THE BUS TO BEULAH

A woman’s chance for a new beginning is derailed by the horrors of human trafficking in Hanes’ novel.

Maria Puente, at the age of 22, is headed from her native Mexico to the United States on an H-1B visa, which makes her eligible to work in nonagricultural businesses for a minimum of three years. When Maria boards the bus that will take her from her “comfortable nest” in Monterrey to a brand-new life in North Carolina, she’s determined to make her family proud. Her future includes a home with her Uncle Tomás and a job as a translator and computer programmer, but the rest of the passengers have only temporary agricultural visas to do grueling fieldwork in rural America. During a travel break at a rest stop, Maria overhears the only other two female passengers having a heated argument; before she knows it, she’s kidnapped by members of a human trafficking ring that’s run by an American agricultural company. Sheriff Will Moser of North Carolina’s Hogg County leads a team in a tense race to recover Maria and bring the traffickers to justice. The story is told hour by hour over 12 days, and Hanes’ prose is tight, forthright, and no-nonsense as he illuminates the lives of multiple characters willing to risk everything for a chance at survival. He tells a story that’s fast-paced and tense even as it addresses serious topics. Sheriff Moser is depicted as blunt and to the point when he expresses his disgust for the corrupt company behind the kidnapping: “They’re sucking the blood out of this place, leaving it with dead migrant workers, enslaved prostitutes, and people vitiated by drugs.” Hanes is also careful to show how Maria later starts to process the trauma she’s experienced, as when she admits that she can’t shake the horror: “I don’t think those memories have anywhere to hide in my brain.”

A kidnapping thriller that also effectively highlights the plight of a marginalized population.