For the dead,/ and for those who rescue/ the living." (Epigraph )

Importance: In this quote, author Luis Alberto Urrea dedicates his novel not only to the deceased Yuma 14 nor to the surviving 12 of the Wellton 26. He specifically includes a mention of "those who rescue the living" as an allusion and homage to the Border Patrol agents who, nearly every day, rescue migrants who attempt to cross the desert into the United States.

Immigration, the drive northward, is a white phenomenon." (The Rules of the Game)

Importance: In this chapter, the author cites historical evidence regarding Europeans who, upon arriving in Mexico, pushed upwards and northwards, in order to challenge his readers' possible assumptions about migration being an exclusively "brown" or "Third World" phenomenon.

Nobody wanted them when they were alive, and now look--everybody wants to own them." (The Rules of the Game )

Importance: This startling, moving passage comments on the irony of the Wellton 26 becoming so famous after their deaths and/or near-deaths. This...