The Tattooed Soldier

Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Hector Tobar's debut novel is a tragic tale of destiny and consequence set in downtown Los Angeles on the eve of the 1992 riots. Antonio Bernal is a Guatemalan refugee haunted by memories of his wife and child murdered at the hands of a man marked with a yellow tattoo. Not far from Antonio's apartment, Guillermo Longoria extends his arm and reveals a tattoo--yellow pelt, black spots, red mouth. It is the mark of the death squad, the Jaguar Battalion of the Guatemalan army. A chance encounter ignites a psychological showdown between these two men who discover that the war in Central America has followed them to the quemazones, the "great burning" of the Los Angeles riots.

"A suspenseful novel . . . Tobar has a fine storyteller's instinct and moves his characters toward the climax with the skill of a chess master." --Los Angeles Times

"A chilling revenge story." --People

"An important and unusual contribution to the Latin experience in American literature." --Newsday

• Finalist for a 1999 PEN Center USA West Award

The son of Guatemalan immigrants, Hector Tobar is a National Correspondent for the Los Angeles Times and was part of the writing team that won a Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the 1992 riots. He holds an MFA from the University of California at Irvine.