About The Book

A rhythmic, terrifying raw plunge into East L.A. gang life, Locas is the story of two teenage girls, Lucia and Cecilia–the girlfriend and sister of a rising young gangster whose gun trade is about to explode into the big business of drugs. When their world starts to split apart under the vicious pressure of gang warfare, Lucia seizes power, rising to become a jefe in her own right, while Cecilia restlessly seeks meaning first in motherhood, then in a bittersweet romance with another woman. Yxta Maya Myrray’s first novel is a wrenching account of two very different women who are united by one thing: each must find a way to define her identity in a brutal, male-dominated world.

Praise

“Murray details these two girls’ grim histories with little sentimentality and much skill.” –The New York Times Book Review

“Murray perfectly captures the patois and fury of the Mexican women of the East L.A neighborhood Echo Park…. Murray gives readers inner-city gang life from the eyes of women. Both narrators’ voices are insistent, unvarnished, in-your-face tough . . . a convincing, under-the-skin work.” –Publishers Weekly

“A stunning debut novel.” –Ms.

“Murray writes with an insider’s eye, eloquently capturing the struggles of being poor and Mexican-American in Los Angeles.” –Chicago Tribune

“As the girls tell their stories in alternatingchapters, each drive-by and gang fight is graphically depicted. . . . Poetic . . . . not for the faint of heart.” –Seventeen

“Murray is a stunningly original prose stylist capable of fashioning exhilarating twirls and dips of dialogue. . . . The rhythms are so sweet and seductive that you’re tempted to drive to the nearest poetry venue and recite aloud from any page and blow the audience away. . . . Passionate, poetic, and, in so many ways, dazzling.” –Los Angeles Times Book Review