Spare Parts by Joshua Davis

Spare Parts by Joshua Davis

Finalist for the J. Anthony Lukas Book Prize

New York Times Best Seller

Four undocumented Mexican American students, two great teachers, one robot-building contest . . . and a major motion picture

In 2004, four Latino teenagers arrived at the Marine Advanced Technology Education Robotics Competition at the University of California, Santa Barbara. They were born in Mexico but raised in Phoenix, Arizona, where they attended an underfunded public high school. No one had ever suggested to Oscar, Cristian, Luis, or Lorenzo that they might amount to much--but two inspiring science teachers had convinced these impoverished, undocumented kids from the desert who had never even seen the ocean that they should try to build an underwater robot.

And build a robot they did. Their robot wasn't pretty, especially compared to those of the competition. They were going up against some of the best collegiate engineers in the country, including a team from MIT backed by a $10,000 grant from ExxonMobil. The Phoenix teenagers had scraped together less than $1,000 and built their robot out of scavenged parts. This was never a level competition--and yet, against all odds . . . they won

But this is just the beginning for these four, whose story--which became a key inspiration to the DREAMers movement--will go on to include first-generation college graduations, deportation, bean-picking in Mexico, and service in Afghanistan.

Joshua Davis's Spare Parts is a story about overcoming insurmountable odds and four young men who proved they were among the most patriotic and talented Americans in this country--even as the country tried to kick them out.

Joshua Davis is a Wired contributing editor, the cofounder of Epic magazine, and the author of The Underdog, a memoir about his experiences as a matador, backward runner, and arm wrestler. For feature writing, he was nominated for a National Magazine Award in 2014. He's also written for The New Yorker and other publications, and his work has been anthologized in Best American Science and Nature Writing 2012, as well as Best Technology Writing 2006, 2007, and 2009. His reporting forms the basis for the film Spare Parts. He resides in the city of San Francisco, California.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9780374534981
ISBN 10	0374534985
Title	Spare Parts
Author	Joshua Davis
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Paperback
Publisher	Farrar, Straus & Giroux Inc
Year published	2014-12-02
Number of pages	240
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.