Second Edition
Hearts and Hands deals with many of the difficult issues addressed in Luis Rodriguez's memoir of gang life, Always Running, but with a focus on healing through community-building. Empowered by his experiences as a peacemaker with gangs in Los Angeles and Chicago, Rodriguez offers a unique book of change. He makes concrete suggestions, shows how we can create nonviolent opportunities for youth today, and redirects kids into productive and satisfying lives. And he warns that we sacrifice community values for material gain when we incarcerate or marginalize people already on the edge of society. His interest in dissolving gang influence on black and latino kids is personal as well as societal; his son, to whom he dedicates Hearts and Hands, is currently serving a prison sentence for gang-related activity. With anecdotes, interviews, and time-tested guidelines, Hearts and Hands makes a powerful argument for building and supporting community life.
Former poet laureate of Los Angeles (2014–2016) Luis J. Rodriguez is the author of fifteen works of fiction, nonfiction, memoir, poetry, and children’s literature, including Hearts and Hands: Creating Community in Violent Times and the acclaimed bestseller Always Running. His most recent memoir, It Calls You Back, was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award in 2011. He is the recipient of the Lila Wallace-Reader’s Digest Writers Award, a Lannan Foundation Poetry Fellowship, a Carl Sandburg Book Award, the PEN Josephine Miles Literary Award, and more. A script consultant for the FX drama Snowfall, he founded Barking Rooster Entertainment, a production company for original content for film, TV, and web. Thirty years ago he founded the well-respected Tia Chucha Press, which publishes mostly poetry collections, and he is co-founder of Tia Chucha’s Cultural Center & Bookstore in LA’s San Fernando Valley. In addition to traveling extensively, he teaches every week at two maximum-security yards at Lancaster State Prison. He was the Green Party’s candidate for governor of California in 2014. He lives in the San Fernando Valley with his wife, Trini, and his children, Ramiro, Andrea, Ruben, and Chito.
