices they make to come here, why they do, and those they leave behind back in Mexico/Central America. After reading this I'll never again think this is just a cut-&-dried legal issue.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is an intense, disturbing, horrifying, and yes, thought provoking true story of migration to the United States from Mexico. A must read if you ask yourself why this whole immigration issue is so complicated.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This book recounts a May 2001 disaster in which three guides led a group of at least 26 immigrants illegally across the Mexico-US border on a route called the Devil's Highway. A guide familiar with the route had stayed home; his partner asserted leadership of the group, got lost, and then made a series of mistakes, all the while denying that he was lost and telling the men that they had just a few more hours of walking. The party ran out of water and at least half of the party cooked to death in 108 degree heat before an American border guard found some of them and called in a rescue operation. After a media-circus prosecution, the surviving guide was sentenced to 16 years in prison; no formal punishment seems to have been visited on the bosses behind the smuggling operation. Based on a year of research, including documents and interviews, The Devil's Highway brings the immigrants' personal stories into focus, and also offers a window into the Border Patrol. For those elements, it's a worthwhile read. It doesn't propose any solutions to the broader problem of illegal immigration, although, to a point, the story suggests that trying to stop it is mostly futile and will inevitably lead to pointless tragedies such as these deaths. The actual sequence of mistakes and bad choices that killed half the party (and could easily have killed them all) would not have been hard to avoid, but as part of the shadow economy, this industry (smuggling people across the border) doesn't operate with liability, safety regulations, or any of the internalized processes that help prevent disasters. One weakness of the book is the author's tendency to overwrite, to pump drama and hard-bitten attitude into aspects of the story that don't need it - for example, early in the book, the account of the first white man to die in this desert. It didn't actually happen in the desert and it doesn't add anything to the story. I found the understated details much more moving -- introducing early on a list of the 'John Does' with their (few) possessions (belt buckle, letter, tattoo), and then later, without making a big deal out of it, slipping in those contents while telling the immigrants' backstories.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    A fascinating and well researched account of a group of men on an economic pilgrimage to the U. S. They were lead by a young, poorly trained, and poorly equipped guide (Coyote) working for an unscrupulous business. The story provides great insight into the policy, methods, and caring attitudes of several U. S. and Mexican government and non governmental organizations as well as the origins and motivations of the pilgrims.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This book was published seven years ago and should be required reading today. It describes how undocumented workers get to the farms, motels, fast food restaurants and factories of the United States and why they undertake that perilous journey through the story of a typical group of men who attempted to cross the Arizona desert on foot. It's brilliantly and humanely written, showing everyone from the Border Patrol to the coyotes who guide the group so disastrously wrong in a critical, but compassionate way. As the political rhetoric heats up here and we have successfully renamed the people who pick our oranges and cook our Big Macs illegal aliens, as though they were non-human and essentially evil, this book is more important than ever. While Urrea does have a bias toward compassion and understanding, he doesn't flinch from addressing the costs to everyone of the issue of workers crossing illegally to work in the north. He also illuminates both the reasons people would be driven to undertake an expensive and potentially deadly journey and the ways American immigration policy has created unforeseen consequences. If every article or book written on this topic were as well-researched and free of hyperbole, I think the national debate on immigration would be both more reasonable and more productive.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Compelling, well-documented telling of the Yuma 14: illegal immigrants who died in the AZ desert trying to cross into the United States. There are no heroes (maybe the US Border Patrol who 'discover' the men) and few villains (maybe the head of the illegal operation) An indictment of the US/Mexican border policy that reads like a who-done-it, this is nonfiction writing at its best.