Mexico Books

This is one of the most beautiful books one can ever read. "LLanto por Ignacio Sanchez Mejias" is a very powerful poem. The strong rhythm will dazzle you. "Romancero Gitano" is written with an eloquent spirit and you will enjoy it as much. I strongly recommend this book and any of Lorca's works.

This work by Lorca fortifies and makes the poetry richer. It gives it emotional, moral, and mental strength absent in the literary works of the late 19th and the early 20th century.

We are so planted in the 21st century and all its accouterments that we forget there was another time, even when some of us lived in it. Dorothy L. Pillsbury transports us back to a simpler time and tells the reader about the Spanish, Indian, and Anglo culture in mid 20th century Santa Fe, New Mexico. Reading the four Adobe series books, in order, is like watching "progress" happen while still hanging on to the old ways. If you have an interest is reasonably contemporary history, the southwest US, divergent cultures, or just want to relax while you read, get all these books and just sit back and enjoy every delightful word. I am so glad I've been able to spend time in Tenario Flat with Dorothy's friends and neighbors.

I have read all four of Dorothy Pillsbury's Adobe books. They are wonderful. You can read each little story individually or just sit down, or lay down, and read until you are transported to the Santa Fe of 1940 New Mexico. Dorothy retired from social work in Southern California and moved to Santa Fe. Each little story makes us at home with the people and town that she learned to love. The Indian and Spanish customs and history of that time that is all but forgotten.

I remember, when i was a child, going to the La Fonda Hotel with my aunt and uncle and we were the only ones there in the patio in the middle of summer. A sleepy little town.

Each of the four of the Pillsbury's Adobe series, including Roots in Adobe, are a continuation of the these stories.

I wish I had had this guidebook when I visited Roswell before. On my next visit I will know what to do besides go to the UFO Museum. Who knew you could ride an antique carousel, attend a live cattle auction, or photograph the hanger where they stored the UFO Crash debris (including the alien bodies)? The section on Nightlife even destroys the myth that there is nothing to do in Roswell after 8 p.m.

The book is well organized, interesting, easy to read, and has a few touches of humor that make it more fun than the usual dry travel guide. I also like the clever alien drawings in the margins. Now I'm ready for my next trip to Roswell!

This is a very useful guidebook for touring Roswell or for learning more about the town where the Roswell Incident took place. It is accurate and up to date. Its website also provides useful travel updates.

The book is arranged by sections of town, making it easy to use as a guide for walking or driving around. Its many maps are helpful but some include too many locations to be read easily.

The whole chapter "On the Trail of the Roswell UFO Crash" has interesting information about the events and locations around town associated with the UFO Crash, as well as information about the UFO Museum, UFO Festival, UFO souvenirs, and even the lyrics to a witty song, "UFO Breakdown." The author doesn't take a position on UFOs but gives a good sample of different stories that have been told about the incident so that a tourist can see how the locations the book describes fit into the overall picture.

Beyond UFOs, the book points out lots of other attractions and activities available to the tourist. It seems to make an effort to identify locations representing Roswell's multicultural roots: Anglo, Hispanic, African-American, Asian, Native American, Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish.

It also points out locations of interesting, if minor, historical events related to Charles Lindbergh, General John Pershing, Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, William Jennings Bryant, Will Rogers, Conrad Hilton, and, of course, Elvis.

The nine page index makes locations easy to find. The appendix lists books and DVDs about Roswell--both UFO-related and on topics ranging from Billy the Kid to Marilyn Monroe.

Charming line drawings of aliens are scattered throughout. Don't miss my favorite one that spoofs the town's alien-face lampposts. It's easily overlooked at the very end of the book.

This book works well as a detailed guide for visitors to find their way to major and minor attractions around Roswell. It also creates a sense of the place for armchair travelers who are interested in visualizing the setting of the 1947 events surrounding the UFO crash. I recommend it for both types of visitors.

This is so well-written it is a good read from cover-to-cover. I consider it the best Baja guidebook on Amazon and second only to the AAA guidebook. This is one of the very few that I would consider a must-have on a trip to Baja. Tons of current, factual information and recommendations.

