A century and a half ago, religious intolerance in Mexico was at its height, to the point that the Catholic majority—sometimes incited by their priests—unleashed criminal acts against believers of other doctrines and their ministers. Such was the case in Ahualulco de Mercado, a small town in Jalisco, when collective fury fell upon a young Protestant pastor. This almost forgotten episode is the basis of Waltz for Wolves and a Shepherd, a novel in which Ernesto Lumbreras, with the help of his precise and inexhaustible imagination, reconstructs a life and a time that, although seemingly distant, bears a close relationship to those of our times.
Originally from Wales, orphaned by his father at the age of five, John Luther Stephens emigrated with his mother to the United States on a slave ship. As a teenager, sensing the approach of the Civil War, he decided to travel to California,...read more
