The Sons of El Rey is a powerful story about legacy and family. It is also a love letter to lucha libre without it being about lucha libre. It is a multi-generation family saga, and each chapter is from the perspective of a different family member and in a different generation. As a result, the story is not linear, but it allows us to see the continuity and changes in the life and options of queer Mexican and Mexican-American men. The chapters from Julian's perspective were the ones with the largest impact on me. The portrayal of an adjunct trying to make ends meet was so real that I had to take a break to manage the emotions it brought to the surface for me. Julian's dad, Freddy, was probably the least interesting part of the story, and I really wish that Elena's side of the story had been a bit. more fleshed out. It is clear that Espinoza was trying to depict a strong but flawed woman, and I think that characterization needed more work. However, his depiction of Julian and Ernesto felt so real and powerful. They were the heart of the book and made it a great reading experience for me.

A story about a family of luchadores across the years. I was intrigued by this one because I love luchador wrestling, but it was a lot more of a sweeping family epic than it was about the wrestling.

A great book. Three generations of men in a luchador legacy in the making, it was heartbreaking and beautiful told through multiple character POVs.

A beautiful, subtle story of how the past repeats itself in surprising ways and how traumas can take generations to heal. Elena was my favorite character, While she got the least print, I loved her because she was so clear in who she was and what she was prepared to do. The story is told without sentimentality yet manages to be very sentimental. Loved it.

Thank you so much to @simonbooks for sending me a copy of THE SONS OF EL REY by Alex Espinoza (June 11, 2024).

Ernesto Vega shot to fame as a luche libre after leaving his family’s rural farm for Mexico City. He courted success more than his lover, Julián, or wife, Elena. Once he family immigrated to the United States, he started a gym where he mentored a new generation of wrestlers and stoked nostalgia by serving as a mascot in the guise of El Rey.

Now, unconscious and in hospice, he is visited by apparitions of El Rey Coyote and his late wife, Maria, as well as his living relatives, including his son Freddy, riddled by guilt because his father’s gym has been in economic decline since Covid and is on the verge of closing, and his gay grandson, Julian, a writer and adjunct English professor who can only pay his bills through acting as as an escort to men who fetishize his brown skin.

Fundamentally, THE SONS OF EL REY is a fascinating family story that hinges on luche libre, a genre of wrestling in which the wrestler has a full face mask and never reveals his or her identity. As Ernesto legitimately hides his everyday self in the ring under El Rey, he also hides his sexuality. While Ernesto and Maria move to the US to provide a better life for their children, Freddy’s career parallel’s that of his father’s, and while Julian attempts to live a life of the mind, he falls back on bodily labor as well.

Multiple narrators shape the story, from the earliest days of Ernesto and Maria’s marriage to the present, and details drawn from the historical context enhance but never overwhelm the narrative (such as the Mexican government’s crackdown on student protesters, also seen in VELVET WAS THE NIGHT by Silvia Moreno-Garcia). Being a fan of luche libre is not necessary to enjoy this book!

It is one of my favorites of 2024 for the inventive storyline, the resonant writing, and the colorful characters as well as the many interesting themes that make this an ideal book club choice.

The Sons of El Rey follows three generations of Vega men through time as they move from rural Michoacán to Mexico City to Los Angeles.

Ernesto, the patriarch of the family, follows his friend Julián (and drags his discontented wife Elena along) from pig farming in the countryside to barely scraping by in the city. In part to make ends meet and in part because he loves the fight, Ernesto becomes the luchador El Rey Coyote. While beloved by the public, his internalized homophobia and inability to connect emotionally create a rift between him, Elena, and Julián resulting in a secret that echoes across generations.

Freddy, Ernesto's son, is struggling to keep his father's gym alive during the peak of the COVID pandemic while Ernesto is slowly fading away in hospice care. Freddy reminisces about his teenage years and how he became a luchador like his father, El Rey Coyote Jr., while he reflects on his relationship with his son Julian who he fails to connect with.

Julian has an MA in English but still can't get enough classes to pay the bills. A man from his gym, Tim, recruits him to hustle for rich, white clients, which sets Julian on a path to reconcile with his father and decide what legacies are worth carrying.

I really enjoyed this book. Told from each man's perspective, plus that of El Rey Coyote, you could see how clearly each man's pain was passed down to the next generation and how they individually try to mitigate it. Where it was lacking for me was Elena's perspective--her chapters were shorter and her character was less developed. With that said, it was an excellent mix of moving and hilarious story telling, and I highly recommend it.

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review!

The Sons of El Rey" by Alex Espinoza is a multi-generational saga that explores the complexities of identity, family, and the pursuit of dreams. Set against the vibrant backdrop of Mexican lucha libre wrestling and East Los Angeles, the novel weaves together the stories of three generations of the Vega family.

Full review at the link below!

I really enjoyed the book. I think the alternating perspectives really pushed the narrative along and allowed you to see the queerness hidden in each of the characters, which is an aspect of the novel I really enjoyed. Secondly I also really loved the characterizations, each character truly felt so full and complete, which I really really really enjoyed.

Thank you to Simon and Shuster and NetGalley for an ARC copy to review.

The cover of this book sucked me in and I was excited to read a novel about Lucha Libre. The book told the story from the point of view of three generations of Vega men , with occasional appearances from from the Lucha character-El Rey Coyote and the wife Elena.

To be honest I stalled out on this book midway through and it took awhile to get back to it. I am glad I finished but I do think there were times it was hard to hold my attention. The book is a family saga that spans several time periods and two countries. It does talk about Lucha Libre, but was more focused on its impact for this particular family. It also covered themes of identity, queerness, and culture, sometimes delving deep and other times just offering a bit of a taste. As often happens in stories with multiple viewpoints, it is hard to get a full picture of any of any of the characters and I was left with a lot questions about some of the motives people had for their actions. It was an interesting read, but not my favorite

The very idea of luchadores is Exotic to me, in the settler-colonial sense. I am as far from a wrestling fan that it is possible for someone to be. So, well, what's the appeal of this story to someone like me?

The very idea of the immigrant journey.

Immigrants are the lifeblood of the US on economic and cultural levels. The country wouldn't exist without us. (The Native Americans would doubtless see this as a plus.) The present cultural conversation around immigrants and their role across the world demands that we see the actual, real humans in these roles not abstractions of Otherness. The best way I know to do that is to learn the stories that immigrants tell us. Author Espinoza, infant immigrant to the US, knows the life he's writing about as a grown queer man.

What he does in this novel is to open the world of men whose lives are lived in the weighty spotlight of expectations. The ones they have, the ones their families—born, chosen, made—have, the ones US culture imposes. Exploring that interplay is fertile ground for stories, for secrets, for endless surprises...mostly the surprise, evergreen, of how very much of a miracle it is that there are any adult survivors of childhood. Fathers aren't usually much good at parenting because, well, where would most men learn it? Immigrant fathers don't even have the acquisition of culture to pass down, so these luchadores are actually very lucky in that they have this familial tie to their fathers. Of course, the links in that chain are all shaped very differently. A gay son isn't going to follow his father into the family trade when it's so explicitly homophobic, is he. And, to be honoest, that surprises me: Lucha libre is vivid, male-centered, and as close to drag as it's possible to be without falsies and heels being involved. (Plenty of wigs, though.) It veers at the last second into that other drag-adjacent cosplay genre, the superhero/supervillain dichotomy.

The women in the story are peripheral, and that is (I believe) by design. If it's going to bother you not to read yet another take on immigrant mother pluckily overcomes cultural and patriarchal barriers story, there's shelves of books that will stroke your needy story parts. The existential stakes aren't, for once, set by the women but by and for men. The women aren't consulted or considered. How very unexaminedly patriarchal. You've been warned.

