My Review of Urrea's "Into the Beautiful North"

As expected, I enjoyed Luis Alberto Urrea's newest novel. I feel like he synthesized his life experiences around a "Quest" theme with an odd and delightful assortment of characters who are more real to me than my neighbors.

The women of Tres Camarones, Sinaloa, Mexico find themselves with a serious shortage of men; so many have gone North into 'Los Estados Unidos'. Inspired by the movie The Magnificent Seven, the main character, Nayeli (Nah-yell'-ee) decides to go North to recruit seven men to return and revitalize her village, and protect them from the drug bandidos who have just taken notice of how isolated yet close to Mazatlan their town is. With her are her two girlfriends and their friend Tacho, the gay taqueria/Internet Cafe owner.

I found many of the scenes funny and endearing, and many more that were frighteningly real in the illegal border crossing experience.

Again, as expected, I recommend this latest fine work to any reader.

The Shepherdess Parable

I wrote the first draft of this last September.


Once upon a time there was a shepherdess who inherited seven sheep. At first she was excited about this.
"This is just a beginning," she told her neighbors, "my flock will grow very large and I will be so proud of my many, many sheep."
The first year passed and two of the seven sheep, who were quite old when she first took possession of them, died. Another had an accident and went lame. But three new sheep joined the flock and the shepherdess was content. She still dreamed of having the largest flock in her village.
The shepherdess was especially fond of her strong, obedient sheep. There seemed to be always about four of those. The weak or lost sheep she found annoying and unworthy and when they wandered off she was not upset.
A few more years went by and the number hovered still around seven. No new lambs were born since her sheep were older and past their lambing days. More of the older ones died and any new weak, lazy or shabby ones would wander off looking for someone to love and help them.
When ten years went by the shepherdess became distraught that her dream of a large flock was not being realized.
"What can be wrong?" she asked herself. Being a godly woman, she prayed to the Great Shepherd asking for more sheep to be added to her flock but through the years, the number continued to hover right around seven.
The shepherdess was growing older herself and was becoming discouraged.
One night as she lay down to sleep, she implored the Great Shepherd to tell her why she still only had seven when she wanted seventy. And thus she fell asleep.
In her dream she saw the seventy sheep she had felt should be hers. When they walked past her she looked at each one and realized that she already knew most of them, they were the weak and lost sheep that she had not given her attention to; had not been sorry to see drift away. Then she heard an angel-voice saying, "Every single sheep was sent by the Great Shepherd, just as you asked. You and your strong, wise sheep were meant to care for those you judged weak and unworthy. Go now and gather up the needy and show them the path to strength and wisdom."
When the shepherdess awoke she understood what her gift was and she spent her remaining years looking for the ones who needed her.

Remember Where You Are

When my grandson A.J. was 2 years old, I was in the habit of entertaining him with animal sounds. I think it started with a book he liked me to read to him about a character who was good at animal sounds but couldn't speak. Anyway, I worked at Arizona AAA back then (1991). His mom, Wendy, called me at work because A.J. wanted to talk to 'Amah'. That's what he still calls me (he's 20 now). A.J. indicated he would like me to make some animal sounds and being 'in the moment' I started right in. I did my wooh, wooh, wooh for a chimpanzee. Then I did my personal favorite, the crow: Aaaa, Aaaa, Aaaa. This is one I had practised in the great outdoors and it was LOUD!

My boss, a tolerant fellow, came out of his office across the room as if shot by a cannon, saying, "What the hell was that?"

I stood up and wide grinned him. He came over to me, eyebrows aloft, and merely said, "Please try to remember where you are, Carol."