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The Garcia Boy: A Memoir
This book is the story of a brilliant young writer whose life was cut short by tragedy. In 2011, the award-winning essayist died from a rare form of cancer at age 36, just as his career was beginning to take off. Thanks to the work of students in the creative writing program at DePaul University, his gripping memoir is now published for the first time.
The son of an undocumented Mexican immigrant ,Torch struggled with addiction before becoming a teacher at a high school in a largely Latino community on Chicago's Lower West Side. His unflinching memoir focuses on the murder of a star student at that school - a symbol of the overwhelming challenges sons and daughters of immigrants face as they attempt to find a place in the larger society. What does it mean to be an American? And how does a person gain (or fail to gain) that identity? Although Rafael Torch wrote The Garcia Boy 15 years ago, the questions he poses are more important than ever.
The son of an undocumented Mexican immigrant ,Torch struggled with addiction before becoming a teacher at a high school in a largely Latino community on Chicago's Lower West Side. His unflinching memoir focuses on the murder of a star student at that school - a symbol of the overwhelming challenges sons and daughters of immigrants face as they attempt to find a place in the larger society. What does it mean to be an American? And how does a person gain (or fail to gain) that identity? Although Rafael Torch wrote The Garcia Boy 15 years ago, the questions he poses are more important than ever.
- GenresMemoir
156 pages, Paperback
Published January 1, 2019
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74 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews
December 10, 2019
There is something awe-inspiring and sad about reading books from authors who died young. Torch passed away of cancer in his 30s, so reading this story about his childhood pulls at my heartstrings in one hell of a way. He describes the struggle of growing up on the streets, getting involved with drugs and alcohol, and his own slow crawl to sobriety. I've read a lot of stories on this topic, but this one had a real ring to it. I liked how it was the author's real story. I got absorbed in his mistakes and lessons learned, especially through the older and wiser tone of himself as a narrator. He paralleled his life with that of a young man who was killed in his neighborhood. The jumps in time and changes in focus created an overwhelming, powerful tone. I wish he was still alive to write more. This story feels incomplete.
March 11, 2019
An amazing memoir by a man whose life was cut too short. This book delves into Chicago's education system, problems with violence, and more, even going into what it means to be American. See my full review here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uRqQ...
March 7, 2019
Rafael Torch’s The Garcia Boy is a touching memoir that addresses issues of gang violence, identity, and what it means to belong in urban America. Through his skillful writing, Torch explores not only the hardships of his own life but that of his immigrant father and the tragic death of one of his students from Cristo Rey High School in Pilsen. While parts of this book take place in his mother’s home in Ohio and in Mexico, this memoir is deeply about Chicago and living in the more forgotten communities of urban America. With both admiration and despair, Torch unfolds for the reader the unbearable truth of students and gang involvement in neighborhoods like Pilsen. Torch writes with a sense of urgency — his life’s work as an educator sought to end the cyclical trauma within his students’ lives, and although he saw some success, he witnessed the continuation of violence with the death of his student.
Although Torch wrote this book years ago, it could not be any more relevant to today’s issues. Immigration, violence, and identity in American culture are addressed daily by news outlets and contemporary fiction. “What does it mean to be American?” is an extremely pertinent question for today’s readers, and The Garcia Boy speaks to this in the most evocative and thought-provoking of ways.
Although Torch wrote this book years ago, it could not be any more relevant to today’s issues. Immigration, violence, and identity in American culture are addressed daily by news outlets and contemporary fiction. “What does it mean to be American?” is an extremely pertinent question for today’s readers, and The Garcia Boy speaks to this in the most evocative and thought-provoking of ways.
June 13, 2020
I put off reading this book for a long time. I worked with Rafael Torch at Cristo Rey, and I was a teacher there when Sergio was murdered. Torch was brilliant and terrifying and so handsome I could barely look at him when I worked there. He was only a few years older than me, but at the time he seemed a world apart, and after reading this book I understand why. Reading his impression of our students, of these kids who filled basically every hour of my day, was impossible. And it was impossible to stop reading, too. The book was beautiful, and beautifully written and captured something about Pilsen in the early 2000s that I don’t think I could ever have explained. It is a terrible tragedy that Torch died as young as he did and that this is the only book of his we will get to read. If this were a different, kinder world, Sergio would’ve gone to Georgetown and be doing something remarkable, and Rafael would still be busting kids with detentions at Cristo Rey.
March 7, 2019
An incredibly moving memoir that asks questions of us that we are too afraid to ask of ourselves. Review to come.
