Author Reyna Grande has spent her writing career documenting the harsh realities of living a life across two borders.
Grande came to the United States as a child to escape the poverty and violence in her home of Igaula, Mexico. Grande struggled to assimilate to a new language and culture. She later faced discrimination and struggles with her health.
Despite this, Grande tries to reframe those traumatic experiences in her latest memoir told in essays, “Migrant Heart: Essays About Things I Can’t Forget.”
Grande said writing and storytelling have been essential tools to processing the pain of her past and turning it into something new.
“There are so many creative ways for us to express ourselves that are healthy ways,” Grande said. “They have to be expressed, all those things we go through, because otherwise we either implode or explode.”
Grande says this essay collection is particularly special for her.
“I feel it really encapsulates my whole identity: my child self; my young adult self, my middle-aged self,” Grande said. “I’m able to write about my children, about being a mother, about my husband. It took a long time to finally create the home that I always wanted as a little girl.”
Grande writes about an expierence with U.S. Border Patrol in her essay, "Into the Borderlands." Hear Reyna reading an excerpt of the essay and watch a video documenting the incident below:
