Beginning in 1969, the Chicano Moratorium movement organized Mexican-American protests seeking social justice in the United States, especially in the Southwest. The movement culminated in 1970 as tens of thousands participated in a sometimes bloody demonstration march through the streets of East Los Angeles. The political unrest caused by the movement was still winding down in the fall of 1971, when along came a bespectacled Okie gringo sent to teach math and English in an East LA church school.

"Hopie and the Los Homes Gang" is an ethnography written like a novel about Chicano gangs in East LA just after the Chicano Moratorium. In this true story, a Brother of the Catholic Church finds himself in the middle of East LA's turmoil, where gangs are everywhere. Brother Hilary recognizes their needs and develops his own approach to try to help them through tennis and exposure to the non-barrio world.

This revised edition adds a 2011 afterword giving an update on the lives of the people in the story. Although suitable for general audiences, the book can and has been used for college and high school classes such as criminal justice, sociology, and ethnic studies.