Read With Me: Summer 2024
Greetings from lovely and wet North Tacoma.
Just a heads up that after today, the newsletter will shift to an irregular summer rhythm. In the Gulf my schedule is pretty routine. My Sundays are generally open and I compile the newsletter late afternoon, my time. It then drops in your inbox first thing in the morning on Sunday US time. That’s harder to do when I am back here in Tacoma. My non-working life in the US is often busier than my working life in the Gulf. I end up with more commitments and a less predictable schedule.
I also don’t feel like dragging my laptop everywhere we go. There’s currently stops scheduled in Washington State, Mexico (tomorrow), California, and Cyprus. Ye olde MacBook isn’t going to make it on all those trips. Like my colleague Mr. Diaz says “NT” (which alternatively means “not today”, “no time”, or “no thanks”, depending on the context).
As an aside, I really love that phrase, “NT.” It’s the perfect response to a ridiculous request from a student or colleague. Here’s how I deployed it this week.
Student: “Mr. Bowling, I’d like to talk to you about my final grade. I know I earned a B-, but I think I deserve…”
Me: “NT!”
That tangent aside, this week’s newsletter is about my summer reading list.
My classroom practice is a testament to my belief that learning is a social activity. I constantly have students turn to their classmates to reflect on the texts we're reading and questions posed. A love of discourse is an enmeshed part of my professional practice and worldview. So, I want to walk through what I plan to read this summer. If you’ve read any of these or want to, I invite you to drop me a line.
Cobalt Red - The book, written by Siddharth Kara, covers the cobalt industry in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and its misery-making impact on the country. Someone pitched this to me as a muckraking exposé on foreign exploitation and forced labor in Central Africa and how it drives instability.
Cobalt is a key ingredient in all modern lithium-ion and nearly all other rechargeable batteries. Which means it is an input for the phone/computer you are reading this on and for every electric and hybrid vehicle manufactured on earth. D.R.C. has the world's largest cobalt deposits by miles and the fight to control and guarantee access to cobalt and other resources there has led the great powers to engage in the same destabilizing coup & counter coup politics that plagued much of Latin America and the Middle East in the last century.
Tyranny of the Minority - This is the follow-up to 2018's How Democracies Die, written by Levitsky and Ziblatt. How Democracies Die looked at rising authoritarian tendencies across several democratic states, including the US. I found it so interesting that I dedicated multiple episodes of the podcast to discussing the book with my friends and a political scientist from UW.
This one looks at how groups that find themselves becoming numerical minorities obstruct democracy and sabotage the democratic process. In order to maintain political dominance, they sacrifice established norms and make previously illegitimate seeming claims to power. Sound familiar? I'm excited for this one and intend to add it to my Comparative Government & Politics class reading list if it's as good as I hope.
Shift (book two of the Silo series) - I am late to the train but Hope and I blew through season one of Silo, the Apple TV+ adaptation of the dystopian-life-underground series by Hugh Howey last month. Afterward, we decided to give the audiobook a shot and are listening to it together (mainly while commuting).
I prefer to experience the book first, then watch the adaptation rather than the other way around. We stop it occasionally to discuss plot points, alternate casting choices, and where the show deviates from the more sparse text to fill-in the universe. It’s very dorky of us, but on brand.
I assumed, incorrectly, that season one of the show was an adaptation of the first book, Wool. But on the way to work Thursday as [redacted climax moment from season one], I realized the season only captured the first half of the book. We have eight more hours of who knows what ahead. Oh, snap!
I can’t wait to finish Wool and move onto Shift. I honestly haven’t been this excited for a book/TV combo universe since I started reading the A Song of Ice and Fire series after watching “The Red Wedding” in Thrones.
At Night All Blood is Black - is a translated work by French author David Diop. The book was originally published in 2018 and published in English in 2021.
The story centers around a pair of Senegalese conscripts in the French army during World War I, a treasured family totem, and that's about all I know. I don't often go into books cold like this, so I'm looking forward to this one. It comes highly recommended from several people. They made their recs based on my love of history and noir novels, like those from Elmore Leonard, Brian Panowich, and SA Cosby.
Like I said at the top, if you have any interest in reading one of these and corresponding over the summer, I’d welcome it. Also, if you are willing, you can share what you're reading. I'm going to have a lot of time in airports (and hopefully relax a bit this summer) and always enjoy recommendations that come from podcast listeners and newsletter subscribers.
A final reminder that in the last newsletter, I mentioned a gathering for readers who are fans of the Sounders at the Central Saloon for pregame on June 29. I'd love to see you there.
I don't know when the next newsletter will be but I will talk to you all soon.
Yours in typos.
As always, if you have any thoughts or feedback about the newsletter, I welcome it, and I really appreciate it when folks share the newsletter with their friends.