Band of Angels (1955) by Robert Penn Warren

1,001 Novels: A Library of America

Band of Angels (1955)

by Robert Penn Warren

New Orleans, Louisiana

Louisiana: 11/28

   Robert Penn Warren is an American author who is perpetually present on my "soft" list- like, I definitely know who he is and would say I "want to" read All the Kings Men, his big hit, but I haven't actually read it, or anything else by him.  I think Warren and other prize-winning authors from the 1950's and 60's in the South have suffered because the wave of African American authors, especially women authors, that emerged in the 1970's and 80's, culminating with Toni Morrison getting the Nobel Prize in 1993.  I'd wager that every time Morrison got added to a 20th century literature syllabus Warren or his ilk got dropped. 

  Reading Band of Angeles- about an Oberlin educated woman who is surprised when her father dies, and she is sold into slavery to settle his debts- I was struck by the stylistic similarities between Warren and Cormac McCarthy- and learned they shared a publisher!

  In many ways Band of Angeles is as daring as anything written about this subject from this time period- in that he deals frankly with the sexual aspects of slavery in a way that authors shied from prior to the aforementioned African American authorial revolution in the 1970's.  But it also pulls its literary punch by having the protagonist's purchaser be a total gentleman... at least to her.

  Band of Angels also goes on for far too long- carrying the protagonist into reconstruction and emancipation and pairing her off with a well-meaning white husband who turns out to be a total dud.  After the fall of the Confederacy, my interest level took a precipitous dip, but this is still a top five title from Louisiana.

Capitalism and Its Critics (2025) by John Cassidy

Audiobook Review

 Capitalism and Its Critics: A History:

 From the Industrial Revolution to AI (2025)

by John Cassidy

    I read about Capitalism and Its Critics in the New York Times, where Jennifer Szalai wrote an excellent review.  Cassidy is best known as a writer on economic topics for the New Yorker.  Both the review and Cassidy's pedigree gave me the idea that this would make a great Audiobook and sure enough, nine months later, I was able to check out a copy of the Audiobook from the Los Angeles Public Library.

  And reader, I was rewarded.  Capitalism and Its Critics is as accesible as it is interesting, and while Cassidy treads no new territory, he does an excellent job of summarizing centuries of economic thought while sparing the reader/listener from reading any of these often-obtuse authors.  More then once while listening to Capitalism and Its Critics I was struck by the thought that it is the eternal fate of the most famous economists to see their work mis-understood and applied by people who haven't read their work.  I'd wager most readers would associate criticism of capitalism with the "Left" as defined by a line of thinkers following in the footsteps of Karl Marx, but Cassidy reveals just as many critics from the "Right." The major difference is that most of the critics from the left, at least up until the time of Keynes, were persecuted, whereas critics from the right tended to end up in power or see their acolytes in power.

  Two themes that Cassidy hammers home are:

1)  Capitalism lives in a perpetual state of crisis.

2)  The idea of a Capitalism existing outside of a State made legal framework is ridiculous.

   Thus, his major criticism of critics from the right is that they live in a fantasy of the free market that is nothing short of fantastic, while at the same time allowing Dictators and Authoritarian strongmen into their tent under the guise of limiting state action in the economy (see Chile).  Meanwhile, he accurately points out that critics from the left have simply been wrong in that they start from a premise that the contradictions inherent in capitalist activity will inevitably lead to the collapse of capitalism.

   He also breathes life into figures I would have considered minor players before reading this book- Karl Polanyi and Joan Robinson to name two and he also develops time periods that don't get much attention in the west- specifically the period of Russian economic thought between the Russian Revolution and the ascension of Stalin.   Even if, like me, you are largely familiar with the history of capitalism without being a specialist or expert, you will find the writing engaging.

