Books read in 2023

This list is longer than usual because I included each of the Murderbot novellas as a full book. Hey, they came between two hardbound covers!

I don't know why characters with accents aren't displaying properly. My apologies.


January

The Future of Our Schools: Teachers Unions and Social Justice, Lois Weiner (1.9.23)
A call for the reinvigoration of teachers unions as bulwarks against neoliberalism, among other things, and pretty scathing in its assessments of the AFT and NEA. Lots of stuff to chew on here as an organizer.

Blindsight, Peter Watts (1.15.23)
Scott's sci-fi book club pick. I had a hard time getting into this, didn't read it for a while, and didn't enjoy picking it back up. The characters ranged from uninteresting to unlikeable, and the author's hard sci-fi style is not my thing. Kudos for actually alien aliens, but they too were ultimately hollow.

The Vegetarian, Han Kang (Deborah Smith, trans.) (1.16.23)
I bought this for Tracey six and a half years ago. She only read it recently, and so did I. This is one of those books I don't know how to talk about. I liked it, I think.

Storming Heaven, Denise Giardina (1.22.23)
I read a review of this book's sequel in an old issue of the United Mine Workers Journal, and it turned out that the library had both. Aside from the subject matter, which is right up my alley, the writing is fantastic. I already put the follow-up on hold. Highly, highly recommended.

John Brown, W.E.B. Du Bois (1.30.23)
I didn't really know anything about John Brown, and I hadn't read anything by Du Bois. This biography solved both problems in an elegant, if slightly old-fashioned, manner. Strong writing about a man and his powerful, moral message.

February

The Unquiet Earth, Denise Giardina (2.4.23)
As good as Storming Heaven. A tremendous read.

The Night Ocean, Paul La Farge (2.20.23)
Tracey got me this after La Farge's recent passing was discussed on Metafilter. I don't think I'd heard of him before. It read like a combination of Bolao, Chabon, Lethem, and Auster, which the book itself acknowledged, and dealt with some of my favorite literary figures. Definitely recommended, especially since it managed to avoid the worst elements of some of those writers, and modern fiction in general, while facing them head-on.

How to Jump-Start Your Union: Lessons From the Chicago Teachers, Mark Brenner, Jenny Brown, Jane Slaughter, Samantha Winslow, and Alexandra Bradbury (2.23.23)
Inspiring organizing from the CTU that I'd love to see at my own local.

55 Strong: Inside the West Virginia Teachers' Strike, Elizabeth Catte, Emily Hilliard, and Jessica Salfia, eds. (2.26.23)
This collection of stories from the 2018 strike is small but powerful, and incredibly inspiring.

March

Red State Revolt: The Teachers' Strike Wave and Working-Class Politics, Eric Blanc (3.10.23)
More crucial reading for work. Well put together, to the point, and full of useful lessons.

Copper Crucible: How the Arizona Miners' Strike of 1983 Recast Labor-Management Relations in America, Jonathan D. Rosenblum (3.14.23)
I read this while visiting southeastern Arizona, not far from where the strike in question took place. Extremely well-paced and detailed, I tore through this in two days.

The Last Watch, J.S. Dewes (3.19.23)
Jay's sci-fi book club pick. Not terrible, not great, probably not memorable (time will tell). Needed to be about a third shorter.

April

Black Worker in the Deep South, Hosea Hudson (4.1.23)
A personal account of growing up and working in Georgia and Alabama in the early 20th century, written by a black union man and Communist Party member. Sharecropping, lynching, red-baiting, clandestine Party work, the fight for the right to vote - Hudson was there for it all.

I'll Forget It When I Die!: The Bisbee Deportation of 1917, Mitchell Abidor (4.6.23)
Tracey bought me this before we visited Bisbee last month. I'd heard about the deportation since it involved the IWW, but this book addresses it in detail. Strongly written, with only a few minor missteps, this was a great read.

Memoirs of a Wobbly, Henry E. McGuckin (4.13.23)
Short, plainly told, and inspiring. First person working-class history at its finest, or at least close to it.

The Package King: A Rank and File History of UPS, Joe Allen (4.17.23)
While interesting in its own right, I read this mainly to learn more about UPS before their upcoming showdown with the Teamsters this summer.

