Fiction. Latino/Latina Studies. California writer Mike Padilla has produced in his first book an award-winning story collection of remarkable artistic maturity, social scope, and psychological subtlety. Winner of the University of California at Irvine Chicano/Latino Literary Prize, HARD LANGUAGE is filled with hard-to-forget characters. Among his other startling snapshots, Padilla captures the day his character's family got together to tear apart old Aunt Eufrasia's house: It is like the christening of a ship, my mother said as the pickaxe swung...