{"product_id":"gonzalez-and-daughter-trucking-co-isbn-9781400097357","title":"Gonzalez and Daughter Trucking Co.","description":"\u003cb\u003eFrom the author of \u003ci\u003eL.A. Weather\u003c\/i\u003e comes “a whimsical, humorous, and passionate mystery that explores the love and hurt of a father and daughter on the run” (Jorge Ramos, News Anchor for Univision).\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e“1,001 nights in a Mexicali women’s prison . . . \u003ci\u003eGonzález and Daughter Trucking Co.\u003c\/i\u003e is about our compulsion to make events into stories and stories into bridges of understanding.”—John Sayles, Screenwriter and Director\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eServing a sentence in a prison in Mexico, Libertad González finds a clever way to pass the time with the weekly Library Club, reading to her fellow inmates from whatever books she can find in the prison’s meager supply. The story that emerges, though, has nothing to do with the words printed on the pages. She tells of a former literature professor and fugitive of the Mexican government who reinvents himself as a trucker in the United States. There he falls in love with a wild woman with whom he shares his truck and his life—that is until Joaquín González unexpectedly finds himself alone on the road with a baby girl and González \u0026amp; Daughter Trucking Co. is born. Joaquín and his daughter make the cab of an 18-wheeler their home, sharing everything—adventures, books, truck-stop chow, and memories of the girl’s mother—until one day the girl grows into a woman, and a chance encounter with one man causes her to rebel against another. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWith her stories, Libertad enthralls a group of female prisoners every bit as eccentric as the tales she tells. In \u003ci\u003eGonzález and Daughter Trucking Co\u003c\/i\u003e., bestselling author María Amparo Escandón seamlessly blends together these elements into one compelling and unexpected conclusion that will have you cheering for Libertad and filled with joy.“A warm and ingenious novel that delights from start to finish.” —Alexander Payne, Screenwriter and Director of \u003ci\u003eSideways\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“1,001 nights in a Mexicali women’s prison...\u003ci\u003eGonzález and Daughter Trucking Co\u003c\/i\u003e. is about our compulsion to make events into stories and stories into bridges of understanding.” —John Sayles, Screenwriter and Director\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Escandón has delivered us yet another work of art. . . A whimsical, humorous, and passionate mystery that explores the love and hurt of a father and daughter on the run.” —Jorge Ramos, News Anchor for Univision and Bestselling Author\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“An ingenious retelling of Scheherazade’s odyssey—but on wheels.” —Ilan Stavans, author of\u003ci\u003e Spanglish: The Making of a New American Language\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003eMaría Amparo Escandón\u003c\/b\u003e is the author of #1 \u003ci\u003eLos Angeles Times\u003c\/i\u003e bestseller \u003ci\u003eEsperanza’s Box of Saints\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eL.A. Weather\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eGonzález \u0026amp; Daughter Trucking Co\u003c\/i\u003e. Named a writer to watch by both \u003ci\u003eNewsweek \u003c\/i\u003eand the \u003ci\u003eL.A. Times\u003c\/i\u003e, she was born in Mexico City and has lived in Los Angeles for nearly four decades.\u003cb\u003eChapter 1\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Bringing back to life all the people I killed is the one wish at the  top of my list.” Had she said those words aloud? Libertad sat up and  looked around to check if anyone had heard her.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMaciza, dozing a few feet away, had trained her ears to listen for  rats tiptoeing around their prison cell. She easily heard Libertad's  impossible wish.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"So, who did you kill?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"It's none of your business.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Did you kill anyone?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLibertad couldn't get herself to confess anything. She opened her  journal and in the darkness searched for her pen between the folds of  her blanket. A cellmate in the far corner snored. Someone in one of  the upper bunks yelled, \"Shut up!\" With so many women sleeping in  such a small cell, it was hard to tell where one body ended and  another began, making it difficult to identify oneself as an  individual.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I don't think you killed anyone, Libertad. I think you want me to  believe that just to impress me. Were you pushing chocolate in  Tijuana?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Chocolate?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Mud, tootsie roll, heroin. Maybe you kidnapped some rich bastard.  C'mon, Libertad, give me some trust. You've been in this shit hole  for almost a year. It's time to share.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I said it's none of your business.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Were you hanging with one of those narcos, or was it fraud? Or a  scam? I bet it was one of those educated people's felonies.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I'm not going to talk about it.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"At least tell me what the hell you're doing locked up in a Mexican  prison. Your government should be trying to get you out of here.  