For #PrideMonth, it's a dads-and-lads custom-made celebration of the bond we either fail to form or miss feeling; it's a clear-eyed look at the gay-son-defies-tradition tale so popular in our group; and a call to acceptance of nonwhite men in our wider community. It's also, in Author Espinoza's award-winning tradition, a delight to read on the language level. Don't expect a deep dive into the world, and language, of the luchadores...our focus is definitely on the people, the family they form and change. They live in the intense, hyperreal fakeness of lucha libre, but they spend little time examining it. As you do. That means as a consequence that the reader doesn't examine it, either. Go in to the read knowing what's on offer and avoid disappointment, says me.

The Mexican backstory is, in my view, scanty. It's not meant to be a knock...it's not the story solely of El Rey Coyote...but it does seem to me that another chapter in Michoacán would've been very welcome. The ending is rushed, and contains a plot thread that's...obscure...for the vast majority of the book. That missing half-star is down to my sense that it was pretty much just sprung on me, though I hasten to say that it did not feel as though it was parachuted in from above. It just wasn't given any oxygen until the ending. Again, best to know now, not come up suddenly upon the end and think, "...wait...".

Not my perfect read, but one I enjoyed very much indeed. A terrific #PrideMonth read.

I loved the unique premise of lucha libre!! in this multigenerational drama. The setting was rich and immersive throughout even with the time jumps, which are never my fave. The family saga had me invested with the sexy secrets, forbidden love, and commentary on identity and queerness. I do wish the characters would’ve had more growth, especially Elena for talk of being a guerrera. Truthfully, I was dying for her to recognize her worth and lay her own smackdown.

Overall rating: 4.25 out of 5 (rounded down to a 4)

I would highly recommend this novel to those that enjoy generational stories that utilize multiple perspectives.

I found this story absolutely beautiful and masterful in its ability to cover so much between generations, how much can be passed between them, and how heavily secrets can weigh on yourself and those around you. It felt like there was so much care given to cover such a vast set of heavy moments faced by each of the characters. Along with that, it felt as though the art of lucha libre was a character in of itself. I especially appreciated how much I got to learn about the love and art of Mexican wrestling and its importance to a culture and community.

As beautiful as I found the work, I did find myself struggling at times with how the swapping perspectives were handled. I would sometimes worry that I read things out of order as the timelines shifted in non-linear ways and it would cause me to backtrack. However, I did love the snappiness to each perspective as it made this book feel quite fast-paced. When a point of view would come to a close, I was always eager to get back to it to learn more of that character’s story.

Along with that, the format of this had me invested in each character and helped to make them all stand out in such unique ways. Each swap of the perspective developed the characters so well and helped to build up the relationships between each one. Even though their circumstances were all so different, I could come to understand how they were shaped by their life experiences and I wanted to give them all such big hugs for everything that they had fought through. Being as invested as I was, I found the ending to be the perfect emotional payoff.

I definitely plan to read the other books in this author’s catalog.

Gosh I really loved this book. It had multiple POVs and went back and forth through time. I loved learning all about luchadores and lucha libre. The characters were so real.

The best book I've read so far this year. The author is an incredible story-teller. The character-driven narrative is propulsive and compulsively readable. We are defined by choices that we make and the family we are born into.

The Sons of El Rey tells the story of three generations of the Vega family, chiefly focusing on the grandfather, Ernesto, the father, Alfredo, and the son, Julian. All three are flawed and also deeply human in their strengths and fears. I empathized with all of them. Ernesto seeks to escape the trauma of his upbringing and the poverty and pointlessness of country life by moving from the countryside to Mexico City where he becomes a luchador, a highly-stylized and performative type of wrestler. He gains great renown as his alter-ego, El Rey Coyote.

