Soldiers and Kings: Survival and Hope in the World of Human Smuggling

"An intimate and one-of-a-kind look at the world of human smuggling in Latin America, by a MacArthur "genius" grant winner and anthropologist Political instability, poverty, climate change, and the insatiable appetite for cheap labor all fuel clandestine movement across borders. As those borders harden, the demand for smugglers who aid migrants across them increases every year. Yet media and politicians have always characterized smugglers-or coyotes, or guides, as they are often known by the migrants who hire their services-using tired tropes and stereotypes, as boogie men and violent warlords. In an effort to better understand this essential yet extralegal billion dollar global industry, internationally recognized anthropologist and expert Jason De Leâon embedded with a group of smugglers moving migrants across Mexico over the course of seven years. The result of this unprecedented access is SOLDIERS AND KINGS: the first ever in-depth, character-driven look at human smuggling. It is a heart-wrenching and intimate narrative that revolves around the life and death of one coyote, Chino, who falls in love and tries to leave smuggling behind. In a powerful, original voice, De Leâon expertly chronicles the lives of low-level foot soldiers breaking into the smuggling game, and morally conflicted gang leaders who oversee rag-tag crews of guides and informants along the migrant trail. SOLDIERS AND KINGS is not only a ground-breaking up-close glimpse of a difficult-to-access world, it is a masterpiece of narrative nonfiction"--