Generation of Swine, Hunter S. Thompson (4.19.23)
Not as, well, gonzo as some of his work, and the format (weekly newspaper columns) gets a bit repetitive. That said, it's interesting to watch some of the big nasty events of the '80s unfold through Thompson's eyes, and his deep aversion to Reagan and his ilk foreshadows what writing about our current political miasma might look like 30 years from now.

We Own the Forests and Other Poems, Hans Brli (Louis A. Muinzer, trans.) (4.23.23)
Amazing poetry from a Norwegian lumberjack. Since it's a bilingual edition, I got to at least take a stab at reading the poems in their original language, which I always enjoy.

'Big Bill' Haywood, Melvyn Dubofsky (4.27.23)
A pretty even-handed assessment of the legendary IWW leader. I was pleased that the Houston Public Library had a copy.

May

Austral, Peter McAuley (5.7.23)
Linda's sci-fi book club choice. An interesting premise undermined by a boring plot and dull characters. Decent, but not very noteworthy, writing.

The Women Troubadours, Meg Bogin (5.19.23)
A fascinating bit of history about the Occitanian women who, for roughly a century, wrote/sang poems that rivaled those of their male counterparts and survived down through the ages. The theme of courtly love isn't particularly interesting, but seeing how it was interpreted by women is.

June

Lord of Light, Roger Zelazny (6.23.23)
Natalia's sci-fi book club pick. One of those books that, in theory, sounds really promising; in practice, while it was not badly written at all, I was really disappointed. Now and then I'd think it was moving in the right direction, only to have the narrative rug pulled out from under my feet. Like I told Tracey, after reading this I don't feel bad about neglecting the collected Chronicles of Amber that's been sitting on the shelf unread for 15 years or more.

Why Buddhism is True, Robert Wright (6.26.23)
I picked this up at The Last Bookstore in L.A. last summer. Overall, I liked it quite a bit, despite not being that keen on pop science stuff and not always agreeing with Wright's take on certain aspects of Buddhism.

July

All Systems Red, Martha Wells (7.1.23)
Tracey's spoken highly of the Murderbot books for a while, and is probably going to pick them for sci-fi book club, so I decided to give them a shot. This was a fun, quick read, light but not without substance. I look forward to reading the other books soon.

Artificial Condition, Martha Wells (7.5.23)
Builds nicely off the first book without throwing too much new stuff at the reader or being a total rehash. Fun!

Rogue Protocol, Martha Wells (7.8.23)
I'm impressed that even in quick succession these books have enough going on to differentiate themselves from one another.

Exit Strategy, Martha Wells (7.15.23)
Still enjoying these. The length and pacing is spot on for telling a story like this.

The Lion in the Living Room: How House Cats Tamed Us and Took Over the World, 7.21.23
While I'm deeply attached to the three cats I live with, and all the other cats I've lived with previously, I've always tried to remind myself that these creatures are not what we project upon them. This book (which I saw a couple months ago on display at the Heights library) does a good job of describing how strange the human-feline relationship really is, and what it's done to the world. I'd recommend it to anyone willing to wrestle with the true nature of cats and our affection towards them.

Fugitive Telemetry, Martha Wells (7.27.23)
The Murderbot cozy mystery, as Tracey called it, and pretty rightfully so.

Bom Dia Camaradas, Ondjaki (7.31.23)
Comprei este livro na Librairie Portugaise & Brsilienne em Paris em 2018. Estava enganado em pensar que o autor e' mocambicano; e' angolano. Gostei muito desta historia de juventude no final dos anos 80/inicio dos anos 90 (nao lembro claramente a data quando a ocorre).

August

Hammer and Hoe: Alabama Communists During the Great Depression, Robin D.G. Kelley (8.1.23)
A fascinating story. As I read it, I found myself continually wondering what the communist movement would have looked like had the Party allowed regional/cultural elements to fuse more organically with its message, instead of pushing a line that sometimes had little to do with local conditions.

Mao Direita do Diabo, Dennis McShade (8.4.23)
Dennis McShade is the pseudonym of Dinis Machado, a well-known Portuguese writer who cranked out three detective stories, this being the first of them, in the '60s. Detective story isn't completely accurate, since the protagonist is an assassin, but they've got the hard-boiled tone I dig so much. Good stuff.

