Steinbeck might not be the No. 1 literary pride of Watsonville for long. Enter Jaime Cortez, whose debut short story collection, Gordo, is set in and around the Pajaro Valley town. Cortez's book is an unforgettable portrait of the working-class Mexican Americans who lived there in the 1970s — including the charming misfit title character, who narrates most of the stories ... Cortez's depiction of Gordo is both joyful and heartbreaking ... both sweet and sorrowful, and it showcases Cortez's ability to fully inhabit the voice of a young boy who knows he doesn't fit in, but is only beginning to understand why ... Cortez is a deeply compassionate writer; he obviously cares about his characters, though he doesn't treat them with kid gloves. The people in this collection are painfully real, sometimes flawed, sometimes angelic, frequently both. Gordo is a lovely book that masterfully evokes 1970s California, but manages, nonetheless, to feel truly universal.

[Gordo] gives the reader an unobstructed view into the lives of those who are often relegated to statistics and political talking points: people who come to the States for a better life for themselves and their offspring ... we enter Cortez’s world, where there is an irresistible mix of childlike desire, piercing observation and ridiculous, but relatable, shenanigans, including wrestling matches and the plundering of a porn collection, along with more serious matters ... the strength of Cortez’s work is that he lays out these stories without defining his characters by their worst actions, showing us people who are closer to reflections of ourselves than we think, even if they do not look like us, or come from the places we call home. And this is the book’s superpower: the cultivation of empathy.

Like Diane Arbus or Weegee, Cortez depicts warts-and-all moments of vulnerability precisely, sometimes even harshly, and without sentiment. Unlike Arbus and Weegee, his camera is the printed word, rather than a Nikon or Speed Graphic ... Cortez is native to this locale, and it shows. He succinctly portrays a largely overlooked California landscape that’s as far removed from the worlds of Silicon Valley and Hollywood as it is from the 14 moons of Neptune. What ultimately draws the reader in, though, is the book’s emotional honesty. Gordo is no smarty-pants, wise-beyond-his-years kid; even as he grows up, he’s often puzzled by life’s abundant mysteries. The characters in and around his life exhibit kindness and cruelty in fluid motion. Cortez artfully frames these characters’ daily struggles and captures them in the freeze-frame flash of a master at work.

Jaime Cortez’s debut story collection, Gordo, opens with 'The Jesus Donut' ... The story is funny and incredibly charming, despite highlighting the acute poverty of the camp’s Latino migrant residents. 'The Jesus Donut' sets the tone for the collection’s waggish and tender look into this significantly ignored world of California migrant communities, here set around Watsonville in the 1970s — both documented and undocumented — mostly through young Gordo’s point of view and his local cast of characters ... Cortez, a Bay Area author, masterfully navigates adverse conditions of migrant life while prioritizing in these stories the way people adapt to their circumstance — managing to find joy and amusement, love and triumph, that which makes us delightfully human — amid its challenge ... There is refreshing retribution for the sissy boy, however, in the character of Raymundo, introduced later in the collection. At first, you cringe as you follow his all-too-familiar struggles through middle school in 'The Problem of Style' gratefully dignified by Cortez’s sweet humor ... Raymundo is a revelatory character in fiction, and one of the book’s beloved achievements.

In his intimate and irreverent debut short story collection, Gordo Jaime Cortez mines his memories of his own working-class California childhood to show life through the eyes of his titular character ... Cortez crafts the vivid and unsentimental perspective of a perceptive kid ... Too often, the publishing industry relegates the point of view of a child to books which are themselves for children, but in Cortez's hands, the language and voice of the young narrator nimbly depict his bilingual milieu and his outsider status therein ... Gordo's innocence and perplexity create a pleasing tension and enhance Cortez's explorations of face, class, sex and gender ... The 11 stories each stand alone, satisfyingly self-contained ... His stories yield countless laugh-out-loud funny moments, but the humor is always sympathetic and above all gives the reader the sensation of having been shown something true.

...exuberant ... At their best, Cortez’s stories highlight the community’s functional and paradoxical stew of interpersonal relationships, brimming with threats as well as love. Cortez has a bright, clear voice that avoids stereotypes and navigates issues of identity with ease ... Readers will be delighted.

Raygay, as he was known by his bullies when young, is asked to make one of his middle school tormentors look good in death; one side of Shy Boy’s head is punctured by a bullet and only Ray can make the wig look stunning. These stories are elemental and unfussy, their emotional hearts affecting and memorable ... Stories that serve as unvarnished, even fond, testaments to a tough, queer life.