Border hacker : a tale of treachery, trafficking, and two friends on the run / Levi Vonk, with Axel Kirschner.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Vonk, Levi, author.

Kirschner, Axel, author.

Contributor:

Rosengarten Family Fund.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Kirschner, Axel.

Vonk, Levi.

United States--Emigration and immigration--Social aspects.

United States.

Mexico--Emigration and immigration--Social aspects.

Mexico.

Human smuggling--Mexico.

Human smuggling.

Noncitizens--United States--Biography.

Noncitizens.

Hackers--United States--Biography.

Hackers.

Anthropologists--United States--Biography.

Anthropologists.

Illegal immigration--United States.

Illegal immigration.

Emigration and immigration--Social aspects.

Genre:

Biographies.

Physical Description:

xv, 330 pages : map ; 25 cm

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

New York : Bold Type Books, 2022.

Summary:

"In 2015, several years before migrant caravans were making headlines, Levi Vonk, a young anthropologist and journalist, went to Mexico to live and work with migrants, in defiance of the conservative politics of his Southern hometown. There he made a friend who would change the course of his life-and quite possibly the course of Mexican history along with it. Axel Kirschner was a lifelong New Yorker, all Queens hustle and bravado, having been brought to the U.S from Guatemala at only a year old. But he was also undocumented. When he met Levi in Mexico in 2015, after being deported for a minor traffic violation, Axel was fighting to get home to his young kids in Queens. While on its surface, Axel's story is an archetypal one, Vonk soon discovered that he was harboring a secret: Axel was a hacker. This secret would launch the two friends on a dangerous adventure far beyond what either of them could have imagined when they first met on the caravan. While Axel's abilities gave him an edge in a system that denied his existence, they would also ensnare him in a tangled underground network of human traffickers, corrupt priests, and anti-government guerillas eager to exploit his talents for their own ends. The Border Hacker is at once an adventure saga-the story of a man who will do anything to return to his family and the friend who will do anything to help him-and a deeper parable about the violence of US immigration policy as shot through a single, extraordinary life"-- Provided by publisher

Contents:

Machine generated contents note: pt. I THE PRIEST

1. The Viacrucis Migrante

2. Wake Up, White Boy

3. The Middle of the Nowhere

4. Only Desperate People

5. The Kidnapper

6. Brown Recluse

7. The Battle of Ixtepec

8. Ruffrider Quest

9. The Fight of the Century

pt. II THE MECHANIC

10. Too Much Blood

11. Godforsaken Chahuites

12. The Power of Technology

13. Hot Spots

14. Dogs and Wolves

15. The American Axel

16. The Auto Shop

17. The Breakout

18. Freer in Mexico

pt. III THE ATTORNEY

19. The Martian

20. A Phone for Nestora Salgado

21. The Right Kind of Traumatized

22. Salmon and Asparagus and Brie

23. Mind Body Problems

24. MAGA

25. Isabela

pt. IV THE ANTHROPOLOGIST

26. Tocayos

27. Lopez Obrador

28. Across.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 319-330).

Local Notes:

Acquired for the Penn Libraries with assistance from the Rosengarten Family Fund.

ISBN:

9781645037057

1645037053

OCLC:

1252845623