    

Last One Out Shut Off the Lights (2020) by Stephanie Soileau

 1,001 Novels: A Library of America

Last One Out Shut Off the Lights (2020)

by Stephanie Soileau

Bayou d’Inde Drive, Sulphur, Louisiana

Louisiana: 9/28

   The Gulf coastline between New Orleans and Houston is a bit of a petro-chemical nightmare, filled with petroleum processing plants and related businesses and supervised by state governments that are hostile to business regulations.  It's also a region that is very exposed to the consequences of climate change, particularly the increased number and intensity of hurricane's making landfall from the Gulf.  This double whammy of environmental degradation makes it entirely possible that whole communities will simply cease to exist, and soon.

  This, I presume is what the title of this book references. Another layer is the weakening of the traditional Cajun community- French speaking Acadians who came down from Newfoundland after the French lost control and the English took over.  From the perspective of the 1,001 Novels: A Library of America, Soileau rates as a minor find.  Certainly, a book of interconnected short-stories about folks on the margins of life in such an interesting area rate higher than YA titles and chick-lit.   Beyond that, however, Last One Out Shut Off the Lights, continues to explore the lives of the losers in American society, by far the most frequent subject of titles that aren't YA or chick-lit.   Where are the folks in this book going? Nowhere.  What are they doing? Nothing.

  The first story, about a teen mom who is bummed about the consequences of her actions and not that into being a Mom, really sets the tone.

Medicine River (2025) by Mary Annete Pember

 Audiobook Review

Medicine River:  A Story of Survival and the Legacy of Indian Boarding Schools (2025)

by Mary Annete Pember

    I listened to this Audiobook because I am interested in the subject of Indian Boarding Schools.  Basically, for decades American authorities took Native American children away from their families and put them in boarding schools where they were taught to deny their heritage, speak English and frequently were subject to abuse and ill-health.  After returning home they frequently suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder and a perpetual feeling of estrangement from their community.

   Pember blends some of this history with her personal experience as the daughter of a woman who went to an Indian Boarding School.  Spoiler alert, there is a lot of family trauma in this book.

  

Murderland (2025) by Caroline Fraser

 Audiobook Review

Murderland (2025)

by Caroline Fraser

  Murderland has an interesting and persuasive thesis: That the spike in serial killing in the 60's and 70's was directly related to industrial activity poisoning children with lead and other toxic substances.  Fraser combines this narrative with capsule biographies of famous American serial killers- Ted Bundy gets most of the ink in Murderland. Fraser also intertwines her own memories of a girlhood in the Tacoma era- the epicenter for factory pollution and serial killers.  The business part of the story is familiar- Mid 20th century capitalism pursues profit at the expense of the environment.  I presume those who are interested in serial killers will know much of that stuff to- I'm not, and I don't know much about Bundy, so I found that bit interesting- Bundy was an audacious killer- he kind of embodies every stereotype that parents fear and his targets were anything but women on the margin of society.   Fraser's memoir material didn't do much for me. 

Seascaper (2025) by Benjamin Wood

 Audiobook Review

Seascraper (2025)

 by Benjamin Wood

  I'm sure I only heard about Seascraper, by English novelist Benjamin Wood, because it was longlisted for the 2025 Booker Prize.  It was a good pick for an Audiobook because it is set in seaside village in the English countryside, so you get some good regional accents.  There is also a strong musical element in the plot, and in the Audiobook you actually get to hear the song that the protagonist writes in a moment of inspiration.  The setting is literally atmospheric- with dense, wet fog playing a key role in the development of the plot.  And, winningly, Seascaper is brief enough to be considered a novella, thought personally I would go with short novel.

Run Away Home (1997) by Patricia C. McKissack

 1,001 Novels: A Library of America

Run Away Home (1997)

by Patricia C. McKissack

Mount Vernon, Alabama

Alabama: 20/20

   Run Away Home is an actual children's book, not a YA Novel, which is refreshing in the context of the 1,001 Novels: A Library of America.   The line between children's and adult fiction is actually thinner than the line between YA fiction and adult fiction.  Literature is filled with children's books that have reached canonical status in the adult lit world, whereas YA fiction has provided many films and television shows with material for adaptation.  Run Away Home is about an Apache boy who escapes from a train taking his people from Arizona to Florida, where they were held for several years in the late 19th century.

