Booklists: suggested reading

 

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Labor Stars

 

Labor organizers, workers, unions, etc. Conflicts with management, corruption and work conditions are frequent themes in these works.

 

Fiction

• Haymarket
  Author: Duberman, Martin B.
  Publisher: Seven Stories $ 24.95 ISBN: 1583226184 Date: 2003
  A historically faithful first novel that brings to life late 19th century Chicago and a handful of remarkable individuals who were willing to dedicate and ultimately give up their lives for what they believed in: human dignity for every person.
  Updated 8.24.05
• Acts of Contrition
  Author: Heffernan, William
  Publisher: Dutton $ 16.95 ISBN: 0453005136 Date: 1986
  The author of the bestselling The Corsican now takes on the New York waterfront in a gripping and poignant novel about a young and politically savvy union president and the compromises he makes to escape his past.
  Updated 8.24.05
• Lonely Crusade
  Author: Himes, Chester B.
  Date: 1947
  This tale of a young black man who becomes a union organizer during WWII remains Himes's greatest attempt to examine and provide solutions for major problems in American life: racism, anti-Semitism, labor strife, and corruption
  Updated 8.22.05
• The Colony of Unrequited Dreams
  Author: Johnston, Wayne
  Publisher: Doubleday List Price: $ 24.95 ISBN: 0385495420 Date: 1999
  PW LJ Kirkus
  Newfoundland is the setting for this story of how fate brings together a witty school boy who pursues socialist dreams and a popular newspaper columnist who writes about the history of the continent.
  Suggested Reading: All Stars
• An Unfinished Season
  Author: Just, Ward S.
  Publisher: Houghton Mifflin $ 24 ISBN: 0618036695 Date: 2004
  Kirkus PW Booklist
  The distinguished chronicler of American social history and political culture hauntingly captures the 1950s, a time when even the small-town family could not escape the nationwide suspicion and dread of "the enemy within."
  Suggested Reading: All Stars | McCarthyism Stars
  Updated 6.1.04
• The Rackets
  Author: Kelly, Thomas
  Publisher: FSG $ 24 ISBN: 0374177201Date: 2001
  A bare-knuckled novel set during a rigged union election in New York City, The Rackets is about construction workers and the mobsters who run their union.
  Updated 8.22.05
• Indemnity Only
  Author: Paretsky, Sara
  Publisher: Dial $ 14.95 ISBN: 0385272138 Date: 2005
  America's "most convincing and engaging" (Entertainment Weekly) female private-eye, V.I. Warshawski, is looking for a missing coed, but finds a large scam involving big business executives, notorious underworld figures and murder.
  Updated 8.22.05
• Music of the Mill
  Author: Rodriguez, Luis J.
  Publisher: Rayo $ 24.95 ISBN: 0060560762 Date: 2005
  From the author of Always Running: La Vida Loca comes an epic novel about three generations of an American family who have built their lives around the decaying steel industry of the late 20th century.
  Updated 8.22.05
• Waterfront
  Author: Schulbert, Budd
  Publisher: Bentley $ 20 ISBN: 0837604346 Date: 1979
  Adapted from Schulberg's Academy Award-winning screenplay of the classic 1954 film On the Waterfront, this novel dramatizes an ex-prizefighter's valiant stand against corruption on the New Jersey docks.
  Updated 8.22.05
• Some Cuts Never Heal
  Author: Sheard, Timothy
  Publisher: Carroll & Graf $ 24 ISBN:0786711264 Date: 2003
  Author Timothy Sheard has captured the pulse of hospital life and given voice to the unseen minions who keep a great medical institution running in this finely crafted murder mystery. With the James Madison University Hospital board of directors desperately seeking a new revenue stream, an egomaniacal surgeon attempts a reckless new procedure that promises to bring millions of dollars to the hospital and international fame to the physician. But the body of a lovely pharmaceutical representative has been found in a patients bed, threatening to ruin the hospitals reputation and shatter its financial security. Amateur sleuth Lenny Moss, custodian and union rep for the hospital workers, is determined to solve the mystery and bring the killer to justice despite the frenzied work pace and inhuman hours he and his co-workers are enduring, as their jobs and one mans freedom hang in the balance. From the operating table to the pharmacists desk, from the emergency room to the human resources office, Sheards vividly drawn characters map out the anatomy of a crime with the discerning eyes of the finest clinician and the dogged determination of a master detective. Battling indifferent hospital policymakers every step of the way, the nurses, aides, critical care workers, secretaries, and morgue attendants of James Madison University Hospital prove that unity in the face of danger can defeat even the most cunning criminal. - Publisher Marketing.
  Updated 8.24.05
• Joe Hill: A Biographical Novel
  Author: Stegner, Wallace
  Date: 1969
  Blending fact with fiction, Wallace Stegner retells the story of Joe Hill - the Wobbly bard who became the stuff of legend when, in 1915, he was executed for the alleged murder of a Salt Lake City businessman. Organizer, agitator, "Labor's Songster" - a rebel from the skin inwards, with an absolute faith in the One Big Union - Joe Hill fought tirelessly in the frequently violent battles between organized labor and industry. But though songs and stories still vaunt him and his legend continues to inspire those who feel the injustices he fought against, Joe Hill may not have been a saintly crusader, and may have been motivated by impulses darker than the search for justice. - Publisher Marketing.
  Updated 8.22.05
• The Intuitionist
  Author: Whitehead, Colson
  Publisher: Anchor List Price: $ 19.95 ISBN: 0385492995 Date: 1999
  BL Kirkus
  It is a time of calamity in a major metropolitan city's Department of Elevator Inspectors, and Lila Mae Watson, the department's first black female inspector, is at the center of it. Beautifully written and wildly imaginative, The Intuitionist stars one of the most lovable heroines of all time.
  Suggested Reading: African American Stars