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In this love story of impossible odds, award-winning writer Tim Z. Hernandez weaves a rich and visionary portrait of Bea Franco, the real woman behind famed American author Jack Kerouac’s “The Mexican Girl.” Set against an ominous backdrop of California in the 1940s, deep in the agricultural heartland of the Great Central Valley, Mañana Means Heaven reveals the desperate circumstances that lead a married woman to an illicit affair with an aspiring young writer traveling across the United States.

When they meet, Franco is a migrant farmworker with two children and a failing marriage, living with poverty, violence, and the looming threat of deportation, while the “college boy” yearns to one day make a name for himself in the writing world. The significance of their romance poses vastly different possibilities and consequences.   

Mañana Means Heaven deftly combines fact and fiction to pull back the veil on one of literature’s most mysterious and evocative characters. Inspired by Franco’s love letters to Kerouac and Hernandez’s interviews with Franco, now in her nineties and living in relative obscurity, the novel brings this lost gem of a story out of the shadows and into the spotlight.

Table of Contents

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  1. Cover
  2. p. 1
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  1. Title Page, Copyright Page
  2. pp. 2-9
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  1. The Last Interview
  2. pp. 1-2
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  1. Part I: The Mexican Girl, 1947
  1. Chapter 1.
  2. pp. 7-9
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  1. Chapter 2.
  2. pp. 11-15
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  1. Chapter 3.
  2. pp. 17-19
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  1. Chapter 4.
  2. pp. 21-25
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  1. Chapter 5.
  2. pp. 27-35
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  1. Chapter 6.
  2. pp. 37-40
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  1. Chapter 7.
  2. pp. 41-43
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  1. Chapter 8.
  2. pp. 45-49
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  1. Chapter 9.
  2. pp. 51-56
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  1. Chapter 10.
  2. pp. 57-63
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  1. Chapter 11.
  2. pp. 65-67
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  1. Chapter 12.
  2. pp. 69-70
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  1. Chapter 13.
  2. pp. 71-73
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  1. Chapter 14.
  2. pp. 75-80
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  1. Chapter 15.
  2. pp. 81-89
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  1. Part II: The San Joaquin Valley
  1. Chapter 16.
  2. pp. 93-100
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  1. Chapter 17.
  2. pp. 101-104
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  1. Chapter 18.
  2. pp. 105-111
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  1. Chapter 19.
  2. pp. 113-124
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  1. Chapter 20.
  2. pp. 125-131
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  1. Chapter 21.
  2. pp. 133-139
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  1. Chapter 22.
  2. pp. 141-145
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  1. Chapter 23.
  2. pp. 147-153
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  1. Chapter 24.
  2. pp. 155-156
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  1. Chapter 25.
  2. pp. 157-160
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  1. Chapter 26.
  2. pp. 161-163
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  1. Chapter 27.
  2. pp. 165-169
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  1. Part III: Mañana Means Heaven
  1. Chapter 28.
  2. pp. 173-178
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  1. Chapter 29.
  2. pp. 179-181
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  1. Chapter 30.
  2. pp. 183-184
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  1. Chapter 31.
  2. pp. 185-191
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  1. Part IV: I Remain As Ever
  1. Chapter 32.
  2. pp. 195-196
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  1. Chapter 33.
  2. pp. 197-198
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  1. Chapter 34.
  2. pp. 199-201
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  1. Chapter 35.
  2. pp. 203-205
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  1. Chapter 36.
  2. pp. 207-208
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  1. Chapter 37.
  2. pp. 209-210
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  1. Chapter 38.
  2. pp. 211-212
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  1. Chapter 39.
  2. pp. 213-214
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  1. Afterword
  2. pp. 215-228
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  1. Acknowledgments
  2. pp. 229-238
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  1. Final Note About the Letters
  2. pp. 230-239
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  1. About the Author
  2. pp. 240-241
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