My book, "The Tamale Letter" is based on a true history of my family over three generations. My grandfather, Anastacio Reyes was an orphan at the age of 10 in Mexico. He drifted from other family members who did not have the financial means nor room to raise another child. He never received an education and could barely read or write. At the age of twelve years old, he worked as a storekeeper's assistance for two years. At the age of fourteen years of age he migrated to the United States with a caravan of migrant workers. He worked odd jobs like making fire pits to cook food, working the fields and cleaning dishes. As he got older, he worked for Southern Pacific Railroad, laying down railroad tracks. At eighteen years old, he met my grandmother Maria Gabino. And after a short courtship they married and raised five children, one being my father, Rudy Reyes. The new Reyes family grew up in Houston during the Great Depression Era and through World War 2. Both our grandfather and grandmother were a loving and Christian family who taught their five children how to treat each other and eventually their families as they got married. The title of my book, "The Tamale Letter" came from an actual letter our aunt Mary Allice, the youngest of the five children wrote to her older brother, Jesse Reyes who was at the Battle of the Bulge.
