THEY CALL YOU BACK

In searching for the stories of 28 Mexicans killed in a 1948 plane crash, a multidisciplinary artist comes to better understand his own experience and identity.

Hernandez’s new gracefully understated book is partly a continuation of All They Will Call You, as the author gathers stories from the descendants of victims of the 1948 Los Gatos Canyon plane crash. It is also his attempt to answer a question he is frequently asked about that work and how and why he came to it in the first place. Since the publication of All They Will Call You in 2017, and the ensuing attempts by the California State Senate to more appropriately identify and honor the victims, more families have found Hernandez. Their stories entwine with his own history, which reaches back generations, including the premature and unjust death of a close relative, to explain the author’s motivation for, and obsession with, uncovering the details of people killed more than 75 years ago. Though Hernandez describes a set of incidents that led him to investigate the Los Gatos crash, there are deeper truths involved. The author characterizes his writing and research as the work, most fundamentally, of the crash victims themselves, calling and prompting him from beyond the grave. “History is not as passive as we think it is,” he writes, as he probes elements both mythic and mystic. As Hernandez skillfully brings forward new histories and remembrances of the crash’s victims, their loved ones, and their descendants, he drives toward essential truths of his identity, particularly as a writer, touching on themes of historic trauma, the meaning and importance of inheritance, and the vital quest to fill voids. With an unapologetic humility, commitment to restoring lost dignity, and deep understanding of human connectedness, Hernandez is a model storyteller.

Entrancing, reverential, and beautiful.