“We all deserve a narrative with clarity, and Towle’s has delivered. Spectacular!” — Ken Burns, renowned filmmaker For anyone who wants to understand the reality of our dysfunctional immigration system beyond slogans, Crossing the Line is an absolute must-read.” — Scott Allen, former editor, Boston Globe Spotlight Investigative Team It was family separation and “kids in cages” that first drove Sarah Towle to the US southern border. On discovering the many-headed hydra that is the US immigration system, she refused to look away. Crossing the Line: Finding America in the Borderlands charts her journey from outrage to activism to abolition as she exposes, layer by broken layer, the now global deterrence-to-detention-to-deportation complex that is set up to fail everyone — save the profiteers and demagogues who benefit from it. Sarah deftly weaves oral storytelling, history, and memoir together to illustrate how US policy has led the charge in flouting post-WWII global commitments to protecting human rights. Yet within the web of criminalization and cruelty, Sarah finds hope in the extraordinary acts of ordinary heroes who prove, every day, that there is a better way. By amplifying their voices and celebrating their efforts, Sarah reveals that we can welcome with dignity those most in need of safety and compassion. In unmasking the real root causes of the “crisis” in human migration, she urges us to act before we travel much further down our current course—one which history will not soon forgive, or forget.