Life and Adventures of Joaquín Murieta, the Celebrated California Bandit by John Rollin Ridge

This book is not one you'd pick up for its literary style, although at times Ridge uses the technique of enigma quite effectively. Instead, you read it as the foundational document behind the myth of Joaquín Murieta, and as a complicated study of the racial discourses at play in California during the Gold Rush. This book creates the state as Joaquín moves from its Northern to Southern extremes.