Thomas Ray Garcia, a Pharr native, is the author of a new collection of short stories about the Texas-Mexico borderlands. The River Runs: Stories won the Américo Paredes Literary Arts Prize for Fiction sponsored by FlowerSong Press and Prickly Pear Publishing. The contest was judged by award-winning author Tim Z. Hernandez.
The River Runs: Stories resists a singular vision of the border by centering the Rio Grande as a site of transformation. In Garcia’s stories, river crossings lead to cross country runs and astral projections. A pregnant teenager learns about motherhood from a curandera. A college student grapples with his identity far from his border town. A child looks into the eye of a drone and sees his family anew.
Garcia is the founder and executive director of the College Scholarship Leadership Access Program, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit based in McAllen. He is also an advocate on K-12 education issues, including expanding courses on Mexican-American literature and history.
“These 11 stories present revitalized insights into border culture,” Garcia said. “With compassion, grittiness, and honesty, they depict life along the Rio Grande and explore what it means for a river to run through our international community.”
“We need more local authors and regional history being taught in our public schools.” Garcia said. “I wrote The River Runs because I wish I could have read more stories about our border culture when I was in high school. I learned about South Texas history at Princeton University, far from home.”
The River Runs: Stories is Garcia’s first attempt at sharing tales about the border. He is also the co-author of the historical memoir about the South Texas Chicano Movement, El Curso de la Raza: The Education of Aurelio Manuel Montemayor, from Texas A&M University Press.
Garcia hopes his books will present more humane and complex narratives about the Texas-Mexico border. Through literature, he believes a national readership can gain insights into border life not shown on the news.
“When people learn about the border, it’s often a negative portrayal they see on the news,” Garcia said. “Our home is reduced to a crisis zone or a political photo-op because these stories flood the airwaves. It’s up to us to reclaim these narratives about our community and share the beauty of our culture with the world. Fiction is one avenue. It enables us to imagine what could be possible, to convey complex ideas through relatable stories, to find the extraordinary in the ordinary.”
The River Runs: Stories is available online on Barnes & Noble, Amazon, and Bookshop.org. Paperback copies are also available for sale at the McAllen Heritage Center, J’aime Les Livres in McAllen, and Búho in Brownsville.
