ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

JOURNALISTS HAVE A SAYING: every reporter needs a little luck. I think this is true, and for me, my greatest stroke of luck has been having people around me who share my drive to tell stories that matter, the stories happening all around us in real life every day, that can help us understand who we are and how we can be better—as people and as a country. This book comes out of that.

Thanks to Daniel Mesino and Karina Macías at Editorial Planeta for coming up with the idea for this project, which was originally published in Spanish in 2017, and for their faith in me to write it, and to Tania Cabrera for editing the stories of our Mexicans in the North with such sensitivity.

How Does It Feel to Be Unwanted? crossed the border and has been published in English thanks to the steadfast determination of my literary agent, Diane Stockwell, who also performed the excellent translation. To Gayatri Patnaik, thank you for so lovingly shepherding these stories. To Helene Atwan, Susan Lumenello, Molly Velazquez-Brown, Caitlin Meyer, Alyssa Hassan, Sanj Kharbanda, and the entire team at Beacon Press, I am grateful for your trust and support.

This project was planned and executed in six months. I could not have written it without the support of the Faber Residency, an arts and humanities retreat in Olot, Catalonia, in Spain, where most of this book took shape. I am grateful to the director Francesc Serés for the space and for his faith and empathy.

Most of the stories in this book are continuations of subjects I have been writing about for the past fourteen years. I am extremely grateful to the editors I have worked with over the course of that time: Salvador Frausto, Gabriel Lerner, Karla Casillas, Guillermo Osorno, Andrés Tapia, Homero Campa, Ernesto Núñez, Elizabeth Palacios, and the dearly missed José Luis Sierra.

Thanks so much to those who helped me revise and edit the manuscript, against the clock: Diego Sedano, Catalina Gayá, Armando Vega-Gil, Alaíde Ventura, Sofía Téllez, and Toni Piqué.

Reporters are only as good as the journalism family who raises them, and I am still learning from mine every day. Thanks to Salvador Frausto, Témoris Grecko, Catalina Gayá, and the members of our collective, Cuadernos Doble Raya. To Diego Fonseca, Wilbert Torre, José Luis Benavides, and Antonio Mejías-Rentas, for their always welcome advice. As always, I am grateful to my family of seven years at La Opinión, the daily newspaper that opened the doors to many of these stories.

Without the generosity of its protagonists, there can be no story. From the bottom of my heart, thanks to Omar León; Claudia Amaro; Yamil Yáujar; Yunuen Bonaparte; Alberto Mendoza; Jennicet Gutiérrez; Mónica Robles; Odilia Romero; Jeanette Vizguerra; Al Labrada; Noemí, Cynthia, and María Romero; Viridiana Hernández; Mafalda and Carlos Gueta; Ana Elena Soto; Daniel Rodríguez; and Luis Ávila for sharing their stories of triumph and resistance.

This book unfolded during a very turbulent time. Thanks to Eliesheva Ramos and my sister Rosal for staying close. To Diego Sedano and to my mother, I cannot thank you enough for your constancy, support, and love.