The award-winning and bestselling classic memoir about a young Chicano gang member surviving the dangerous streets of East Los Angeles, is on its 30th anniversary! Pick up a copy, now featuring a new introduction by Luis J. Rodriguez, and meet the author himself.
About the book:
Successful as a Chicano poet, Rodriguez thought he had put the streets and his own days as a gang member behind him-until his young son joined a gang. Rogriguez fought for his child by telling his own story in the national bestseller and New York Times Notable Book, Always Running: La Vida Loco, Gang Days in L.A. This vivid memoir explores gang life and cautions against the death and destruction that haunts its participants. The book has been included on school reading lists nationwide but has often been the subject of controversy due to its frank depictions of gang life being named one of the nation's 100 most censored titles by the American Library Association. Always Running was adapted as a play in 2019 by LJR and Hector Rodriguez. In 1012, Rodriguez published a sequel titled it Calls You Back: An Odyssey of Love, Addiction, Revolutions, and Healing.
Meet the author: Luis J. Rodriguez is an acclaimed poet, novelist, children's book author, journalist, and co-founder of Tía Chucha's Centro Cultural & bookstore. Rodriguez's honors include the Lila Wallace-Reader's Digest Writers' Award, a California Arts Council Legacy Fellowship, the Sundance Institute's Arts Writing Fellowship, a Lannan Fellowship for Poetry, the National Hispanic Media Coalition Impact Award, several Illinois Arts Council fellowships, and the Dorothea Lang-Paul Taylor Prize in Journalism with photojournalist Donna De Cesare for their cover-age of Salvadoran gang youth in Los Angeles and El Salvador. He was one of 50 leaders worldwide selected as "Unsung Heroes of Compassion," presented by His Holiness, the Dalai Lama. In 2022 he was presented the Los Angeles Times' Robert Kirsch Award for Lifetime Achievement. In 2023 Cinemi-lls Tv created a short documentary on Luis J. Rodriguez titled Triple OG From Lomas.
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Always Running: Photography by Luis J. Rodriguez
I first read Luis J. Rodriguez book, "Always Running" in my early twenties. Many of the people, places, and the events in the book seemed like memories of my own family and friends, places I lived, and things that happened. The book's popularity over the last three decades makes me think that there are many people who feel this way. That it holds a special place in their lives, like it does in mine. Putting together the exhibition "Always running: Photography by Luis J. Rodriguez" on the occasion of the thirtieth anniversary of the publishing of the book has been a privilege. The photos have a sensitivity to time and place that could only have been captured by someone who was thinking deeply about their lives. Beyond their aesthetic qualities, this body of work is an important piece of American History. I am thankful to Tía Chucha's and to Luis J. Rodriguez for trusting me to help get this beautiful work out in the world.
Always Running Photo Exhibit Curator:
-Noé Montez