The Rough Guides are my favorite guide books, and this guide to Baja California is great, too. It's been invaluable in planning my trip next month. Well-written, to boot.

Don J. Usner's love of Chimayo and it's history comes through loud and clear in this book. Through interviews, historical documents preserved by families of Chimayo, stories of residents, and pictures Don Usner is able to tell the history of this interesting plaza.

I feel that the stories and information in this book serve as an example of each plaza in New Mexico. I believe that many of the plazas and towns are similar to Chimayo. The difference is that Chimayo has preserved it's history through being off the beaten path and not much of a tourist attraction (except for those who are interested in history!)

I was able to hear Mr. Usner talk to a group of teachers about the writing of this book and his other book. He has gone through a lot of trails to publish this book and preserve the history of Chimayo. I have a lot of respect for Mr. Usner.

I would buy more books by this author. He able to take a subject that many authors would make dry and uninteresting and make it come alive. Very good.

Before reading Sabino's Map: Life in Chimayo's Old Plaza (1995), one should first read Benigna's Chimayo: Cuentos From The Old Plaza (2001), both by Don J Usner. Reading the newer book first will allow for a better understanding and appreciation of the older book.

Don is an extraordinary writer who is an 8th generation Chimayoso, even though he was not actually raised full time in Chimayo. He brings to his writing a humanity informed and formed through family, place and the cuentos of his grandmother, Benigna, and others.

This story of the Chimayo Plaza, the oldest Hispanic plaza in the U.S., is the story of Sabino's Map and about the houses and families of the Plaza noted on that map. It is the story of their histories, religions, natural history and the cultural/social history of northern New Mexico over 300 plus years.

The writer is connected in many ways to his topics in these two books and those connections come through loud and clear by way of excellent writing, which is not very common, and careful scholarship. Don has objectivity with both passion for the subjects and compassion for the people, many to whom he is related, sometimes through more than one branch of the family.

In the end one has the cuentos of Benigna, the history of the Plaza, the smells of the chiles and old plaza rooms, the feel of the weavings and the living and loving histories of families.

Did I like these books and will I purchase other books by Don J Usner? You bet.

This is a terrific guide to trail riding in New Mexico. This book gave valuable information on trail riding, camping with your horses and general information about trail riding gear. I would highly recommend this book for anyone visiting or living here in New Mexico.

This is a well written book that all trail riders in new mexico must own. You'll love it. The authors personnally rode every trail in their book and have outlined it beautifully. They wrote this book because no one else had and they noted a need for it.

Donna Ketcheson, Back Country Horseman

This short book is a delightful read. Sadie's history and her success in the oldest profession is treated in a sensitive and humorous manner, providing some insight into life at a very specific location in the Old West at the end of the 19th century. The "then-and-now" photos are fascinating. I bought a copy for a friend.