The reader learns much about this sport as well as the multi-generational impacts of the sport on the Vega family both in Mexico City and in East LA where Ernesto moves his family before his son is born. In the present, Ernesto is on his deathbed and he is visited not only by his living relatives but by the ghost of his wife and the spirit of his alter-ego in the ring, El Rey Coyote. This spirit is both master and conscience. Life is a struggle (often literal) for the Vegas. Ernesto and Freddy fight in the ring and are constantly nursing the wounds that come with the profession; Freddy struggles to keep the family gym afloat post-Covid; Ernesto's wife, Elena, warns her daughter to "not be fooled" by the roles society proscribes for women but to rage and resist. Both Ernesto and Julian struggle with being gay. Julian is lost and struggles with his career as an English instructor and pushes away the one man who loves him.

The author resolves the story in way that is at once moving, sad and hopeful--in a word, realistically. Secrets from the past that have had a great impact on the present are revealed. I will definitely take a look at Mr. Espinoza's earlier books and will eagerly anticipate his next one.
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Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

I knew absolutely nothing about Mexican wrestling before this wonderful heartfelt expansive novel of a family, Three generationsnof men, all struggling with self for different reasons, voice this, as do others - and each voice is both strong and atmospheric, This surprised me- I thought it would be one I'd skim or DNF but Espinoza pulled me in and kept me reading. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. Terrific read,

This was funny and entertaining. It reminded me of the movie Nacho Libre, with Jack Black for some reason. It was a good story, I’d recommend it.

Thanks to NetGalley for the eARC of this novel. A story about three generations of Mexican-American men who explore their identities, both gay and straight, and how lucha serves as a salve to their pain and a way to escape what they can't face. While the men cannot talk about themselves or their own needs, they are able to create otherworldly identities that place them above it all. A beautiful, subtle story of how the past repeats itself in surprising ways and how traumas can take generations to heal. Elena was my favorite character, While she got the least print, i loved her because she was so clear in who she was and what she was prepared to do. The story is told without sentimentality yet manages to be very sentimental. Loved it.

Family saga about three generations of men spanning from Mexico to present day Los Angeles, all set within the world of lucha libre. Full of intense family drama and secrets, LGBTQIA+ rep and heartbreaking revelations. It’s a beautiful and compelling story, particularly the parts about being a gay man in the traditionally masculine world of wrestling.

This book felt a little out of my comfort zone (don't know anything about the world of Mexican wrestling), but I was eager to dive in because I love a good generational novel. Overall, I loved these characters. I felt like I could really understand their depth of emotion and their motivations. However, the structure of the storytelling was difficult for me to get used to. There's a huge amount of jumping around in time frames (even just with one character at a time), so I felt like it was hard for me to keep track of where I was in these characters' lives. This also made it challenging to link together certain family patterns, because the story was so non-linear. Also, the big reveal at the end seemed sort of predictable (and there was way too much buildup for what the secret was for it to not be all that dramatic). Espinoza is a talented writer, but it felt like there was a lot of repetition throughout (particularly with the character of Julian, who was the grandson). I loved the ending, but this just missed the mark in a lot of ways for me.

So I’m kind of in the middle with this one. I really enjoyed learning about lucha libre and the rich history and traditions surrounding it. It does a great job of really immersing you in the culture to the point where I have now gone down a deep dive and am trying to learn as much about lucha as I can! This in itself could be seen as a success. If a book makes you interested in its subject matter without you previously having an idea what it is, I think that means the author knows what they’re doing. However, I struggled with almost everything else about this book. This book is written in the perspective of three generations of Vega men as they navigate the influence that lucha has had on their life. I really loved reading from Ernesto’s perspective when he was in Mexico, but I found myself bored whenever we returned to modern day. I also personally hate when any book mentions COVID, but that’s just a personal problem of mine.

All in all, I think this book had a strong start and foundation, but it just kind of stalls halfway through and keeps repeating the same beats. Because you pretty much know the outcome of all the characters from the beginning, you begin to lose interest in their day to day struggles. I would still recommend others to read this because the setting and environment is so rich that I think it is worth it, but overall I think it was just OK. Looking forward to reading more from this author in the future!

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for the eARC!