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is recommended to those who are interested in even a general way about the issues surrounding the US-Mexico border. For people living in the area who feel that the subject matter may be a little too up-close-and-personal, I understand that, but the author did a very good job of getting through the bad parts very quickly so that you had a sense of it but weren't overhwelmed by it. Which didn't stop me from skimming some of that anyway. The book had quite a bit more to offer than just that with brief but cogent discussions of some of the larger issues causing the border problem in the first place and both the harm and good being done by the governments on both sides.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Extreamly well written non-fic book about the difficulties of the US-Mexico border. To do so Urrea retells the story of 26 mexicans as they try to cross the border, only 12 of them make it out alive. Amazing and I would recommend it to anyone.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    First Line: Five men stumbled out of the mountain pass so sunstruck they didn't know their own names, couldn't remember where they'd come from, had forgotten how long they'd been lost.So many illegal immigrants die in the desert Southwest of the U.S. that only notorious catastrophes make headlines. Urrea reconstructs one such incident in the Sonoran Desert, the ordeal of sun and thirst of two dozen men in May 2001, half of whom suffered excruciating deaths. (The press labeled them the Yuma 14 although there were more than fourteen men and Yuma had nothing to do with it.) Tracing their lives and routes to the border, Urrea's surreal style makes the desert landscape shimmer and distort as the pages turn. The way that Urrea blends the terse facts of the case into his narrative produces a powerful, almost diabolical impression of the disaster and the exploitative conditions at the border. Urrea does a masterful job of humanizing this whole situation--which is exactly what is needed.This book is an eye-opener and has encouraged me to research this topic more. This is long overdue, and I'll be trying to make up for lost time.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Well-written, and a surprisingly good read considering how depressing the subject matter is. Sometimes a little over-sensationalized, but Urrea seems to handle the evidence well. Does a really good job of showing how complex the issue is, and of portraying the people on all sides of the issue. Contains a lot of good information about the issues involved.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Seriously depressing, but compelling reading about illegal immigrants dieing in the desert trying to get into the U.S. Every chest-thumping anti-immigrant yahoo should be forced to read this book.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    An excellent book & well narrated by the author. Urrea does a great job providing a human face to many of the different sides to the complex issue of people smuggling across the U.S. - Mexico border.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This is a nonfiction work by novelist Luis Alberto Urrea which in an investigative report of border crossing of the Yuma 14 and border crossing in general. I can highly recommend this book as a fair and non biased report of border crossing. I've read Galeano's Memory of Fire which really points the political manipulation. Urrea also tells us about the politics. He fairly points out the humanness of the crossers, he points out the humanity of the border patrol. Politics is not humane, it is manipulations. We should not get our opinions from political sources. This book should be mandatory read before a person forms any opinion.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    This book would presents a look at the immigration issue by telling the story of a group of walkers who died in or survived a Mexican border crossing in which they "got lost" and suffered greatly in the Arizona desert. The immigration issue is a complex issue, and this book certainly describes a horrific experience. It paints a picture that will stay with the reader long after they complete the book. I listened to the audio version produced by Hachette and offered through the summer AudioSync program. Unfortunately the narrator read too slowly for me, and his voice was not expressive enough in places. He tried to create expression through pauses rather than vocal inflections.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    An entertaining and sad story about why and how immigrants cross the US/Mexico Border. Some of them risk their lives by crossing one of the driest and hottest desert in North America. This is a story about a specific group who tried. Many of them died.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A simple, bitter, sarcastic tone throughout, but I simply could not put it down. Raw, shocking and torturous.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Living in California makes me miss the rain. A good thunderstorm, a tropical shower, that smell, that heaviness in the air that lets you know the rain is coming. It’s drizzling here in Fremont today, and is expected to rain for the next couple of days, but it’s a different sort of rain. It’s the kind that creeps up on you, that you can barely hear, that isn’t announced via a flash and boom.

