If this book were a novel, you’d say it was too implausible: an unlikely friendship, a dangerous journey, an apparent benefactor who turns out to be the opposite. But it’s all true, and Levi Vonk brings this extraordinary story to life with verve and zest.”
—Adam Hochschild, author of King Leopold’s Ghost“Our twenty-first-century American hero is a deported hacker, cruelly cast out from the only country he’s ever known into the lawless labyrinth of statelessness, surviving on bravado and genius skill, while forming the most improbable partnership with a young string-bean ‘cracker’ academic whose generosity and courage never fails—and whose initial naivete is honed on this journey into the knowing, thoughtful voice of the chronicler of this book. Border Hacker is by turns heartbreaking, terrifying, hilarious, enraging, and inspiring. To say it humanizes contentious issues is a profound understatement.”
—Francisco Goldman, author of Monkey Boy“Jack Kerouac, move over. In Border Hacker, Levi Vonk and Axel Kirschner’s unlikely friendship makes for the ultimate on-the-road buddy story. Suspenseful, intimate, and superbly told, Border Hacker is an amazing book, and as a tell-all account of the modern migrant experience, it kicks ass and takes no prisoners.”
—Jon Lee Anderson, author of Che: A Revolutionary Life“Combining Vonk’s in-depth reportage on U.S. border policy, predatory shelter operators, and the links between cartels, kidnappers, and the police with Kirschner’s first-person testimony, the two unspool a riveting and disturbing story. Readers will be aghast.”—Publishers Weekly
“An inspiring, timely border story…a significant addition to the literature on an ongoing humanitarian crisis…An engaging work of on-the-ground journalism that exposes root causes of a chronic problem.”—Kirkus Reviews
“Axel and Levi are likable characters, which makes rooting for them easy. This is a cultural anthropology story that’s well-told and eminently readable.”—The Bibliophage
“[A] thrilling, troubling, and wholly unique hybrid of confessional memoir and intrepid reportage…Border Hacker documents the phenomenon of migrant caravanning in the Americas more ably than any other book to my knowledge…is a singularly courageous book.”—Jacobin
“[T]he importance of Border Hacker is not in its allegations of activists’ wrongdoing but in its illustration of the material and bureaucratic challenges of moving through Mexico, which incentivize all sorts of grift.”—The Nation
“We too, after reading these vibrant pages, want to be capable of writing books as necessary and generous as this.”
—Alejandro Zambra, author of Chilean Poet