Isn't that what Americans do in their movies?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Just drop it, will you? I'm not digging around to find out why you're here.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"That's because you already know.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"All I know is that you killed your husband. It's no secret. You've  told everyone.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Yeah, that's right. But why I did it is what I don't discuss with  just anyone. Only with someone I know will understand. That means  you, and no one else in this goddamn hen pen.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"All right, why did you do it?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I did it for love.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLibertad wished she were as certain as Maciza was about why she had  made her own mistakes. But her memories were in disarray. She needed  to do some serious mental housekeeping.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn her first few days at the Mexicali Penal Institution for Women,  Libertad had kept to herself, but the more she tried to avoid  conversation with the other inmates, the more she was stalked with  questions in the hallways, in the showers, in the toilet, in the  kitchen. Every so often she tried to tell them why she was there, but  she found it impossible to explain. Once, when she was asked  directly, she uttered a fetus of a word, something like, \"Iaaggrhh.\"  Since she was in the cafeteria, the woman next to her thought she was  choking and proceeded to pound her on the back with all her might.  Her tray fell off the table and her poor man's chilaquiles—with no  chicken, that is—spilled on the floor.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLibertad was not complying with the unwritten rule that all new  prisoners had to declare and make public the reason they had been  incarcerated. Everyone had to know who had done what to whom and why  the prisoner claimed to be innocent. Of course, extensive details of  the crime were expected. Otherwise, what would they all talk about in  those long desert days?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBecause Libertad's strange behavior had brought out a chronic  uneasiness and a desperate curiosity among her fellow inmates, she  tried to belong in other ways. She taught Diva, one of her seven  other cellmates and an authority on prison fashion, how to calculate  the time by positioning her fingers in a certain angle against the  palm of her other hand.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"It's a hand sundial.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Very useful around here,\" said Diva as she tried it, nearly burning  her eyes from staring at the sun in the middle of the exercise yard.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLibertad also helped Maciza train for a nonexistent marathon by  timing her laps around the cellblock's hallways and shared her  tamales with Culebra, the woman with the longest fingernails she had  ever seen.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBut even after curfew, after the lights were out and everyone had  settled in to sleep, a question would shoot into the darkness of her  cell.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Are you in for murder?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAs the first couple of months went by, Libertad's cellmates began to  lose control of their curiosity and tried all kinds of techniques to  squeeze the story out of her, even the hard-core ones they'd been  exposed to firsthand during their encounters with the Mexican  authorities. But just before they resorted to torture, Maciza put a  stop to it. She knew Libertad would crack sooner or later. She had  subtler, more effective psychological ways to work her over.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"It's okay, I can wait. You can blab your guts out when you're  ready,\" Maciza would say. \"That's all we do around here, anyway. We  blab our guts out.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"It's not that I won't talk, Maciza. I just can't.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Don't worry, it will come out. We'll make it come out.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA book changed everything. Which book, Libertad didn't remember. All  she knew was that a few months after she arrived in the Mexicali  Penal Institution for Women, she went to the library, picked up a  dog-eared paperback, and began reading aloud, the way her father had  taught her and the only way she knew. Sitting in that dark and  sorry-looking room, she noticed that the words on the page were  different from the words she said.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShe wondered if her thoughts were getting tangled with the plot. It  happened to her sometimes, when she was tired. She tried to read  again, this time paying more attention to the story, but it didn't  work. By the time she looked up, a small group of inmates had  gathered around her and were listening attentively. From then on,  she'd go to the library, pick any book, and read as loud as she  could. Somehow, between the chapters in those tattered paperbacks and  the stories in her mind, the words transformed themselves into her  own account of the events that led to her incarceration.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhen she read to her fellow inmates, she felt the pressure in her  chest ease. She imagined her lungs backed up with words and her voice  pushing them out, letting her breathe. Wiping her soul clean of  remorse had turned out to be most difficult and slow, but she had  more time than life. This was her only way of alleviating the pain.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eChapter 2 \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWe started the business together when I was born, my father and I.  The sign on the door of our truck read GONZALEZ \u0026amp; DAUGHTER TRUCKING  CO. I'd touch those words before I got in the cab. This ritual gave  me a sense of comfort. It was part of my routine. To feel the subtle  texture of the pink words and the purple border and with the same  fingers make the sign of the cross. Then, to open the gate of the  tiny plastic altar glued to the dashboard and kiss the Virgin of  Guadalupe. All that had to happen before I put the key in the  ignition.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLibertad made eye contact with the other inmates listening to her  story in the prison library and wiped a drop of sweat off her  forehead.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSoon after she realized that whenever she read aloud she drew an  audience, and that the stories she told were not in the books but in  her head, she decided to find a way to turn her time in the library  into a prison activity. It would be her way of confessing her crime  to her fellow inmates. So, in a long letter written on the back of an  unused visitor permit, Libertad proposed to Warden Guzmon to set up  and run a library club at no cost to the government. Her suggestion  was immediately approved.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThat hot and arid day she pretended to read from \u003ci\u003eThe Three  Musketeers\u003c\/i\u003e. The paper in the mangled book was so brittle and dry that  it absorbed her saliva, desperately quenching its thirst every time  she licked her finger to turn a page.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe air, too, was a prisoner here. No drafts. No fresh air. Only  heat, the kind that injures the nostrils. This jail was the hottest  place in Mexicali, a city known to be the hottest in the world. But  the inmates' attention never wavered. Maciza, sitting in the second  row, blew quick breaths down her shirt in an effort to dry the sweat  that pooled between her generous breasts.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLike millions of other Mexicans, I was born in Los Angeles,  California. But I never lived there. I was always on the road,  traveling with my father. We took our truck across the country, from  coast to coast, on interstate highways, back roads, even small dirt  roads that would never make it to a map. But we didn't cross over to  Mexico. Ever. That country, as much as I'd learned to love it, was  off-limits for us and I never set foot in it until much later in my  trucking life. Everywhere else, I was known as Gonzalez's daughter,  Gonzalez's girl, Gonzalez's kiddo.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd what about my education? What I know I learned from my father.  We'd make a special stop in every city to browse for books, in  English or Spanish, particularly in those small, cluttered bookstores  almost always located in busy downtown streets where it was  impossible to maneuver, let alone park, our rig. But the ordeal was  part of the thrill. Wherever we went, no matter what type of road we  traveled or how heavy a load we hauled, we read aloud to each other  over the constant rumble of the engine. I never went to school. I was  truck-schooled.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAs a little girl, I read while my father drove. Later, when I finally  took over the steering wheel, he did the reading. Then we'd trade  places. Because we couldn't store the books we'd already finished in  our truck's tiny sleeper, we'd throw them out the window, leaving the  highways scattered with knowledge. \u003ci\u003eWhat We Talk About When We Talk  About Love\u003c\/i\u003e is probably lying by the carcass of a skunk on the  shoulder of Interstate 10 just past Indio. Loose pages of \u003ci\u003eHamlet \u003c\/i\u003e tangled in tumbleweed must be rolling across Highway 86, over by  Salton Sea. Sand dunes on the way to Palm Springs, right where the  windmills catch the air from the desert and turn it into electricity,  are digesting the deluxe edition of \u003ci\u003eDon Quixote\u003c\/i\u003e. If I could string  together all the lines of text I've read aloud on the road, I'd be  able to tie a bow of words around the world.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLibertad stopped to check the time on the clock hanging high on the  wall across the library. Once again, as it had been since its  inception a couple of months back, the hour allotted to their weekly  Library Club had gone much too fast. She put \u003ci\u003eThe Three Musketeers\u003c\/i\u003e on  the shelf next to \u003ci\u003eCrime and Punishment \u003c\/i\u003eand announced to her audience,  \"That's it for today. We'll continue next Wednesday.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Where's the mother?\" asked Maciza on the way out. \"Where the hell is  the mother?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"It's coming up in one of the next chapters.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Why isn't she in the truck with her little girl?\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"You'll find out.\"","brand":"Crown","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46301236166885,"sku":"NP9781400097357","price":21.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9781400097357.jpg?v=1767728306","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/gonzalez-and-daughter-trucking-co-isbn-9781400097357","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}