As the wall makes its slow march forward, Gibson sets out on a quest to meet people whose lives are connected to the border. It’s hard to think of an archetype he doesn’t profile ... The book’s 60 short chapters are easy to gobble up, especially since Gibson is constantly peppering us with surreal tidbit ... The juicy anecdotes keep the book spicy, but the sheer number of people crammed into the pages prevents any character from ever becoming fully developed. Gibson also falls into a familiar pitfall of contemporary journalistic writing, putting himself in the story even though his character doesn’t give us any deeper insight into the subject. The book sometimes reads a bit like a travelogue of Gibson’s own adventures. It can be disjointing to go from a state representative discussing immigration reform to Gibson quipping about the bad coffee he’s drinking at Denny’s ... But Gibson’s book stands out from the pack in other important ways. So much of today’s journalism lacks context for Trump’s immigration policies. In 14 Miles, the president’s attack on immigration is rightly presented as the latest in a long history of attempts to keep, or kick, foreigners out.

Gibson’s first-hand accounts and comments on his broken Spanish and the quality of whatever coffee he’s being subjected to bring a personal edge to his observations and research on a topic with international reach spanning decades. In the shadow of the prototypes, Gibson seeks out people willing to share their experiences of and perspectives on the impact of the many forces at work on the border...They’re all given voices within Gibson’s enlightening and inclusive report on the walled border.

Written in a narrative style, this engaging book will appeal to anyone interested in learning more about who lives along the border and what a wall means to them.

Gibson’s exhaustive work is worthy scholarship. He painstakingly chronicles the phases of the prototype-building and interviews scores of people who live and work along the border. While his heart is clearly with the undocumented immigrants desperate to enter the country, his journalist’s eye also focuses with precision on the contractors building the wall, the border agents patrolling it, and the politicians supporting it ... The book is filled with poignant stories like Avila’s — unfortunately, for continuity, it is filled with too much detail about some of them. Rather than stick close to the wall, so to speak, Gibson meanders into the minutiae of the lives of those he meets along the way, sometimes confusing the reader and diluting the message of the greater meaning of the wall. By turning off the tape recorder a bit sooner with some of his subjects, he would have had a smoother narrative ... by the time the author returns to his theme, the reader is so bogged down in extraneous details that De La Fuente’s significance to the story is forgotten. He does this with other interview subjects as well ... Still, Gibson’s wanderings sometimes work.

Though there is plenty of information about the numerous prototypes for the physical wall—as well as the tangled bureaucracy involved in choosing one and starting the work—the page-turning, often tense narrative covers much more. The author chronicles his time with men and women on both sides of the 1,954-mile border. In addition to telling Gibson about the tangible effects of the physical wall, many illuminate what the idea of a wall means to them. The author’s range of reporting is impressive ... Throughout the book, Gibson portrays the varied humanity on both sides with journalistic integrity and readable prose that often includes subtle yet biting social commentary ... An important current affairs book that deserves a wide audience before the 2020 election.

... [an] empathetic, voice-driven account ... Gibson interviews people living on both sides of the border...Their overlapping perspectives set the book apart from more didactic, issue-driven accounts ... More philosophical meditation on the meaning and function of a border than hard-hitting exposé, Gibson’s multifaceted portrait makes a meaningful contribution to the question of what a humane and sensible immigration policy would look like. Readers will be left with a lot to ponder.