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Javier Zamora

Biography

Javier Zamora

Javier Zamora was born in El Salvador in 1990. His father fled the country when he was one and his mother when he was about to turn five. Both parents’ migrations were caused by the US-funded Salvadoran Civil War. When he was nine Javier migrated through Guatemala, Mexico and the Sonoran Desert. His debut poetry collection, UNACCOMPANIED, explores the impact of the war and immigration on his family. Zamora has been a Stegner Fellow at Stanford and a Radcliffe Fellow at Harvard and holds fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Poetry Foundation.

Javier Zamora

Books by Javier Zamora

Solito: A Memoir
by Javier Zamora - Memoir, Nonfiction

Nine-year-old Javier Zamora embarks on a 3,000-mile journey from his small town in El Salvador, through Guatemala and Mexico, and across the U.S. border. He leaves behind his beloved aunt and grandparents to reunite with a mother who left four years ago and a father he barely remembers. Traveling alone amid a group of strangers and a “coyote” hired to lead them to safety, Javier expects his trip to last two short weeks. But he cannot foresee the perilous boat trips, relentless desert treks, pointed guns, arrests and deceptions that await him. Nor can he know that those two weeks will expand into two life-altering months alongside fellow migrants who will come to encircle him like an unexpected family.