Cantú (contributor, Guernica) uses a series of vignettes to recount his experiences as a U.S. Border Patrol agent. Stories of catching migrants and retrieving dead bodies are interspersed with interludes that provide historical context to the border conflict. Throughout his time as an agent, Cantú is plagued by unsettling dreams and struggles to justify his work to his mother, who is proud of her Mexican heritage and skeptical of the Border Patrol. After Cantú leaves the Border Patrol he befriends José, an undocumented immigrant who has been living and working in the United States for more than 30 years. José visits his dying mother in Mexico and finds that he cannot return to his family and life in the United States. Cantú assists José's family with the legal proceedings, while musing on the juxtaposition between border agents and those affected by the policies that the they enforce. José also tells his side of the story, emphasizing his reasons for wanting to remain in America. VERDICT A personal, unguarded look at border life from the perspective of a migrant and agent, recommended for those wishing to gain a deeper understanding of current events.-Rebekah Kati, Univ. of North Carolina, Chapel Hill © Copyright 2018. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Cantú narrates the stellar audio edition of his memoir about his time as a border-patrol agent in Arizona. He uses a manner that respectfully conveys the life-and-death struggles of the people he witnessed desperately trying to cross into the United States from Mexico. Cantú, raised in the Southwest by a single mother of Mexican heritage, resists the temptation to go for obvious ethnic vocal characterizations or demonstrative displays, instead opting for an understated delivery to relate the details of spouses separated from one another, parents separated from children, and border crossers facing the elements. When advocating on behalf of a friend who is a detained undocumented immigrant, Cantú speaks in tones that elicit understanding and empathy rather than pity. The passages recounting parent-child visitation at a detention center provide an especially memorable display of Cantú's narration style working in sync with his writing style. Cantú first shared parts of this narrative on the radio show This American Life; his excellent audiobook will appeal to fans of that show and of first-person nonfiction storytelling in general. A Riverhead hardcover. (Feb.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

A Mexican-American student of international relations becomes a United States Border Patrol agent to learn what he can't in the classroom.Cant is a talented writer who knows where to find great material, even as he risks losing his soul in the process. His Mexican mother had worked as a ranger in West Texas, and he had an affinity for the region that spurred his departure from academic life to learn firsthand about patrolling the border and determining the fates of the Mexicans who dared to cross it. Some were selling drugs, and others just wanted a better life; some had to work with a drug cartel in order to finance their escape. The author was by all accounts a good agent for some five years, upholding the law without brutalizing those he captured for deportation, as some agents did. But he feared what the experience was doing to him. He had trouble sleeping and suffered disturbing dreams, and he felt he was becoming desensitized. His mother warned him, "we learn violence by watching others, by seeing it enshrined in institutions. Then, even without our choosing it, it begins to seem normal to us, it even becomes part of who we are." Cant left the field for a desk job and became more reflective and more disturbed; eventually, he returned to scholarship with a research grant. But then a man he knew and liked through a daily coffee shop connection ran afoul of the border authorities after returning to Mexico to visit his dying mother and trying to return to his home and family. His plight and the author's involvement in it, perhaps an attempt to find personal redemption, puts a human face on the issue and gives it a fresh, urgent perspective. "There are thousands of people just like him, thousands of cases, thousands of families," writes Cant, who knows the part he played in keeping out so many in similar situations.A devastating narrative of the very real human effects of depersonalized policy. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

FORCE OF NATURE, by Jane Harper. (Flatiron, $16.99.) In this thriller from the hugely popular Australian crime novelist, five colleagues set out for a hike in the bush, but only four return. Aaron Falk, a federal agent, investigates the missing hiker - a woman who was widely disliked and secretly looking into her firm's dodgy finances. He turns up a web of betrayals and secrets, and acts as the book's moral compass. FEEL FREE: Essays, by Zadie Smith. (Penguin, $18.) Ajoyful current guides these selections, which touch on everything from a philosophical consideration of Justin Bieber's appeal to the thrill of public parks in Italy. As our reviewer, Amanda Fortini, put it, "It is exquisitely pleasurable to observe Smith thinking on the page, not least because we have no idea where she's headed." ANATOMY OF A MIRACLE, by Jonathan Miles. (Hogarth, $16.) When an Army veteran who has been paralyzed from the waist down suddenly can walk again, his recovery raises a number of questions: Was it divine intervention? A medical breakthrough? And above all, why him? Miles's novel mimics a New Journalism narrative style, and our reviewer, Christopher R. Beha, called the book "a highly entertaining literary performance." DAUGHTERS OF THE WINTER QUEEN: Four Remarkable Sisters, the Crown of Bohemia, and the Enduring Legacy of Mary, Queen of Scots, by Nancy Goldstone. (Back Bay/Little, Brown, $18.99.) Goldstone is known for her histories of royals, and this one charts the stormy life of Elizabeth Stuart. The daughter of Charles I and known as "the most charming princess of Europe," she schemed for her children in 17th-century England. The book doubles as a useful introduction to a time when Britain's relations with Europe were strained. THE ESSEX SERPENT, by Sarah Perry. (Custom House/William Morrow, $16.99.) In this romance-meets-ghost-story, it's 1893 and Cora, recently widowed, heads to the coast of England with her son. There, she finds a town racked with worry that a fearsome monster has returned. As Cora investigates the phenomenon, she is drawn to a local pastor, and their dialogues about faith and science help create a richly satisfying relationship. THE LINE BECOMES A RIVER, by Francisco Cantú. (Riverhead, $17.) To better understand immigration in the United States, Cantu joined the Border Patrol. He writes of his time with the agency, where he witnessed casual cruelty toward migrants. A later section, which tells the story of a friend who was deported, makes a meaningful contribution to literature of the border.