Nobody, including Onofre himself, knew how he learned to read and write—certainly he had never attended school. But all at once, when still a child, Onofre had awakened able to read. His sudden skill was a miracle of sorts, on a par with the unexplained underground barking of Cleofes Apodaca’s lost sheepdog Pendejo or the bell whose ringing caused Padre Sinkovich to undermine the foundations of his very own church. Onofre Martínez could no longer write, however, because he had lost his literate arm, and he had no more been able to transfer literacy to his left arm than Bernabé Montoya had been able to wheedle a fine out of Onofre for all those parking meter violations.

— The Milagro Beanfield War by John Nichols (New Mexico Trilogy, #1)