Book Review: “The Line Becomes a River”

The Line Becomes a River: Dispatches from the Border

Francisco Cantú

Hardcover, 256 pages

Publication Date: February 6, 2018

Publisher: Riverhead Books

Genre: Nonfiction, Memoir/History

Though “The Line Becomes a River” was released nearly a year ago, it is still a relevant book, especially in light of the recent government shutdown and an impending second shutdown if politicians cannot come to an agreement over the southern border wall. I read this book to challenge myself. I know very little about the border aside from the exaggerated comments about it, which flood the news, and if you are uneducated about something, what better way to start becoming informed than to read a book?

“The Line Becomes a River” is primarily the memoirs of Cantú during his time employed by the United States Border Patrol. He worked in the field, traversing the desert in search of illegal immigrants, and in an intelligence position, doing research and writing reports over border disputes. After four years with the Border Patrol, Cantú left to pursue further education and became a Fulbright fellow.

Throughout the book, he befriends a man at his civilian job who is arrested trying to re-enter the country illegally after traveling to Mexico to see his dying mother. Cantú, insistent on helping his friend not get deported, is forced to see the other side of the American immigration system he was once a member of.

Interspersed with his own experiences, Cantú provides the history of the southern border between the United States and Mexico, tracing its origins to what it is today. He speaks about Mexican literature written about the border and how it affects the people who live in the shadow of it. As he deals with working for the Border Patrol and ultimately trying to help an illegal immigrant appeal to the immigration system, Cantú wrestles with his own identity as the descendant of Mexican immigrants, as well as his feelings of being caught between two countries.

I was expecting a book clearly pushing for one political agenda or another. That is not what this book is. Above everything else, “The Line Becomes a River” is a humanizing book. It humanizes the people on both sides of the border: members of Border Patrol and the people who are willing to risk everything to cross the border.

For the first time, I was able to see the border through the eyes of the people it affects and not through the angry words of vitriolic politics. Cantú writes about the border from an insider’s perspective as a Border Patrol agent and from an outsider’s perspective as he witnesses firsthand what a deportation can do to a family trying to make a better life for their children in America.

Wherever you fall on the political spectrum, I cannot overstate how I much I think you should read this book. In a country where people tend to view those they disagree with as the enemy, this book will hopefully spark your empathy for your fellow humans on both sides of the border.

I would like to close with a quote from “The Line Becomes a River.” Cantú is describing to his mother what it is like to be outside of the Border Patrol and take a different look at the American immigration system:

“All these years, I told her, it’s like I’ve been circling beneath a giant, my gaze fixed upon its foot resting at the ground. But now, I said, it’s like I’m starting to crane my head upward, like I’m finally seeing the thing that crushes.”

Paige Holmes is a junior journalism major from Topeka, KS. Reading is her favorite thing to do because it teaches one how to think, imagine and live. Paige believes there is no better way to learn something or be entertained than by reading a book. Her favorite genre of books is fantasy/thriller and her favorite book is ‘Opening Moves’ by Steven James.

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