Soldiers and Kings

An intense, intimate, and first-of-its-kind look at the world of human smuggling in Latin America by a MacArthur "genius" grant winner and anthropologist with unprecedented access.

Political instability, poverty, climate change, and the insatiable appetite for cheap labor all fuel clandestine movement across borders. As those borders harden, the demand for smugglers who aid migrants across them increases every year. Yet the real lives and work of smugglers—or coyotes, or guides, as they are often known by the migrants who hire their services—are only ever reported on from a distance, using tired tropes and stereotypes, often depicted as boogeymen and violent warlords. In an effort to better understand this essential yet extralegal, billion-dollar global industry, internationally recognized anthropologist and expert Jason De León embedded with a group of smugglers moving migrants across Mexico over the course of seven years.

The result of this unique and extraordinary access is Soldiers and Kings, the first-ever in-depth, character-driven look at human smuggling. It is a heart-wrenching and intimate narrative that revolves around the life and death of one coyote who falls in love and tries to leave smuggling behind. In a powerful, original voice, De León expertly chronicles the lives of low-level foot soldiers breaking into the smuggling game, and morally conflicted gang leaders who oversee ragtag crews of guides and informants along the migrant trail. Soldiers and Kings is not only a groundbreaking, up-close glimpse of a difficult-to-access world, it is a masterpiece of narrative nonfiction.