Óscar Martínez 
The Beast 
Riding the Rails and Dodging Narcos on the Migrant Trail

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The Economist & The Financial Times



One day a few years ago, 300 migrants were kidnapped between the remote desert towns of Altar, Mexico, and Sasabe, Arizona. A local priest got 120 released, many with broken ankles and other marks of abuse, but the rest vanished. �scar Mart�nez, a young writer from El Salvador, was in Altar soon after the abduction, and his account of the migrant disappearances is only one of the harrowing stories he garnered from two years spent traveling up and down the migrant trail from Central America and across the US border. More than a quarter of a million Central Americans make this increasingly dangerous journey each year, and each year as many as 20, 000 of them are kidnapped.



Mart�nez writes in powerful, unforgettable prose about clinging to the tops of freight trains; finding respite, work and hardship in shelters and brothels; and riding shotgun with the border patrol. Illustrated with stunning full-color photographs,
The Beast is the first book to shed light on the harsh new reality of the migrant trail in the age of the narcotraficantes.

Circa l’autore

John Washington is a writer, translator, and activist. A regular contributor to The Nation magazine and The Intercept, he writes about immigration and border politics, as well as criminal justice, photography, and literature. Washington is an award winning translator, having translated �scar Martinez, Anabel Hern�ndez, and Sandra Rodriguez Nieto, among others. A long term volunteer with No More Deaths, he has been working with activist organizations in Mexico, California, Arizona, and New York for more than a decade. He is currently based in Brooklyn.