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Type of bind: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN num: 9780140238280
ISBN number: 014023828X
Label: Penguin Books
Manufacturer: Penguin Books
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 355
Printing Date: September 01, 1996
Publishing house: Penguin Books
Sale Popularity Level: 4252
Studio: Penguin Books
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Product Description:
While leading their lives in their gated hilltop community in Los Angeles, Delaney and Kyra Mossbacher accidently meet Mexican illegal aliens Ca+a7ndido and Ame+a7rica Rinco+a7n, and their encounter brings them together in a relationship of error and misunderstanding. Reprint.
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Rated by buyers 
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Sometimes I miss the days when I read indiscriminately, chewing through whatever fell into my hands with crazy abandon. But then my reading skills matured and now I feel cheated if I read a book where certain incongruous plot elements are thrown in without the requisite foreshadowing. If, for instance, a left-leaning environmentalist beta male pulls a gun out of his closet without so much as an earlier hint of its existence, I must cry foul. Same goes for landslides that suddenly sweep main characters up and away. Characters that you have just spent 350 pages caring about, mind you. And then leaving their fate up for conjecture without so much as an apology ("I'm sorry, I don't know what happened to Delaney. Perhaps he'll turn up in another book, who knows?") How rude.
For all that, I did enjoy most of the book. Boyle succeeded in making me care about unlikable characters and that's no small feat. I'll probably read another book by him, even though he committed the cardinal sin of making the protagonist a writer.
Rated by buyers 
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Well-written, thought provoking, but depressing. Boyle did a masterful job of "writing out of two people's heads". He articulately compares the plight of an illegal immigrant couple with the lives of a suburban couple who are significantly affected by the immigrants presence in this country. Everyone has a valid point of view. It was great book club discusion book.
Rated by buyers 
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Compelling, powerful, gut wrenching, thrilling, and absolutely unpredictable are the very first words that come to mind. I loved the way the story alternates each chapter between the voices of the two, one the illegal Mexican immigrant couple and the other the white yuppie Californian couple. All the characters are starkly shown in full blown human imperfection as each struggles with life in a unique way; the Mexicans to maintain basic life, and the Californians to maintain a lifestyle. The story is chock full of tough issues including illegal immigration, racism, man's humanity (or lack of it) to man, and each heart wrenching dilemma is pretty much left hanging there, just as it is in reality...in each of our lives. This is earth-shattering in it's dead-on portrayal of the souls of so many of us. The story is magnificently written, excitingly told - an absolute page turner, full of beauty and ugliness; a book that forces us to ask ourselves many painful and important questions along the way. This is a life-altering book; it will grab you and keep you sitting on the edge of your seat. I wish everyone would read it. Bravo, Boyle. If anyone reading this has read other Boyle novels, I would appreciate their personal comments. Thanks!
Rated by buyers 
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I had high expectations for this book after the amount of praise I'd seen TC Boyle garnered with. That's probably why it was such a let down. The narrative is the same bland, mass market fiction style done countless times before. That in itself is okay if it's done well, but this book is bogged down by an obsession with chronological events. There is page after page of text that doesn't seem to have any real relevance except for it being the subsequent step in time. Worse still is the amount of coincidence in the novel, which is completely unbelievable and makes it clear he had a message to deliver rather than a story to tell. The point that the West Coast liberals are phony is beat into the ground as are the deplorable conditions the Mexican immigrants suffer, to the point where it almost becomes an exaggerated parody (albeit a humorless one).
It did have a few good moments, but they were lost in this sloppy execution. I thought the ending was lacking as well, with a ridiculous endeavor at gun violence and another natural catastrophe(on top of the forest fire) crammed in the last 30 pages. At times I do think Boyle could be a good writer, but this effort didn't seem to work.
Rated by buyers -
Delaney Mossbacher is a wealthy yuppie-liberal who lives in the suburbs of Los Angeles. One day on his way to the recycling center, he hits a pedestrian with his car. The man hit is Candido Rincon, a poor, illegal immigrant from Mexico. Feeling guilty, Delaney gives Candido twenty dollars to compensate for his injuries, and the two men go their separate ways. Yet with the accident, Delaney and Candido's lives become woven together for the rest of the book.
This story is so relevant to anyone who lives near the Mexican/US border. It is written from two different points of view; an illegal immigrant and his pregnant wife, who are struggling to better their life, and that of and a wealthy couple living in a gated community.
This book hooked me from the very very first page, and I NEVER lost interest for a minute. EXCELLENT.
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