A good story resides in a world all its own, and I wanted to have the reader understand quickly what this world was like, a world where some people like Toño “La Perra” Becerra have a hard on for violence and some others, like “The Judge” Vallejo…go about inflicting violence like a sacred, god given duty.

For the Ploughshares blog, Daniel Peña interviews Rafael Acosta about his novel Conquistador, Mexicans’ love of Cormac McCarthy, and whether he likes the Spurs or the Lakers.