The Tortilla Curtain

Content Warning: This section contains a reference to rape.

Throughout the novel, the coyote often appears as a symbol of the undocumented Mexican immigrant, and the battle against the coyote population mirrors anti-immigrant rhetoric. At the start of the novel, one of Kyra’s dogs is killed by a coyote who jumps the six-foot tall fence around the Mossbachers’ backyard. Later, the fence is replaced with eight feet of chain-link, which does nothing to stop another coyote from running off with the second dog. Delaney, who supposedly supports living in harmony with nature and people from around the world, writes a column about coyotes using language that echoes what other characters use when discussing immigration. He writes that he “has begun to feel that some sort of control must be applied” (219) on the coyote population, using a sensationalized story of a baby taken from a patio as an example of the apparent danger. He argues that coyotes are “cunning, versatile, hungry and unstoppable” (221), similar to the threatening language that other residents in Arroyo Blanco use to warn of the danger of undocumented immigrants.

América also employs the symbolism of the coyote by equating herself to the wild dog, although not for the same reasons as the likes of Delaney and Kyra.