   The young African American girl who finds him becomes attached, and the story, about the girl's father struggling to maintain his piece of land in the face of white resistance, is a familiar one. 

A Hall of Mirrors (1967) by Robert Stone

 1,001 Novels: A Library of America

A Hall of Mirrors (1967)

by Robert Stone

New Orleans, Louisiana

Louisiana: 8/28

  I decided I can't handle Mississippi straight up so I'm going to alternate with Louisiana and Florida. I'm also done with all the Mississippi/Louisiana Audiobooks I can handle, so it's hard copy library books from here on out.  A Hall of Mirrors was Stone's first novel- he won the National Book Award for Dog Soldiers in 1974.  Stone was a finalist for the National Book Award three more times, but I would put him the "mostly forgotten" category- writers like Pynchon and Delillo took similar themes of paranoia and corruption at the heart of the American Dream and came up with something that appealed to critics and professors, Stone reads more like a linear descendant of Hemingway.  I did enjoy A Hall of Mirrors, about an alcoholic radioman who stumbles into a nefarious ultra-right-wing conspiracy to... do what I don't know exactly.  Some kind of a Civil War 2 plot I suppose, though the scheme remains hazy. 

  No question that A Hall of Mirrors stands out against the field of YA lit, chick lit and trauma-porn favored by editor Susan Straight. I enjoyed the depiction of down-n-out New Orleans circa the 1960s.  Cool.

Miami Blues (1984) by Charles Willeford

 1,001 Novels: A Library of America

Miami Blues (1984)

by Charles Willeford

Miami, Florida

Florida 1/23

    Charles Willeford is a genre writer of crime-fiction who was elevated after he died to canonical status. His publication history spans decades with hits from the 1950;s, Pick-Up(1955), Cockfighter from the 1970's and his hobo-memoir I Was Looking for a Street, published in 1968.   Miami Blues also got a successful movie version, starring Alec Baldwin as the villain.  Blues was the first book in his late career series Sergeant Hoke Moseley of the Miami Police Department.  I guess you could call Miami Blues his sell-out book, since Willeford's reputation is/was as a writer of crime-fiction, not police procedurals.  Miami Blues still represents a half-way point between a true expression of the police procedural genre since Moseley splits his protagonist duties with Freddy Frenger, the casual California psychopath who has relocated to Miami after being released from a California prison.

  Also memorable is Susie Waggoner, who was equally memorable in the movie as depicted by Jenifer Jason Leigh. Like all Willeford books, the casual brutality and it's equally brutal consequences- fake teeth, fingers chopped off, eyes gouged out, retains the capacity to shock after decades. If Miami Blues was published today it would still impress.

Forrest Gump (1986) by Winston Groom

 1,001 Novels: A Library of America

\Forrest Gump (1986)

by Winston Groom

Mobile, Alabama

Alabama: 19/20

  It was back in August of 2025 that I tackled my first title in the Alabama chapter of the 1,001 Novels: A Library of America project.  Now, here we are.  Most of the work was done in November- what stands out is that this was the first state where I decided to eschew Audiobooks on the theory that it would be insufferable having to listen to most of these titles.  I don't regret the decision, which means that I'm running three states ahead in Audiobook titles right now (Florida) while physical books are stuck back in Mississippi and Louisiana.   My Audiobook consumption is dropping precipitously- a trend which started last year but is really apparent this year.

   Forrest Gump is, of course, the source material for the Tom Hanks film.  I was surprised that the book Forres Gump is described more like John Cena, to use a contemporary example, than Tom Hanks.  He is depicted as six foot six and heavily muscled, which, we all know Tom Hanks is not.  Wouldn't call myself a fan of the film (who is?) but of course I saw it like everyone else.  As is to be expected, the book is sharper on the edges than the Ron Howard directed film.  Gump is no racist, but the amount of n words thrown around was disturbing in a book published in the 80's that had little or nothing to say about racism. 

  There's also little of Mobile Alabama in the book- as the movie depicts, Gump appears Zelig-like at many of the most important events of the late 20th century.