KPBS Reporter Named Finalist For Emerging Writer Prize

Is our pleasure when we get to celebrate the one of our own here KPBS, recently KPBS reporter Jim Cabrera was in one of the finalists for the procedure and fusion emerging writers prize. Her entry is described by this way, is a cross-border memoir about a young American's quest to understand her Mexican father involvement migrant covers the mental geographical and spiritual frontiers. Jim Cabrera joins us now. What was it you want to understand about your father that sent you on this journey next. I grew up thinking my father was a schizophrenic, my mother is a doctor, that's how she described him to me after he disappeared from our lives he was gone for many years, traveling across three continents, fleeing Nilesh CIA operatives you believe were subjecting him to covert experiment, using remote electromagnetic torture technology. I guess when my mom describes him to me Exeter became obsessed with the idea, it was helpful in a way because it meant that my father's absence wasn't because he didn't care about us but because of a chemical imbalance in his brain. It is also scary and it is that the idea because I started to [Indiscernible] since is a genetic disease. In college I tried to figure it all out and my dad came back from his travels, he started talking and he was very articulate, when he was talking about his experiences that he didn't seem like a crazy person to me signing up my mission to find out what was going on especially when I moved to Mexico City to become a foreign correspondent that's in my head was from certain a lot of investigating their that's the mystery at the heart of this book. Why did you choose this title? I chose the title Kirks because I should probably mention alert in Mexico in mind I have a great-grandmother who was a good there, the entire town relied on her to foresee the future or to heal people, she could even locate lost horses and livestock for people and people were just line up outside her door she made her living the same. And found a lot of similarities of between them easily expert in natural medicine, he cured her Chihuahua blindness, so anyway I basically exploited the possibility that might that may have been part of something that manifested differently because of the culture. I've done large Association of people with been diagnosed with schizophrenia were object that diagnosis think that their hallucinations were inaccurate and sometimes even helpful. At which point the sentence became sinister. This is a fascinating tale and we're going to wait with great anticipation to see where those finalists are announced, and the winner is announced. I have been speaking with Jim Cabrera reporter and the author of the memoir cracks.