March 7, 2019
As a DePaul University MA in Writing and Publishing student who was directly involved in the publishing process of "The Garcia Boy," Rafael Torch's gripping memoir holds a special place in my heart.
The son of an undocumented Mexican immigrant, Torch struggled with addiction before becoming a teacher and Dean at Cristo Rey Jesuit High School in Chicago. His unflinching memoir focuses on the murder of a bright student at his school. While Torch managed to survive drugs and alcoholism, he died from cancer at the age of 36.
"The Garcia Boy" hits issues close to our Sweet Home Chicago. This memoir has the opportunity to take on a life of its own, long after its writer’s death. This memoir has the potential of taking on a life of its own, long after its writer's death.
The son of an undocumented Mexican immigrant, Torch struggled with addiction before becoming a teacher and Dean at Cristo Rey Jesuit High School in Chicago. His unflinching memoir focuses on the murder of a bright student at his school. While Torch managed to survive drugs and alcoholism, he died from cancer at the age of 36.
"The Garcia Boy" hits issues close to our Sweet Home Chicago. This memoir has the opportunity to take on a life of its own, long after its writer’s death. This memoir has the potential of taking on a life of its own, long after its writer's death.
November 12, 2022
Published through Big Shoulders Books and DePaul University it is intended to be distributed to educators and others free of charge via a grant so that unheard Chicagoans have a platform, social justice is addressed, and creativity is rewarded through the writing and publishing process of students. The Garcia Boy is part memoir, part drawn out autobiographical elegy, a unique script about the life of Rafael Torch. A man without an identity—Mexican father, white Italian mother—Torch struggles with ethnicity and culture even as both accost him gratuitously. He visits his father in Mexico, a drunk and rather petulant role model leaving little hope for “nurture” to take a light-hearted course of action. There is a history of violence, primarily external, in the family. The dynamic is strong enough that Rafael eventually becomes a partially embodied version of his father (as many of us do whether we like it or not). He turns to alcohol and drugs to medicate, presumably for his predisposition to addiction or his need to cope with the past trauma of a deadbeat dad. He lives a life of scorched earth for a bit only to redeem himself by giving back as an educator in the inner city. Working with kids of ethnic groups, he processes all of their daily issues while enduring tragedies along the way. The tragedy of the Garcia boy opens his eyes as somewhat of a stunted youth figure in which promise has been cut short, a life in the mirror of his own that, with one altered choice here or there, could have been his. Parallelism or the ghost of Robert Frost? Perhaps both. Yet, the reaper comes for us all, and Torch’s life’s pavement ends when he loses his battle with a rare form of cancer in his 30s shortly after witnessing the birth of his son. Both sad and fulfilling, the story aches to be linear but unfortunately is not.
April 10, 2019
Editor Miles Harvey was handed a manuscript. A manuscript that was written, lived, rewritten added on by the author and put away. After reading this manuscript Miles could not put it away. This author's voice needed to be heard. He took on this project with the blessing and help of the author's wife and with a group of students this author's dream is here for us.
It's a story of 3 men bound by demons, culture and even a surname. We see each man's journey and how their environment molded their lives. Rafael Garcia immigrates to the US and finds the dream becomes more of a nightmare. Alcoholism, gangs, and jail take him form his son.
Tari Torch raises her son and tries to guide him to a better life. But blood runs thick in her son and he follows his father's way. Rafael Torch, our author, crawls out of it all after jail time and hitting rock bottom. He becomes a teacher and sets out to make a difference in these young students' lives some who are headed down the same path he emerged from. One of his students is murdered in a gang shooting. He can't shake the effect this student had on him. An intelligent and talented student who was accepted to Georgetown on full scholarship who was stopped before he completed his journey.
Rafael compares all three lives of the Garcia boys and each travelled their own road and arrived at separate destinations.
Thank you Miles Harvey, Emily Torch and the incredibly talented students who took Rafael's words and story to the world.
It's a story of 3 men bound by demons, culture and even a surname. We see each man's journey and how their environment molded their lives. Rafael Garcia immigrates to the US and finds the dream becomes more of a nightmare. Alcoholism, gangs, and jail take him form his son.
Tari Torch raises her son and tries to guide him to a better life. But blood runs thick in her son and he follows his father's way. Rafael Torch, our author, crawls out of it all after jail time and hitting rock bottom. He becomes a teacher and sets out to make a difference in these young students' lives some who are headed down the same path he emerged from. One of his students is murdered in a gang shooting. He can't shake the effect this student had on him. An intelligent and talented student who was accepted to Georgetown on full scholarship who was stopped before he completed his journey.
Rafael compares all three lives of the Garcia boys and each travelled their own road and arrived at separate destinations.
Thank you Miles Harvey, Emily Torch and the incredibly talented students who took Rafael's words and story to the world.
June 1, 2024
This was an interesting book in which the author interwove his own life experiences with those of his parents and a young student he had who was murdered. The García Boy was published by DePaul University, and so it was interesting read a book that was often set in Chicago in areas that I know or have heard of. In a way, this book seemed like the author’s attempt to explain and find meaning in his life, family, and experiences.
As a Spanish professor, I especially enjoyed reading about his dad’s experience coming to the U.S. at the age of 19 in search of The American Dream. He honestly shares how defeated his father became and how he took refuge in alcohol, which resulted in his parent’s divorce and his lack of a relationship with him. On pages 133 and 134 he honestly shares how his dad’s lack of English language skills limit his life experiences when he writes:
“You never talk because you feel it, your difference, when you speak; all the ways in which you say your vowels differently and the way your consonants are hard and conspiratorial. Your language makes you feel dumb and dirty and rude and crude and not so heroic. It’s then that you feel illegal and invisible. Then you feel ashamed. You tell yourself you are going to lose the accent but think that’s an impossibility and I know it will be. You will never lose it. If language is the last thread to the old country, you will be Mexican for the rest of your life……”.
Yes, the languages we speak, or do not speak, influence and impact our lives and life experiences.
There was a lot to learn in these 149 pages and sometimes I went back through certain parts to better understand and really remember what the author was trying to share. The author’s writing is descriptive and powerful. I am sure that if Rafael Torch had not died of cancer at 36, he would have become a very respected and well-known author who had the skills to bring attention to important challenges and struggles that many are still facing in 2024.
As a Spanish professor, I especially enjoyed reading about his dad’s experience coming to the U.S. at the age of 19 in search of The American Dream. He honestly shares how defeated his father became and how he took refuge in alcohol, which resulted in his parent’s divorce and his lack of a relationship with him. On pages 133 and 134 he honestly shares how his dad’s lack of English language skills limit his life experiences when he writes:
“You never talk because you feel it, your difference, when you speak; all the ways in which you say your vowels differently and the way your consonants are hard and conspiratorial. Your language makes you feel dumb and dirty and rude and crude and not so heroic. It’s then that you feel illegal and invisible. Then you feel ashamed. You tell yourself you are going to lose the accent but think that’s an impossibility and I know it will be. You will never lose it. If language is the last thread to the old country, you will be Mexican for the rest of your life……”.
Yes, the languages we speak, or do not speak, influence and impact our lives and life experiences.
There was a lot to learn in these 149 pages and sometimes I went back through certain parts to better understand and really remember what the author was trying to share. The author’s writing is descriptive and powerful. I am sure that if Rafael Torch had not died of cancer at 36, he would have become a very respected and well-known author who had the skills to bring attention to important challenges and struggles that many are still facing in 2024.
July 16, 2019
I read this book for a book club where Rafael Torch's widow, Emily Olson-Torch, and a student editor (sorry I didn't catch your name!) were there to also talk about this book. The Garcia Boy touches upon a variety of issues such as race, heritage, addiction, identity, gang violence and education in disadvantaged neighborhoods. It is both a personal examination and an analysis of why children from poor neighborhoods find it hard to leave the ghetto.
This story, about 3 different people with the surname Garcia, come together over 3 generations. Rafael's father, a man who is an illegal immigrant and drunk, Rafael and his struggles with addiction and how he overcomes it, and a young student tragically murdered by gang violence. While Rafael eventually overcame his addiction, became a dean at a school, and found a woman to love and have his child, he eventually encounters the looming specter of death in the form of a rare cancer.
Sadly, he would pass away before he was able to do more with his works and life, but this book can have great impact, especially because it is so relevant today. People say that those in the ghetto are there because of their own choices, but they don't realize how hard it can be for them to escape from that world. And for those that do escape they often feel that they are a part of two worlds, and what that loneliness of leaving one world for the other means. They struggle with whether or not they can ever really be a part of that other world. Rafael often struggled with the loneliness of being a child of two worlds.
It was great being able to meet Emily and talk with one of the editors. The whole process of how this book came into being was inspirational, and I do hope that more people will take advantage and read this book. While it can be hard to follow at times, it is important to remember that it is a book of stories. This is definitely a story that will stick with me for a long time to come.
This story, about 3 different people with the surname Garcia, come together over 3 generations. Rafael's father, a man who is an illegal immigrant and drunk, Rafael and his struggles with addiction and how he overcomes it, and a young student tragically murdered by gang violence. While Rafael eventually overcame his addiction, became a dean at a school, and found a woman to love and have his child, he eventually encounters the looming specter of death in the form of a rare cancer.
Sadly, he would pass away before he was able to do more with his works and life, but this book can have great impact, especially because it is so relevant today. People say that those in the ghetto are there because of their own choices, but they don't realize how hard it can be for them to escape from that world. And for those that do escape they often feel that they are a part of two worlds, and what that loneliness of leaving one world for the other means. They struggle with whether or not they can ever really be a part of that other world. Rafael often struggled with the loneliness of being a child of two worlds.
It was great being able to meet Emily and talk with one of the editors. The whole process of how this book came into being was inspirational, and I do hope that more people will take advantage and read this book. While it can be hard to follow at times, it is important to remember that it is a book of stories. This is definitely a story that will stick with me for a long time to come.
December 9, 2020
Ugh, I liked this book for so many reasons. I am half Mexican. The author has always felt Mexican to his white family and white to his Mexican family. I know that exact feeling. I grew up knowing many peers who didn’t make it past their 21st birthday due to gang affiliation from Pilsen and Little Village and beyond. It’s a very weird, fine line to walk seeing both sides of society in your own family, in the ones closest to you. I admire that Rafa was a giant fuck up, who fought like hell to change his path. He writes a very truthful, raw account of how he felt on the whole ride. From his lowest of low to the high. His explanation of his love for his wife was beautiful and brought me to tears. He was so damn happy to finally have true happiness in this woman. And then for her to give him Rocco at the end of his winding road, it was tragically beautiful. Aside from his compelling story, Rafael Torch was a really talented writer in his own right. He put words and thoughts together quite masterfully and I really enjoyed his style. I’m thankful that Big Shoulders published this very talented authors work.
May 22, 2019
First, thanks to Big Shoulders Books and DePaul University (Chicago) for copies of the book to read, discuss, and review.
The Garcia Boy is not only a memoir, it's a portrait of life growing up Hispanic and white in Chicago and Ohio in the 1990s and early 2000s. It's the story of Rafael Torch, his father and grandfather, their struggles with alcohol, with family, and with the contradictions in their lives as they build families.
Rafael Torch tells stories just as his father did. The stories of their lives weave in and out of the narrative in small bits, in snippets, in longer poetic prose. They remind readers of the difficulties of adapting to life in new places, to building new identities, and the diversity of struggle to find a place within a community.
Readers who take the time to delve into Torch's work will be enriched by the experience.
The Garcia Boy is not only a memoir, it's a portrait of life growing up Hispanic and white in Chicago and Ohio in the 1990s and early 2000s. It's the story of Rafael Torch, his father and grandfather, their struggles with alcohol, with family, and with the contradictions in their lives as they build families.
Rafael Torch tells stories just as his father did. The stories of their lives weave in and out of the narrative in small bits, in snippets, in longer poetic prose. They remind readers of the difficulties of adapting to life in new places, to building new identities, and the diversity of struggle to find a place within a community.
Readers who take the time to delve into Torch's work will be enriched by the experience.
June 24, 2019
The son of an immigrant from Mexico tries to understand his place is in America. Torch is haunted by the the what ifs represented by the Garcia boy - the other plausible path his life might have taken. The author Torch's prose is impassioned however the structure of the book is a little frustrating.
January 8, 2020
Really enjoyed reading about the truth of what goes on in inner city neighborhoods. I was able to pinpoint many locations described in the book since I grew up in the neighborhood where this book was based on. Very sad truth on the violence plaguing our neighborhoods.
January 19, 2024
The complexities and actuality of living in the West Side of Chicago and being local to the area is so pertinent to emotionally experiencing and responding to Torch’s memoir. The peaks and lows.
It was beautiful written— the forward, memoir itself, and heartfelt afterward.
It was beautiful written— the forward, memoir itself, and heartfelt afterward.
April 13, 2019
This book was achingly moving from the forward to the afterward. Bravo to those instrumental in the publishing and distribution of The Garcia Boy!
April 17, 2019
What a passionate and perceptive memoir! I loved this autobiological tale of another Chicago neighborhood with his honest and detailed story.
June 9, 2019
Exquisite writing - almost poetic at times.
February 22, 2020
I’d give this 6 stars if I could. Raw, gritty, moving. Every ‘American’ needs to read this book.
December 10, 2020
An odd memoir of identity and choices and finding out where you fit in.
January 31, 2023
Achingly beautiful, unabashedly honest memoir about being a Mexican immigrant, the biracial son of a Mexican immigrant, and a boy of great potential who dies during gang wars in Chicago.
July 12, 2025
The two pages where he writes about meeting his wife, Emily, are crushingly beautiful. Last 10 pages or so really got me
March 19, 2024
3.5 stars. But if I have to round, I am rounding up.
“You, too, will have one story that all the others will come from.”
I wasn’t sure where to start with this review. While other writers structure their reviews like well-written papers prepared to be turned in for a grade, I ache for a real approach, like a confession, or a conversation.
I came across The Garcia Boy at the Harper & Row Literary Festival in Chicago. I drove up from southern Illinois to attend. I’m not from either place—much like a theme in this book. While I am not an immigrant or *insert here*-American, like addressed in this book, I have always felt the displacement and label of “other”. There are times when I miss home, but I don’t know where home is. I’ve come to find my home in the people of my life instead of places. What are these places without our people filling them? A collection of stuff that prompts an aching ball of nostalgia.
I enjoyed reading about the trials of Torch and his family. Enjoyed not as in excitement, but as in I took something away from it. His words sit heavy in my gut. Honestly, the book left me with a bit of an emotional hangover. Torch tells his and his family’s stories about where they are from and what they went through to get where they are now. Sounds like life, doesn’t it? That is exactly what this memoir is—life with the truth rearing its ugly mug and rancid breath in your face.
Request to order or download this book for free from the publisher at: https://bigshouldersbooks.com/book-or...
“You, too, will have one story that all the others will come from.”
I wasn’t sure where to start with this review. While other writers structure their reviews like well-written papers prepared to be turned in for a grade, I ache for a real approach, like a confession, or a conversation.
I came across The Garcia Boy at the Harper & Row Literary Festival in Chicago. I drove up from southern Illinois to attend. I’m not from either place—much like a theme in this book. While I am not an immigrant or *insert here*-American, like addressed in this book, I have always felt the displacement and label of “other”. There are times when I miss home, but I don’t know where home is. I’ve come to find my home in the people of my life instead of places. What are these places without our people filling them? A collection of stuff that prompts an aching ball of nostalgia.
I enjoyed reading about the trials of Torch and his family. Enjoyed not as in excitement, but as in I took something away from it. His words sit heavy in my gut. Honestly, the book left me with a bit of an emotional hangover. Torch tells his and his family’s stories about where they are from and what they went through to get where they are now. Sounds like life, doesn’t it? That is exactly what this memoir is—life with the truth rearing its ugly mug and rancid breath in your face.
Request to order or download this book for free from the publisher at: https://bigshouldersbooks.com/book-or...
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May 10, 2019The Garcia Boy by Rafael Torch is a poignant memoir of the son of a Mexican immigrant father and American/Italian mother. Living in Chicago, Illinois and working professionally as a dean of a local school, Rafael decides to compile a book depicting the continual struggles of Mexican immigrants in America. How they try diligently to fit into the culture, without losing their ancestral heritage in the process. The published book was put together after Rafael’s death by Big Shoulders Books and DePaul University students.
I love how Rafael recounts his own personal story in correlation with the story of a teenage boy from his school. The cold-blooded murder of the young man strikes a nerve in Rafael prompting him to reflect on the similarities between the two of them.
Equally interesting, is how he writes about alcoholism and the effect it had on his own life, as well as, that of his family. I find the emotions are genuine and honest. The students of DePaul performed a fantastic job placing Rafael’s work together to assemble the book.
The only thing I did not like is the book gives the impression that these struggles are exclusive to the Latino immigrant population. I believe that these struggles are found in all groups of people and all cities.
I recommend The Garcia Boy by Rafael Torch to young adults, and schools working with grades 7 thru 12. I think this book is a valuable tool for educators in those grades. I enjoyed reading the book immensely and did not want to put it down. It easily deserved 5 out of 5 stars.
I love how Rafael recounts his own personal story in correlation with the story of a teenage boy from his school. The cold-blooded murder of the young man strikes a nerve in Rafael prompting him to reflect on the similarities between the two of them.
Equally interesting, is how he writes about alcoholism and the effect it had on his own life, as well as, that of his family. I find the emotions are genuine and honest. The students of DePaul performed a fantastic job placing Rafael’s work together to assemble the book.
The only thing I did not like is the book gives the impression that these struggles are exclusive to the Latino immigrant population. I believe that these struggles are found in all groups of people and all cities.
I recommend The Garcia Boy by Rafael Torch to young adults, and schools working with grades 7 thru 12. I think this book is a valuable tool for educators in those grades. I enjoyed reading the book immensely and did not want to put it down. It easily deserved 5 out of 5 stars.
Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews