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They Call You Back
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A haunting, an obsession, a calling: Tim Z. Hernandez has been searching for people his whole life. Now, in this highly anticipated memoir, he takes us along on an investigative odyssey through personal and collective history to uncover the surprising conjunctions that bind our stories together.
Hernandez’s mission to find the families of the twenty-eight Mexicans who were killed in the 1948 plane wreck at Los Gatos Canyon formed the basis for his acclaimed documentary novel All They Will Call You, which the San Francisco Chronicle dubbed “a stunning piece of investigative journalism,” and the New York Times hailed as “painstaking detective work by a writer who is the descendant of farmworkers.”
In this riveting new work, Hernandez continues his search for the plane crash victims while also turning the lens on himself and his ancestral past, revealing the tumultuous and deeply intimate experiences that have fueled his investigations—a lifelong journey haunted by memory, addiction, generational trauma, and the spirit world.
They Call You Back is the true chronicle of one man’s obsession to restore dignity to an undignified chapter in America’s past, while at the same time making a case for why we must heal our personal wounds if we are ever to heal our political ones.
***2025 SOUTHWEST BOOK OF THE YEAR for MEMOIR***
***WINNER OF THE 2025 TILLIE OLSEN AWARD for CREATIVE NONFICTION***
Tim Z. Hernandez is an award winning author, investigative researcher, performer, and documentary filmmaker. As a writer, his work includes poetry, novels, historical fiction, memoir, and screenplays, many of which have received international acclaim. His work has been featured in the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, C-Span, and highlighted in NPR’s Latino USA, All Things Considered and Alt.Latino. In 2013, Public Radio International hailed his book, Mañana Means Heaven, as a Book of the Year, and in 2011 he was selected among the “New American Poets” by the Poetry Society of America.
His debut collection of poetry, Skin Tax received the American Book Award, and his debut novel, Breathing, In Dust received the 2010 Premio Aztlan Prize. His second collection of poetry, Natural Takeover of Small Things received the 2014 Colorado Book Award, and his novel, Mañana Means Heaven, received the 2014 International Latino Book Award in historical fiction. His book, All They Will Call You, is a genre bending work of non-fiction based on the song by Woody Guthrie, “Deportee (Plane Wreck at Los Gatos).” This book is the first installment of the plane crash series. The second installment, They Call You Back, a memoir based on his search, was released Fall 2024. His most recent collection of poetry, “Some of the Light: New & Selected Poems” was released with Beacon Press (2023), for which he was featured in People Magazine.
On January 29, 2018, Hernandez was honored by the California State Senate in a recognition ceremony that took place at the state capital in Sacramento, Ca. The ceremony included the families of the victims of the plane crash at Los Gatos, as well as folk icon Joan Baez. As a performer, he has collaborated with various troupes, theater ensembles, and artists, and has performed in spaces such as Theaterwork in Santa Fe, Dixon Place in NYC, and The Getty Center in Los Angeles. He’s lent his poetry and voice to music albums, performing and recording with acclaimed musicians, such as jazz legend and composer, David Amram, latin jazz/ hip-hop group 40 Watt Hype, folk rocker Johnny Irion, bluesman Lance Canales, and Grammy Award winning classical composer Eugene Freisen.
Since 2007-2016, he collaborated with Poets & Writers Inc. teaching creative writing workshops across the west coast, and from 2010-14 he was the state-wide coordinator for Colorado Writers-in-the-Schools with focus on rural, under-served communities, teaching creative writing to grades K-12. Since 2015 he has been the co-host for the popular literary radio program Words on a Wire KTEP 88.5fm, the NPR affiliate for the borderlands, and he is a frequent guest artist at Universities, cultural institutions, and literary centers across the United States and internationally.
Hernandez holds an M.F.A. from Bennington College in Vermont, and a B.A. in Writing & Literature from Naropa University, the first accredited Buddhist University in the United States. He is currently an Associate Professor in the University of Texas El Paso’s Bilingual M.F.A. in Creative Writing program, and he lives in El Paso, Texas with his two children.