Discussion Reading: Everything Begins and Ends at the Kentucky Club

Different stories in the book had different settings. For instance, He Has Gone to Be with the Women was at the Kentucky Club, The Art of Translation," was at the hospital and "The Rule Maker" was at El Paso. The setting of the story is in the Hispanic/Latino community, which is the border city of Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua, Mexico and the El Paso, Texas in the US.

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The tree places that I learned a lot in the story are EL Paso, Juarez, and The Kentucky Club. EL Paso is the city in the border where all the characters in the story reside. The closeness of the town to the border impacts the personality of the characters and the peace there is compared to the turmoil of Juarez. Juarez is the place crossways the border from El Paso, it is chaotic and characterized by a lot of violence. The Kentucky Club is where the characters of the story end up; it is a comfy place and also a retreat from the chaos outside.

The setting of the texts plays an essential role; The Kentucky club creates an environment where people could meet and socialize since the other side of the city was chaotic. Furthermore, the setting was ideal for bringing up the theme of love, race, and despair.

The stories in the book Everything Begins and Ends at the Kentucky Club, could not take place somewhere else because the characters involved are travelers. Therefore, there should be a shift from a location to another across the border. In this aspect, the border between Ciudad Juarez and El Paso forms a perfect setting. Additionally, the settings in the stories, especially The Kentucky Club together with the residence, brings out the intended theme of the play, leading to the division between the characters.

In the story, there are different instances of conflict that the characters experience, some of the conflicts include: conflict of identity; Juan Carlos as protagonist reflects on the people he meets at the coffee shop trying to ask his name and how his day was. (He Has Gone To Be With the Women). Secondly, conflict of language as identifying; the authors describe how language is strongly related to the individuals' identity. The characters in the story are of Mexican origin. While at El Paso, their residence which is close to the border, they are forced to challenge their dual identity. They are both speakers of English and Spanish; however, some characters embrace their Spanish speaking culture, while for others it is a distant part of their identities. They recognize Spanish as part of Mexican heritage, but they don't speak it.

Thirdly, conflict of race; racism led to the attack of Nick, by the xenophobic white men. Fourthly, family conflict; Both Charlies family are in despair; they lack unity leading to the hopelessness among the characters.

In the story, there is the tension of racism, crime, tragedy, family conflict, and separation. In the story, The Art of Translation, the conflict of race was partially resolved when Nick had to learn again the meaning of the words used by the language of xenophobic white men, as he recovers from the brutal race-bashing.

The literature work by the author has demonstrated different themes from the beginning up to the end. The main themes in the story are tragedy and race, love and relationship and family conflict.

In the story, the author, Ben Saenz, appears to be asking issues related to crime, family relationship, race and identity, bisexual relationship and conflict resolution method. They include: On which way, could one resolve a family conflict? Does embracing the other peoples culture away to resolve racism? Can our daily activities separate us from our loved ones?

It was necessary for the writer to answer the question to fulfill the theme of the story completely and also, not to leave the readers in suspense.