Network Effect, Martha Wells (8.17.23)
This wasn't bad, but I think Murderbot stories work better as novellas.

Turing & Burroughs, Rudy Rucker (8.30.23)
My sci-fi book club pick. I've always liked, but not loved, Rudy Rucker, so it's no surprise I haven't kept up with his work. This sounded interesting, mainly because I'm a big Burroughs fan. It was okay.

Book of Blues, Jack Kerouac (8.31.23)
Not my favorite book of Kerouac's poetry, but there are still some choice lines, and I appreciate (even if I don't really enjoy) the overall approach.

September

House Made of Dawn, N. Scott Momaday (9.16.23)
I learned about this from the Metafilter discussion of an episode of Reservation Dogs. A fantastic book, beautiful and powerful. Highly recommended.

The Honjin Murders, Seisi Yokomizo (Louise Heal Kawai, trans.) (9.23.23)
I saw this at the library and it looked interesting. And it was! I'll have to see if they have another book by this author.

Strike Back: Rediscovering Militant Tactics to Fight the Attacks on Public Employee Unions, Joe Burns (9.26.23)
I read the first edition of this book, which provided a lot of useful examples of how public sector unions (like the one I organize for) can build power by ignoring restrictive labor laws, among other things. Useful for thinking strategically.

October

Face Boss: The Memoir of a Western Kentucky Coal Miner, Michael D. Guillerman (10.6.23)
Plain but detailed writing made this a really fast read. The subject matter is interesting, and I really liked Guillerman's voice.

Kerouac at the "Wild Boar", John Montgomery (compiler) (10.19.23)
A collection of essays, recollections, and stories about Jack Kerouac that I found at Kaboom Books. Hit or miss, but interesting enough.

Fever House, Keith Rosson (10.22.23)
I dropped by Murder by the Book last week and picked up a few books. This was one of them. I enjoyed it, and read it pretty quickly, though I'm irked that it was clearly a setup for another novel. Part crime novel, part occult horror, part zombie apocalypse. Good for October.

You Deserve A Tech Union, Ethan Marcotte (10.25.23)
I got this for my brother. Not a bad read for folks unfamiliar with labor stuff, and for those who are familiar with labor stuff, still worthwhile.

November

The Long Deep Grudge: A Story of Big Capital, Radical Labor, and Class War in the American Heartland, Toni Gilpin (11.15.23)
I'd been looking forward to reading this for a while, and it was every bit as good as I'd hoped (and expected, based on reviews). Every union could learn a lot from the story of FE's endless battle against International Harvester.

Carbon County USA: Miners for Democracy in Utah and the West, Christian Wright (11.23.23)
Solid analysis of the impact of the UMWA, and efforts to reform it, in the West. It also raises age-old questions about the efficacy of existing organizing models and unions' emphasis on bargaining contracts, and sheds valuable light on the role of women, minorities, and young people in various aspects of mining and unionism.

Blue Light of the Screen: On Horror, Ghosts, and God, Claire Cronin (11.30.23)
A very strange book, not so much thematically but stylistically. No, not strange- haunted.

Organize or Die, Clyde Johnson (12.6.23)
I heard about this from a DSA National Labor Commission member and union carpenter. It was interesting and fiery, and I learned a lot about how unions should not function.

December

The Stars My Destination, Alfred Bester (12.13.23)
Scott's sci-fi book club pick. There was a fair amount I liked about it, some things I disliked, and a lot that I have to chew on.

Fellow Worker: The Life of Fred Thompson, Fred Thompson, Dave Roediger (ed.) (12.14.23)
Great stuff. Thompson seems like a warm, thoughtful, deeply humane person, and his approach to politics is of the sort I'd like to emulate.

Labor in New Mexico: Unions, Strikes, and Social History since 1881, Robert Kern, ed. (12.22.23)
I bought this at the Silver City Bookshop earlier this month. Published in 1983, it's exactly what it says it is.

Jerry Wurf: Labor's Last Angry Man, Joseph C. Goulden (12.29.23)
A biography of AFSCME's most influential president. Inspiring stuff, even if Wurf does seem like a real dick a lot of the time.


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