This image is the cover for the book Heart of Aztlan

Heart of Aztlan

PEN Center West Award Winner: A novel of myth and migration set in a mid-twentieth–century New Mexico barrio, by the author of Bless Me, Ultima.

Today is the day Benjie Chávez and his family will leave the town of Guadalupe behind. Far from the land of the eagle and the nopal, they travel west to find a new home of opportunity. But adapting to the big, impersonal city of Albuquerque is no easy task. As both life and death come to the barrio, a blind seer named Crispin arrives in the Chávezes’ world. At first everyone dismisses his stories about an elusive place called Aztlán as the ramblings of an old man. But gradually, they come to realize that he can see what they cannot.

In earthy prose, American Book Award–winning author Rudolfo Anaya tells a spellbinding story of myth and migration, love and loss. Heart of Atzlán is a hopeful and heartbreaking novel about people in search of the shimmering mirage of a better life—and the land that keeps calling them back.

Rudolfo Anaya

Rudolfo Anaya is professor emeritus of English at the University of New Mexico. He has received numerous literary awards, including the Premio Quinto Sol and a National Medal of Arts. He is the author of the classic work Bless Me, Ultima, which was chosen for the National Endowment for the Arts’ Big Read. Anaya’s other books for adults include Tortuga, Heart of Aztlan, Alburquerque, Rio Grande Fall, Shaman Winter, Jemez Spring, Serafina’s Stories, The Man Who Could Fly and Other Stories, and Rudolfo Anaya: The Essays. His children’s books include Farolitos of Christmas, My Land Sings, Elegy on the Death of César Chávez, Roadrunner’s Dance, and The First Tortilla. Bless Me, Ultima was adapted into a feature film in 2013. Anaya resides in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Open Road Integrated Media