Reactions to “Standing Up”

My 97-year-old friend was disappointed the novel didn’t have more sex. Our older son told us he didn’t need to know that Sophie, the character based on his mother, thought that Nick, the character based on his father, had a “very nice ass.”

Other than that, the response to Standing Up: Tales of Struggle has been overwhelmingly positive — including from the 97-year-old and this son.

Larry Miller and I wanted to tell the stories of the people Imbolo Mbue calls “the deliberately unheard” — those who clean bloody sheets, forge steel, process checks, staff call centers, all while caring for kids, holding relationships together, and wrestling with multiple forms of oppression. We especially wanted to capture the moments when people realize that exploitation is not inevitable and that we can change it if we act together.

We’re pleased but not surprised that readers are hungry for more stories like this. But we have been blown away by the range of people who agreed to write blurbs for the book. Some of them are renowned authors like Jacquelyn Mitchard (her debut novel was Oprah’s first book club pick), Jennifer Morales (her first book was the “Common Read” at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee), and Linda Christensen, a brilliant writer and teacher of writing. Others are prominent social justice leaders like Cong. Pramila Jayapal, Gloria Steinem, Ai-jen Poo, Bill Fletcher, Rinku Sen and Karen Nussbaum. AFL-CIO president Liz Shuler called our book “an essential novel for any union organizer or labor movement enthusiast.” Labor educators want people to use this book in training organizers and labor leaders. One called it “a cookbook for activists.” Several were delighted to see white workers grappling with the need to fight racism, men learning to be feminists.

I’m proud that people praise the way we told these stories. They like that the book is “about struggle and change, but also about joy and humor.” They called it “funny,” “entertaining.” Steven Greenhouse, former labor reporter for the NY Times, said, “I feel as if Norma Rae or Studs Terkel had written a novel.”

Normalizing Organizing
Recently we held a virtual book party for family and close friends to celebrate the launch of Standing Up. I asked two experts on narrative, RInku Sen and Anat Shenker-Osorio, to say a few words about why it’s important to get stories like this out in the world. Their comments summed up our hopes for this novel.

Rinku, who directs Narrative Initiative, especially liked that the book normalizes organizing. She described a gathering of organizers where people asked: “Is there a way for us to be less depressing, and also not boring?” For Rinku, the path to excitement and joy in this work runs through stories. “The organizers in Standing Up are not ideologues,” Rinku said. “They’re not geniuses, and yet they do what we want people to do: be with other people in your situation so together you can figure out how to change it, not just for a minute or for yourselves but how to change the system.”

For Rinku, Standing Up shows that organizers “like to have fun and family and love and victories, just like everyone does. We have to get over losses, shortfalls, just like they do… I could give this book to anyone I met who wants to know, what is activism? What is organizing? If people see the work as joyful, exciting, they might want to come with us more often.”

Anat has a podcast called “Works to Win By.” She teaches organizers that we “need to stop telling people what we don’t want them to do and say what we do need them to do.” For her, our book is “show not tell,” and what it shows is that “everyday, ordinary people in difficult circumstances are organizers. It’s not a magical hat you wear. It’s her, him, you, me, people of all kinds.”

What Anat has learned over years of analyzing messages is that in order to believe an action is worth taking, people “have to believe they have a shot at pulling it off. This book shows progressive ideas are not just popular, they’re actually possible.”

We are enormously grateful to these amazing leaders for lifting up our book and hope that they will inspire you to read it.