Cogan’s Reviews This is one of the most enjoyable fiction “reads” I’ve had in a long time. It’s simply good straightforward storytelling complete with interesting and likeable characters and a good basic plot situation. It is founded on an actual incident in relations between the U.S. and Mexico when, in 1916, Pancho Villa’s bandidos, led […]
Continue ReadingCogan’s Reviews “Mexifornia,” to quote the author, “is about the nature of a new California and what it means for America – a reflection upon the strange society that is emerging as the result of a demographic and a cultural revolution like no other in our times.” Thus Victor Davis Hanson opens his close examination […]
Continue ReadingCogan’s Reviews Cynicism isn’t my favorite literary mode. It wears thin after a while. And John Ross is nothing if not cynical. For the first two chapters I wondered if I was going to make it all the way. However, the saving factor in his book, “The Annexation of Mexico” is that most of the […]
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Cogan’s Reviews This, like its predecessor, All The Pretty Horses, is another coming-of-age story involving a young American in the border country between Mexico and New Mexico in the 1930s. Billy Parham is sixteen years old when he traps a wolf in New Mexico and decides to take the injured animal back across the border […]
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Cogan’s Reviews A regular feature of our e-mail are the letters we get from people all over North America seeking information about various aspects of life and travel in Mexico. This is because of articles and reviews I’ve written over the years. I’m sure the other MexConnect writers also get similar queries. I’m rather fortunate, […]
Continue ReadingCogan’s Reviews The story begins in 1941, at the time America went to war with Japan and Germany. It concerns the Salazar family, poor farmers in Chihuahua. The grandfather, Sebastian, knows he is dying and he advises the family to move to the United States. He reasons that because of the war the Americans will […]
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I should explain at the outset that I have lived in Ajijic on the shores of Lake Chapala for the past five years and there are days when I’ll admit I feel surrounded by Americans and Canadians. I can see all the reasons for living here as happily as I do — the climate, the […]
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A funny thing happened the other day to one of my favorite Mexicans. He was invited to speak at a college, which, once upon a time, slammed the front door in his face. Deep in the MexConnect archives is a previous story about Rodolfo Calva Marquez, migratory worker without proper papers, who had the good fortune […]
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For some, illegal immigration is a simple equation, what you risk for what you get. Luis Alberto Martinez Gomez became an illegal immigrant four years ago. He was 16. “Everybody was on their way to the U.S.” He had shallow roots in Tepic, four years until his parents divorced. After that, his mother moved around. […]
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Perhaps you have heard that illegal immigration is down. The economy up north is supposedly discouraging. More and better border surveillance, patrols and the fence could be factors. Up, down or sideways, illegal immigration is, well, illegal. It is breaking and entering followed by an occasional game of hide and seek. Through the years, 15 […]
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