Patsy Crow King has certainly got hold of a fascinating figure to write about in this book. More than just a dry, museum piece about life in the late 19th century, King uses original stories taken from real newspapers of the era to bring her story, and her characters, to life.
In a time when guns and strong whisky and salty language were the order of the day,we meet up with the lady they called the Belle of the Black Range Mountains of Southwest New Mexico, an area rife with the chaos and high-spirited living of miners in a boomtown area. Sadie happened to be one tough lady in the middle of a Man's World. Like other
determined women full of 'spit' and vinegar--Annie Oakley comes to mine--Sadie had to stake her claim and make her stand.
While she has been cited in later publications as being the owner of a restaurant, a hotel and the first woman to own and ride in her own stage line, she was, first and foremost, the area's most successful madam.
The language and names that abound in Sadie's world are nothing if not colorful. Her "house" was located on Virtue Avenue! Her "girls" had names unthinkable in today's PC world: Lousy Lou, Deaf Connie and Jew Etta. "Dog Face" Connelly and Pretty Sam were two of the area's most prominent citizens. And, when a wary customer dawdled over his breakfast, Sadie stood over him and asked, "Whatsa matter with them aigs?
You want 'em doner?"
It is Pretty Sam's ebullient Christmas Eve Party, to which everybody in the area is invited, that provides the high dramatic moment in the book. A single young lady is introduced, and we learn she has two suitors for the evening. Being that everyone in those days was liberally armed, and usually heavily liquored up, you wait with anticipation to see if this evening of merrymaking will survive this precarious situation intact.
There happen to be other instances where gunplay plays a part in the story. Henry Orchard, who takes Sadie to wife and runs the stage line with her, turns into a casualty at Sadie's hands when she grows tired of his drinking and runs "the wretched man" out of town with "a final salute by letting him have both barrels."
King's obvious affection for her heroine propels the book forward. Besides showing Sadie's ingenious ability in business, King puts Sadie's very real generosity on display, too. Sadie leads a drive to build a church in the area at one point and, much later in her life, after a flood and subsequent influenza outbreak decimate the area, Sadie becomes "doctor, nurse, undertaker and comforter" for many of the unfortunate victims.
In analyzing Sadie's life just after she has passed on, a biographer concludes that St. Peter would have reviewed her credentials for admission to the Pearly Gates and "issued her a pass to the reserved seats." Then, this same writer pronounces judgment on who Sadie was: "Wherever she is, Sadie is a character."
Besides chronicling Sadie and her times, the book provides updated material that documents the area. Archival photos show how they lived then, and a group of new photos taken by Bill King, the author's husband, gives a current picture of the way the area looks now.
This is one book that opens up history to the readers and affords a glimpse into a lively, swashbuckling time that will probably never come again. It is informative and entertaining without "running on" (it's less than 100 pages, is double-spaced, has numerous pictures).
It is recommended reading.

It is not proper to read a book that you are giving as a gift. So I dunno what is was about, how well it was written or such fancy stuff that reviewer people talk about. It did have a pretty cover.

Amazon told me to review this purchase.

Enjoyable reading; especially if you are interested in past history of silver mines.

Primer libro que leo de este autor, dificil de leer al principio pero una vez familiarizado con la trama aunque muy larga es facilisimo de leer

Un maravilloso paseo por la conquista de mexico a traves de los ojos de el hijo de una india con un español, lo que significaba ser el producto de esta relacion. Un viaje maravilloso por la riqueza cultural de nuestro pais

Esta es la historia de Cristobal el Bastardo, híbrido de dos razas la blanca española y la india americana, abandonado y despreciado por ambos, educado desde su más tierna infancia por un sacerdote que le esconde su verdadero origen que tras ser asesinado en oscuras circunstancias lo obliga a llevar una vida de auténtico lépero, a vagar, espiar, mendigar, robar e inclusive a vivir una serie de aventuras que lo llevan desde las profundidades de las minas de plata hasta los más exquisitos salones de Sevilla y Ciudad de México, desde la mas absoluta miseria y esclavitud a la mayor opulencia palaciega.
Una novela muy interesante que nos da un paseo por la Nueva España colonial donde las costumbres, estilos de vida, razas, religion, sistema administrativo y demás detalles de la colonia están presentes en esta história-crónica, todo esto matizado con fragmentos de la literatura del Siglo de Oro español. Un libro idóneo para aquellos que disfrutan y gustan de la literatura de corte histórico.

Written by Gral. Juan B. Vargas, not just a "Dorado", but he (and his brothers) had a very close relationship with Villa, his brother Cipriano Vargas died Columbus. This book has a short bio of most of the "Dorados" as they appear in the group photo. It also includes a detailed interview with Benjamín Argumedo just before he died (unique information); plus many stories about his days with Villa. This is not a novel.

If you are interested in Pancho Villa, and in his Division of the North, this is a great book for detailed information on how Villa conducted his campaigns. Written by a member of Villa's "Dorados" (his personal escort), I found this book a fascinating key to revolutionary combat operations. The big problem I faced was my poor abilitiy to read Spanish. But with patience and a good Spanish-English dictionary, you can find much of real value in this book. This one should be translated into English so that the non-Spanish-reading audience might have the opportunity to judge how the revolution was conducted, rather than depending on the majority of English-language works, many of which are incredibly ethno-centric, and obviously ignorant of the real events.