Victor Villasenor

The author of Thirteen Senses describes his struggles with cultural discrimination and an untreated learning disability, recounting his victimization as a non-English-speaking Latino in an American school system and his eventual rise to an award-winning writer. Reader's Guide available.

Burro Genius

Presents the story of the publication of the author's work "Rain of Gold," as well as describing his experiences in communication with his ancestors and the Spirit World and his conviction that altered states of consciousness exist and are accessible.

Beyond Rain of Gold

A daring memoir of love, magic, adventure, and miracles, Victor Villaseñor's Thirteen Senses continues the exhilarating family saga that began in the widely acclaimed bestseller Rain of Gold, delivering a stunning story of passion, family, and the forgotten mystical senses that stir within us all. Thirteen Senses begins with the fiftieth wedding anniversary of the aging former bootlegger Salvador and his elegant wife, Lupe. When asked by a young priest to repeat the sacred ceremonial phrase "to honor and obey," Lupe surprises herself and says. "No, I will not say 'obey'. How dare you! You don't talk to me like this after fifty years of marriage and I now knowing what I know!" After the hilarious shock of Lupe's rejection of the ceremony, the Villaseñor family is forced to examine the love that Lupe and Salvador have shared for so many years -- a universal, gut-honest love that will eventually energize and inspire the couple into old age.

A Memoir

Thirteen Senses

Presents the true story of Juan Corona, a Mexican labor contractor, who was arrested in connection with twenty-five mutilated bodies that were discovered in Yuba City, California, and charged with the largest mass murder ever attributed to one man in the United States. Reprint.

The People Vs. Juan Corona

Jury

Macho!

From a pioneer of modern U.S. Hispanic literature, and the New York Times bestselling author of Crazy Loco Love and Rain of Gold, comes a gripping, coming-of-age tale that exposes the intensity and sheer will of one brave young immigrant who crosses the Mexican border. Roberto Garcia is only seventeen, but he already has big dreams of making his fortune, building a family, and gaining the respect of his community. With ambition to burn and a passion to prove his manhood, Roberto takes the dangerous journey north, crossing the Mexican border to pick fruit in the “golden fields” of California. It is said that a good man can make more money there in a week than in an entire year in the mountains of Michoacán, his home. With dreams that overshadow harsh realities, Roberto is unprepared for the jammed boxcars and bolted trucks that carry undervalued migrant workers through the searing desert to long days of harsh labor. Raw, powerful, poetic, and heartbreaking, Macho! brings to life the brutality of migrant labor, Cesar Chavez’s efforts to unionize workers, and a vivid portrayal of the immigrant experience through the eyes of a brave young man who bids goodbye to everything he knows to follow his dreams.

A Novel

Growing up on his parents’ ranch in North San Diego County, Victor Villaseñor’s teenage years were marked by a painful quest to find a place for himself in a world he did not fit into. Discriminated due to his Mexican heritage, Victor questions the tenets of his faith and the restrictions it places on his own spirituality and sexuality. Ultimately, his search for identity takes him to Mexico to learn of his family’s roots, where he soon discovers that his heritage doesn’t determine his intelligence or success. Through this often humorous and poignant tale, Victor deftly undermines the macho stereotype so often associated with Latinos, while exposing the tender vulnerability and naïveté of a young man grappling with the roles foisted on him by the church and society. Victor’s youthful misadventures elicit sympathy, laughter, and tears as he attempts to divine the mysteries of the opposite sex in this powerful, revealing memoir. “The clarity that comes from Villaseñor’s personal and cultural experience is not matched in any of Steinbeck’s major works” (Los Angeles Times).

Crazy Loco Love

De pie frente al público, Victor Villaseñor miró al grupo de maestros sentados frente a él, y su mente se llenó de recuerdos de infancia llenos de humillación y abuso por parte de sus profesores. Se sintió enfurecer. Con el corazón en la mano, comenzó a hablar de esos abusos. Y cuando terminó, para su gran sorpresa, encontró a todos los profesores de pie aplau-diéndolo enfáticamente. Muchas de las personas en el público no lograban contener sus lágrimas.Así comienzan las conmovedoras y apasionadas memorias de Victor Villaseñor. A pesar de ser muy talentoso e imaginativo desde muy niño, tuvo que vivir con una dificultad de aprendizaje (no fue sino hasta los 44 años de edad que fue diagnosticado con un caso grave de dislexia), y la frustración de ser latino en una escuela americana en la que sólo se hablaba inglés. A pesar de los profesores que lo maltrataban porque no podía hablar inglés, Villaseñor se aferró a su sueño de un día convertirse en escritor. Hoy en día, es considerado uno de los autores más importantes de nuestra era.

Victor Villasenor

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