First published in 1943, this classic memoir by well-known Filipino poet Carlos Bulosan describes his boyhood in the Philippines, his voyage to America, and his years of hardship and despair as an itinerant laborer following the harvest trail in the rural West.
America came to him in a public ward in the Los Angeles County Hospital while around him men died gasping for their last bit of air, and he learned that while America could be cruel it could also be immeasurably kind. . . . For Carlos Bulosan no lifetime could be long enough in which to explain to America that no man could destroy his faith in it again. He wanted to contribute something toward the final fulfillment of America. So he wrote this book that holds the bitterness of his own blood.
-- Carlos P. Romulo * New York Times *Bulosan's gripping memoir-novel of a young Filipino immigrant long ago secured its place in Asian American literature. . . . An outstanding introductory essay extends the historical discussion (and in some ways brings it full circle) in this third edition. . . . [Bulosan's] call to action resonates with the same urgency today as it did seven decades ago.
-- Greg Lewis * Pacific Northwest Quarterly *To resist the call to heartlessness, let's heed the call to idealism expressed by Bulosan in America Is in the Heart.
-- Tyron Beason * Seattle Times *