Two studies of Chicano detective fiction

“When detective fiction moved out of the parlor room and onto the “mean streets” in the ’30s, it was only a matter of time before those streets ran through America’s inner-city barrios. Chester Himes’ Harlem-set crime novels of the ’40s brought some diversity to the genre, and a half-century later Mexican Americans finally hopped aboard the multicultural mystery train.

The boom in Chicano detective fiction that began in the ’90s shows no sign of stopping, as more and more Mexican American authors have turned to the genre. Although the trend has yet to produce a best seller, it has attracted high-profile writers ”” most notably, Rudolfo Anaya (best-known to Austinites as the author of “Bless Me, Ultima”), who recently completed a quartet of novels featuring the shaman sleuth Sonny Baca.”

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