Charro Claus and the Tejas Kid

San Antonio Current

Even Santa Claus sends the jobs he is unable or unwilling to do to Mexico. The jolly old outsourcer enlists his primo Pancho to deliver presents along the Texas-Mexico border, and his young nephew Vincent stows away in the present sack, in this colorful storybook by local author-illustrator Xavier Garza.

Pancho, dressed in a mariachi suit, pilots a wagon hauled by flying burritos (the non-delicious, non-musical sort). The simple South Texas Christmas tale is printed in both English and Spanish, allowing for several different bilingual reading opportunities, a logical choice for a book that pointedly asserts: “Not even rain or cloudy skies or walls or wire fences keep them from crossing back and forth to El Paso and Ciudad Juarez, to Roma and Miguel Aleman, to Rio Grande City and to Camargo. ... The border is his home!”

Charro Claus is the perfect gift for the children of your Minute Men relatives.

- November 19, 2008