Always Running Summary

The book “Always Running” is an autobiography authored by Rodriquez since it documents the day to day life of Rodriquez as a gang member. The story is a true narration of the author’s life in a Chicano gang and what he does to free himself from these challenges. The book is a non-fiction novel which describes the life and obstacles encountered by adolescent gang members. The story is centered around economic and social forces that influence and affect members of a gang especially those at the adolescent stage and the challenges they encounter in their environment. Rodriquez is the main protagonist of the story who narrates his gang life and how he managed to escape from it. The setting of this story is in East Los Angeles, Chicano, United States.

Despite his mother being a school secretary, and his father a principal in Mexico, they find it cumber to find a stable employment in United States. There are also constant wrangles and conflicts involving his parents. For instance, Rodriquez’s mother is unhappy because his father does not want to return to Mexico. Though the mother is making every effort in making sure the family does not disintegrate, these efforts seems not to bear fruit as there are constant misunderstandings in the family. Consequently, the lack of a stable employment and frequent misunderstandings affects the stability of the family putting Rodriguez at a crossroad in his childhood. The economic instability, made him and his family to move from one region to another and coming face to face with racism. The constant discrimination creates a sense of alienation in Rodriguez which he carries to his adolescence. He equates the kind of life in which he lives in to that of the gang culture that was prevalent in his environment and which he comes to document in his subsequent

It is very rare for someone who had taken a firsthand experience in gang life to come up in the open and narrate these experiences to the public as well as the dangers which they go through. This is irrespective of the fact that the realism of gang life can be seen in news, movies or in the actual streets, reading about it and visualizing the scenes in one’s mind is like taking a firsthand experience in these