    California is dry. But not as dry as the Devil’s Highway (and I mean the actual ‘highway’ here, not the book above). I mean, look at the way Urrea opens his book:

    “Five men stumbled out of the mountain pass so sunstruck they didn’t know their own names, couldn’t remember where they’d come from, had forgotten how long they’d been lost. One of them wandered back up a peak. One of them was barefoot. They were burned nearly black, their lips huge and cracking, what paltry drool still available to them spuming from their mouths in a salty foam as they walked. Their eyes were cloudy with dust, almost too dry to blink up a tear. Their hair was  hard and stiffened by old sweat, standing in crowns from their scalps, old sweat because their bodies were no longer sweating. They were drunk from having their brains baked in the pan, they were seeing God and the devils, and they were dizzy from drinking their own urine, the poisons clogging their systems.”

    Doesn’t that just make you want to reach for your glass of water and take a huge chug?

    These five men were part of an original group of 26 who were trying to cross from Mexico into the United States, into Arizona, for the promise of a better life, led by a rather inept guide who eventually leads them to this disastrous ending. This crossing kills many illegal immigrants every year, but one or two never make the headlines, unlike these 26 – of which 14 died excruciating deaths. Urrea traces these men back to their small towns, attempting to tell their stories from what little is known of their backgrounds – the inventory of their few possessions and the clothes they wore on this trek was particularly sad to read.

    Urrea doesn’t simply drag the reader along with him on his hot and dusty journey. Instead he involves us, he brings us into this tale he is attempting to weave for us. For instance, when discussing the leader of the Spanish expedition looking for gold in 1541, he has the reader imagine how he died.

    “No record states how Melchior entered the pen, but it doesn’t seem likely he stopped to open a gate. Not Melchior. He jumped over the fence, and in jumping, somehow he bobbled his lance throw and missed the dog entirely. You can see the dog tipping and sidestepping and making tracks for the horizon, casting wounded looks over his shoulder. And here is where Melchior Diaz died.”

    So you can imagine what it must be like when he describes and explains the different stages of death by heat. A very graphic, difficult read but like a highway accident, something you just can’t tear your eyes away from.

    Just make sure you’ve got plenty to drink while reading The Devil’s Highway.

     
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I've taken a number of writing classes with Luis, and he's a kick-ass person who takes your breath away... and his writing isn't much different. This book kept me on the edge of my seat... I don't think I slept for three days until I finished this one. And it's not even pro-immigrant or pro-border guard, but a nice balanced representation of the reality of people's lives.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    So many in the US complain about illegal immigrants, while forgetting that their ancestors once came to this country uninvited. And most of those who come, now, really don't want to; they have family back home and many of them can't find jobs, because the American corporations have pulled out and left few jobs and those that are available are worse than minimum wage here. Sadly, many of those who try to come to the US die in their search for a better life for them and their families.This exposes the selfishness that often comes with abundance that many US citizens enjoy. All of us can gain perspective by thinking about the ordeals our ancestors went through so that we could enjoy freedom of religion and the abundance available in this country. And, in truth, there are people in this country who are so far from that abundance that they can't even afford to see it on TV. It's not helping them to keep the immigrants out. They don't have access to the jobs the immigrants are out for. The world is screwed up enough without our complaining about people trying for a better life. Many who complain, however, try to lump all illegal aliens into one group: drug and human traffickers.I'm reminded of the way German-Americans, Japanese-Americans were treated during WWII, and the way many people of Middle Eastern descent were treated (are still?) after 9/11. It's fear--xenophobia! And it is sad and disgusting. Especially when it is those who are simply trying to pursue happiness or a little less sadness, or even a little more to feed, clothe and house their family. These immigrants often die in a horrible way, crossing Hell trying to reach the Promised Land which despises them for no other reason than they aren't from here. Yes, the drugs and crime are often part of it--but, NEWS FLASH! drugs and crime have been part of the culture of the US for a loooong time and it does NOT depend on illegal immigration to keep going.This book gives names to a few of the hundreds that try to find a better life, it gives the outsider a view into the lives of the kinds of people they are, how they live, how they want what everyone wants: happiness and the chance to take care of their families. I can't imagine anything closer to Hell on Earth than what all these desperate men endured and what lead to many of them to their deaths. Luis Alberto Urrea also shows how our jobs are not really in danger of being all taken away by illegal immigrants.If you are interested in what goes on on the Mexican-American border; in what often happens to the people who try to cross into a better life; or in ways all this is handled by our respective governments, and what that means for citizens of both countries; this is a good read to has a few answers, while at the same time putting a face on the brave and desperate people.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This book is well worth the read and the 4 star rating just for the insight, perspective, and better understanding of the complicated issues associated with illegal entry at the Mexican /US border.

    For those like myself who live outside the SW Sun Belt, I would suspect that the majority of us are exposed only to news stories affecting the larger economic and political picture. This book really brought to light the tragic and profound implications of our policies and behaviors to the personal lives of all those involved on both sides of the border.

    The unbelievable billions of dollars spent to stem the flow of people into the US. The unquenchable drive for people to rise from poverty and improve theirs and their loved ones lives; and the risks that they will take to achieve those dreams. Then add the whole repulsive crime based infrastructure and environment that develops, preys, and exists supported by this situation.

    While the author offers sublimities and innuendos, there are no clear cut solutions or recommendations. Perhaps the best measure is the enlightenment of his broader audience in a way that stimulates or fosters thoughts leading towards mediating alternative actions or solutions. And to this extent, I believe Mr. Urrea has been exceedingly successful.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This was a tragic look at the struggles faced by immigrants attempting to enter the U.S. In May 2001 a group of at least 26 Mexicans attempted to enter Arizona through the desert on foot. A series of missteps cost at least 14 of the walkers their lives. The book adds a personal story to the plight of immigrants and was well researched, especially considering that so much is still unknown and accounts of those involved are unreliable due to the effects of hyperthermia. Speaking of, the description of the stages of hyperthermia actually made me get up and drink a glass of water. The author did a very good job at looking at this incident through various lenses and emphasizing that immigration is not a black and white issue. The book poses no solutions, but raises some good questions…How could one coyote (a-hole that he was) be solely responsible for the deaths? This incident was tragic because of the number of deaths, but why are the victims treated as heroes and martyrs after the fact? Would all the money that is spent on border protection and treatment of border victims be better spent on a sound immigration program or in the Mexican economy?
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    The May 2001 Operation Broken Promise is doomed from the beginning. Twenty-six ?walkers? (illegal aliens) began their journey north to the United States and jobs; only twelve survived. Urrea gives the bad news up front in this true story and weaves his way backward through all the wrong turns and mistakes.The author methodically takes the reader through the six stages of hyperthermia. It?s a harrowing way to die. There are only sketchy stories about these men and their hard lives. They all had dreams of a better life only to meet up with their worst nightmares as the unrelenting sun burns their skin and literally sucks the life from them. ?In many ancient religious texts, fallen angels were bound in chains and buried beneath a desert known only as Desolation. This could be the place.? (Pg. 4)This book tells a harsh story?one without resolution or a happy ending. The last fifty pages or so tell of the ?politics of stupidity? that rule on both sides of the border. Unfortunately, things have not improved in the ten years since the book was written.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This is one of my all-time favorite books, and one I recommend more often than all others, especially to men. It’s the gruesome true story of 28 men emigrating from Mexico into the U.S. across the desert on a particular route known as The Devil’s Highway. Their coyote, or guide, is inexperienced, gets them lost, and leaves them to die in the desert. You will never think about heat, thirst or the desert the same way again. Urrea is a poet and novelist aside from being an award-winning non-fiction author, and his amazing unraveling of this ill-fated border crossing is nothing short of mesmerizing…and oddly beautiful. He humanizes the immigrant workers we so frequently disregard. Images from this book still haunt me. Have a big glass of cool water with you when you read this one
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    The Devil’s Highway is an oddly compelling read as it takes you through the life and death of illegal immigration. It presents a view point you may not have considered before if you are a Sirius Patriot Radio fan. I wasn’t sure if I would like it, but it is a fine read, if you keep an open mind.