Dagoberto Gilb's six favorite books

Dagoberto Gilb's books include The Flowers, Gritos, Woodcuts of Women, The Last Known Residence of Mickey Acuña, The Magic of Blood, which won the PEN/Hemingway Award, and the newly released story collection Before the End, After the Beginning. Gilb is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, and has been a finalist for both the PEN/Faulkner and National Book Critics Circle Award.

One of his six favorite books, as told to The Week magazine:

With His Pistol in His Hand by Américo Paredes

Written with fine humor, Paredes's book explores the story behind a popular ballad about a Texas Mexican who in 1901 was wrongly accused of being a horse thief and stood up to the Texas Rangers who chased him. It's a fascinating account of the incident, and of the racism that Mexican-Americans lived through.

Read about the other books on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue