Growing up can be difficult for anyone. Growing up with blindness, family mental illness, and bigotry in 1970s New York City can be nearly unnavigable.
In the new memoir An Eye for an I, author James Francisco Bonilla recounts growing up with limited eyesight and the baggage that comes with it. "I was born with congenital cataracts," says Bonilla. "I've never seen out of my left eye." At the age of nine, while playing a playground game with a sore loser, Bonilla was struck in the right eye by a horseshoe. "I lost most of the usable sight in my right eye, and I was to spend the next decade being legally blind."
A lack of tolerance and understanding from peers led to years of abuse in his youth; both Bonilla's limited sight and his Spanish accent made him a target for thieves and predators. "It required a certain amount of willingness to defend yourself," says Bonilla of his situation. The memoir also dives into Bonilla's relationship with his mother and her mental illness, the social mishaps born from his blindness, and the hope of regaining his lost sense of sight.
Bonilla will be in attendance at a book release in St. Paul at Next Chapter Books on Thursday, November 6th as well as in Winona on November 13th at the Blue Heron Coffeehouse. An Eye for an I is available at most booksellers and online through various sites including the University of Minnesota Press.
Minnesota Reads is produced at The North 103.3 with funding provided in part by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund.
