Elements

Book excerpt: Elements, a wild ride through the barrios of East L.A.: two homeboys caught in a house burgling, a weirdo on the loose in Hollywood, a loner brooding on a drug deal, a fledgling writer cartwheeling across the landscape in his attempts for wholeness, falling down flat and getting up again in a series of stories displaying the confusions and angst, the joys and beauties of being Mexican American and being alive. Elements, a healthy addition to the growing family of Mexican American literature, a new voice, a fresh perspective, an appealing candor, a revealing look into the soul of the Mexican American neither barrio born and raised nor suburban weaned and teased, but a working-class product of two cultures vast and conflicting.