The Useless Servants

Houston, Texas: Arte Publico Press, 1993. AQ2 - A first edition (same date) hardcover book SIGNED by author (first name only) and inscribed to previous owner on the title page in very good condition in good dust jacket that is mylar protected. Dust jacket has wrinkling, chipping, crease, and tears on the edges, corners, and some sides, dust jacket and book have some bumped corners, light discoloration and shelf wear. The Useless Servants is a testament to the intelligence and culture of ordinary soldiers whose lives should have been more valuable to society than mere cannon fodder. 8.75"x5.75", 191 pages. Satisfaction Guaranteed. Beyond the morbidly sophisticated battle tactics plotted by generals and immortalized by military historians lies the stark reality of war. In The Useless Servants, award-winning author Rolando Hinojosa captures the obscenity and pointlessness of this primal struggle in the pages of a Korean War journal written by his fictional everyman, Rafe Buenrostro. Drawing from his own war experience, Hinojosa probes the mind of this Texas country boy who suddenly finds himself the well-oiled part of a vast killing machine. Dehumanized by the horrors that surround him, Rafe records his observations laconically and without emotion in a routine geared to survival and to becoming more effective in the performance of his grisly duty as an artilleryman. In The Useless Servants Hinojosa departs from his usual genre, the generational novels that chronicle the human comedy in an imaginary region on the Texas Mexico border. He sets aside the usual theme of inter-ethnic and interpersonal conflict to confront a painful chapter in his own life, placing Rafe Buenrostro, one of his alter egos, in a far more serious drama lived on the edge of sanity on the frontier between physical survival and spiritual destruction.. Signed by Author. First Edition. Hardcover. Very Good/Good. 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall.