The Curtain of Trees

University of New Mexico Press • 2009

"Cultural transformation, and small-town life along the Mexico-Arizona border, are illuminated in this tender collection of stories by poet and novelist Ríos (Whispering to Fool the Wind; The Iguana Killer). There is little sentimentality in these nine tales, even as they delicately balance a nuanced melancholia with faith in the sustenance that family and close friends provide. The title story, which closes the collection in a sensuous and dramatic extended narrative, focuses on headstrong Carmelita and her family over years of betrayal, love and love lost." —Publishers Weekly