The Way of the Jaguar — Francisco X. Stork

Fiction. Latino/Latina Studies. The story of Ismael Diaz, a successful real estate lawyer in Boston, whose trespass on his neighbor's property to put out a fire sets off a chain reaction of events that ends with him on death row. In prison he writes a diary that reconstructs his life and the circumstances that led him to commit murder and learns "the way of the jaguar" from another inmate. Partly anicent Aztec philosophy and partly an idiosyncratic, extrapolated doctrine, it entails facign down death itself and accepting life. This knowledge fianlly enableds Diaz to make the most important decision he has ever made.