Cantu is a third-generation Mexican-American who, against his mother's wishes, went to work for the U.S. Border Patrol from 2008 - 2012. In this no-holds-barred memoir, he shares horrific stories from his work experience, while also discussing the conflict he experienced seeing the atrocities of death, inhumanity, and evil from the side of law enforcement. Within this narrative, he also discusses the history of how the border between Mexico and the United States came to be and how this location is a hotbed of political discussion today.

Cantu does a wonderful job highlighting the inhumanity of this endeavor. True, a host of issues complicate the reality of immigration and illegal border crossings, yet what's lost in the divisive political rhetoric is the humanity of the many (at one point he mentions mass graves of migrants killed by drug cartels) people who have died. Interestingly, there's no mention of the death of truly evil people. It's not the drug lords or gang members dying in this region. It's the desperate families caught up in years of corruption and calamity and violence who are trying to provide a better life for themselves and their families. His story about Jose, an undocumented man who spent 30 years in the United States before being deported back to Mexico after trying to cross back into the US to reunite with his wife and three sons (he went home to see his mother before she died).

Cantu's narrative is a bit uneven in parts, but the first-person experience he had is affecting. I realize it's "political" to say that I think humanity should outweigh hate and selfishness in these situations, and I'm sure I'm looking at a truly complicated situation with too-sensitive, too-hopeful eyes. Yet, Cantu was immeshed in the realities of this region and he has written not about how dangerous or burdensome undocumented immigrants are, but how much "fixes" for the border problem put humanity last, if at all. Why can't humanity drive our country's solutions?

I'll end with this. I kept thinking of the elaborate funerals we have for people we love. How we celebrate the life a person we love has lived. Imagine someone dying from violence and literally being thrown away in a mass grave with countless others. Don't those people matter? Didn't they each have rich lives filled with people who loved them? In my too-sensitive heart, I say they did and they deserve our respect. There must be a humane way we can try and handle this reality. But, for some powerful and enlightening perspective, do read Cantu's book.