There Is a Rio Grande in Heaven: Stories

Reyes’s debut collection of stories explores identity, inequity, technology, and bureaucracy through the lens of the Salvadoran diaspora. Some tales play out in the future, while others are tied to the past or focus on what migration into the United States looks like today. Johnny Rey Diaz narrates each account superbly, voicing a reggaetón star, a corrupt politician, a ruthless finance broker, and even an occasional AI creation as they encounter difficult choices and profound transformations. Speculative accounts such as “The Salvadoran Slice of Mars” present detainees in outer space and western U.S. cities, while “He Eats His Own” centers on the hero’s obsession with his Guazapa family’s homegrown mangoes and his failure to bring his family together. Outcomes aren’t always bleak, but each story comes to terms with unrelenting sociopolitical and environmental changes that must be confronted.