NIGHTLY READING THREAD: This is Edition #79 of #GMGReads. Every night through this (increasingly) weird (and sad) time, I've been tweeting out a list of my five favorite books around a general theme—and a link to an indie bookstore where you can order them online....
Tonight, I wanted to feature books about the never-ending challenge of fighting for rights and justice. You should order as many of these books as you can here at @SemicolonChi, Chicago's only black-woman owned bookstore: bookshop.org/shop/Semicolon…
Before I get started, I also want to share this great reading list today from Civil War historian @UnderwaterLance about non-whitewashed histories of that time. I found it super interesting and added a few books to my lists to read:
1) Jonathan Harr's A CIVIL ACTION follows a David vs. Goliath story as a man takes two powerful corporations in the courtroom, accusing them of killing children with their contaminated water: bookshop.org/books/a-civil-…
2) I was always proud of my home state Vermont for leading the way on civil unions, and David Moats recounted how that unfolded in CIVIL WARS: betterworldbooks.com/product/detail…
PS: I've not read Jo Becker's (@jo_becker) newer book on the broader fight for marriage equality, FORCING THE SPRING, but it's supposed to be terrific: bookshop.org/books/forcing-…
PPS: If you're looking for a broader book on the gays right movement, try THE GAY REVOLUTION by Lillian Faderman (@lillianfaderman): bookshop.org/books/the-gay-…
3) Two good works on the heroic efforts of defense lawyers and officials to fight the stain of the prisoners at Guantanamo Bay: Karen Greenberg's (@KarenGreenberg3) THE LEAST WORST PLACE bookshop.org/books/the-leas… and Jonathan Mahler's THE CHALLENGE: bookshop.org/books/the-chal…
4) Anthony Lewis wrote two tremendous books about court cases that made America more just: GIDEON'S TRUMPET, about a poor defendant who changed America's courtrooms, bookshop.org/books/gideon-s… and MAKE NO LAW, about the First Amendment, bookshop.org/books/make-no-…
PS: Also speaking of the courts, Renee Knake Jefferson (@reneeknake) and Hannah Brenner Johnson (@hannahbrenner) have a new book, SHORTLISTED: out last month, that's a biography of nine women who were considered for the Supreme Court and never made it: bookshop.org/books/shortlis…
5) Public Defender Amy Bach's ORDINARY INJUSTICE challenges our view of how courts work—arguing that too often conveyor-belt assembly line justice means that defendants don't get the fair treatment they deserve: bookshop.org/books/ordinary…
Those are tonight's #GMGReads. What are your favorite books on justice and making the world a more just place? Share! #avidreadersunite
