Crossing, by Manuel Luis Martinez, an IUB professor of English, has been named one of the 10 best books of 1999 by a writer of color by the PEN American Center, a worldwide organization of literary writers. Published by Bilingual Review Press in 1998, the work is Martinez’ first novel. Crossing also was recently nominated for the prestigious Pushcart Prize.

"These two events are a credit to the desire of readers and editors to read ethnic fiction, which does not often receive that much attention," Martinez said. Crossing was inspired by a newspaper account of 13 undocumented workers left to suffocate in a boxcar outside El Paso, Texas. The novel follows 16-year-old Luis, who, restless and haunted by the death of his father, decides to leave his small town in Mexico to seek his fortune in the United States. Luis makes a fateful decision to hide in a railroad boxcar to cross the border. As the short trip stretches into days, the men in the boxcar begin to confess their past crimes, sins and desires for a better life as they face death.

"The work is really my attempt to explore the American obsession with mobility, that irrepressible hope that there must be something better somewhere and the relentless desire to move on in search of this elusive goal," Martinez said.

He is currently working on a book of short stories entitled Lomos, as well as a second novel entitled Three Women and a Musician.