Border-crime authors write about border crime for very similar reasons. San Diego County resident T. Jefferson Parker is a bestselling author with multiple awards to his credit, Clark Lohr is a debut author. Parker, who has published 18 novels to date, said, “What entices me about our border with Mexico is the fact that guns and money go south, and drugs and people come north, almost every hour of every day. What lies beyond the border in Mexico is a violence unprecedented in the history of that wonderful country. It’s rich ground for a thriller writer. I also happen to think that what happens along the border is of huge and grave importance to us all. This story must be told.”
Lohr, who lives near Tucson, sees the same thing along the Arizona border. “The drug trade has always existed between the US and Mexico and the drug trade is one of the only ways to get money in border towns.”
For fiction crime writers, this environment creates fertile territory for that next novel. In the continuation of Parker’s “Border” series, The Border Lords explores issues that those who don’t live near the Mexico border can barely appreciate. Parker noted, “Trying to control illegal weapons going into Mexico is on scale with the labors of Hercules. A huge border, a thousand different ways to get guns across it, tons of money being paid to smugglers, and relatively small U.S. agencies trying to stop it. Bear in mind that in the U.S., guns are basically legal and millions of people have millions of guns. In Mexico, they are basically not legal. So the border becomes a witch’s brew of supply and demand.”
Part of what drives this illegal trade is a difference in laws and culture. Said Parker, “Our Constitution establishes our right to keep and bear arms. Mexico has no such specific granting of that right, and there are practically no gun stores there. We have very different ways of looking at it.”
So, while border crime provides ample material for writers, both Lohr and Parker agree that there are no easy solutions to the problems. Parker believes that legalizing marijuana would help by “…gutting approximately 60% of the black market.” Would violence decrease in response? Parker’s reply, “Maybe. Trouble is, you’d still have hard drugs out there.”
Learn more about T. Jefferson Parker and Clark Lohr in Parts 1 and 2 of this series: Border crime fiction - Devil's Kitchen and Border crime fiction - The Border Lords.
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