The story of a wetback. A Guatemalan peasant in trouble with the authorities heads north with the intention of making enough money to send for his family. The novel chronicles his journey through Mexico, his illegal entry into the U.S. and his exploitation by a Texas rancher.

An aid for librarians and teachers interested in exposing students in kindergarten through high school with an understanding and appreciation of the people, history, and art and political, social, and economic problems of Central and South American countries, and Latino-heritage people in the United States.

A novel of ambitions and desires thwarted in a small Texas town, Dancing with Lyndon brings the early 1950s to life. Living in a small conservative and racist town, Thomas Patterson, a stiff young criminal lawyer, is running for state district judge and hoping for endorsements from either the governor or young Lyndon Johnson, who's running for the senate. Thomas's stay-at-home wife and their teenaged son Tommy are satellites to his grandiose political aspirations. But all hopes for a substantial political career are dashed when a black client Thomas successfully defended against a charge of the rape of a white girl kills himself, leaving a note confessing to the crime. The town turns against the Patterson family, jeering, threatening, and even vandalizing Thomas's car. The menacing atmosphere only adds to the tensions escalating within the family. Mary Lee, Thomas's dreamy, restless wife, can't quite grasp why she is so unhappy but knows it has something to do with Thomas's reliance on logic and reason to the exclusion of all emotion. Impulsively, she seeks the advice of a gypsy woman who foretells temptation, change, and someone to show her the way. Fourteen-year-old Tommy is caught between his parents' conflicting unspoken demands and struggles to make his own way and his own decisions about life. As tensions mount, he alternates between concern for his parents and the forbidden, budding attraction he feels for the daughter of a gypsy woman. All the protagonists' desires and ambitions come to a head at a barbecue where Lyndon Johnson is scheduled to speak. Thomas's political career takes an unexpected turn, Mary Lee finally understands where her desires can lead her, and Tommy comes to see his parents in a new light.

Maggie O’Neill’s life in Houston has become a story of loss. Maggie, always in a contentious relationship with her mother, becomes caretaker when the difficult woman is dying of cancer. Maggie’s marriage of almost twenty-five years ends in divorce, and her only child has left Houston to find his independence. Maggie is left with little more than her camera, to which she, a novice, warily entrusts her future. Desperate to begin a new life, she drives to Laredo and fights off her doubts as she crosses the border into Mexico. Slowly, the Mexican landscape and people open her eyes to a fresh way of seeing through the lens of her camera. During a stopover in San Miguel de Allende she receives unsolicited advice to go to Casa Azul, Frida Kahlo’s house in Coyoacan. In Oaxaca, on impulse, Maggie enrolls in a watercolor class taught by Connor, a visiting Texas artist, and from there the story unfolds through both Maggie’s and Connor’s eyes. The author’s own experiences of living in Oaxaca and his close observation of detail inform the story in a rich, evocative way.