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Democracy Awakening, by Heather Cox Richardson

I started writing this review of Democracy Awakening the day after the Presidential election, but I just couldn’t finish it. I was feeling too sad and the writing just made me sadder. So here I am, now almost two weeks post-election and I am better able to talk about this wonderful book.

Ms. Richardson divides her book into three sections: Undermining Democracy, The Authoritarian Experiment, and Reclaiming America. The first section gives us a comprehensive American history lesson, focusing on the words in the Declaration of Independence that she claims set the stage for the unfolding of our commitment to government by and for the people. “All men are created equal.” Certainly an odd statement for 1776, when the only people who would be able to vote (and other marks of democracy) in this new land were white men who owned property. And yet, that statement has resonated throughout our history as we slowly but surely inched forward to expand the categories of people who fall within its reach. But the author also uses this section of the book to demonstrate that this “progress” toward ever-greater inclusion has been a jerky, back-and-forth movement, always interrupted by those of wealth and power who resisted giving decision-making ability to more and more people unlike themselves.

In the second section of the book, Ms. Richardson starts with Donald Trump’s 2016 election. She calls out the worldview of the Trump inner circle, in particular that of Steve Bannon. “Bannon and his allies escalated the long-standing anti-liberal rhetoric of Republican talk radio hosts into hard-right paternalism. Under Bannon’s direction, right-leaning Breitbart News Network had run articles attacking politically active women and Black Americans and yet could insist that Bannon was neither sexist nor racist because in their formulation, a return to a traditional society would be best for everyone…. This worldview struck a chord with disaffected white Americans who felt as if they had been left behind since the 1980s…. A worldview that put Christianity at the center was especially appealing to evangelicals.” Richardson goes further to examine the travel ban, Trump’s increasing closeness to Putin and Russia, the “Unite The Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, the first impeachment and Trump’s increasing rewriting of American history. She quotes Trump as saying, “Our country didn’t grow great with them. It grew great with you and your thought process and your ideology.” And, of course, she covers the second impeachment and Trump’s refusal to accept the results of the 2020 election.

Richardson’s third section, Reclaiming America, reminds us, in the words the book’s jacket, “that it is up to us to reclaim the principles on which the nation was founded, principles that have been repeatedly championed by marginalized Americans. Their dedication to the promises embodied in our history has renewed our commitment to democracy in the past. And it is in their commitment where we will find the road map for the nation’s future.”

So here we are. We read this book before the election, as I mentioned earlier. Many of us were hopeful that this election would mark this renewed commitment to democracy that Richardson showcases in this book. But no! So where do we find hope? I find hope going back to the first section of the book and remembering that our progress has always been two steps forward, one-and-a-half steps back. Maybe this step, which I and the people in our book club find a giant leap backward, is just the harbinger of our next progress. We can hope and pray.

–Jeanie Smith

The Truth About Immigration: Why Successful Societies Welcome Newcomers, by Zeke Hernandez

The Truth About Immigration was published in June of 2024, and therefore was quite timely and relevant when our group began reading it in late Fall of 2024 – finishing our discussion of it just after the second election of Donald Trump.

Having read it, the upside is that we all feel better educated about how immigration works in the United States, as well as its pros and cons. While it’s clear that the current archaic system needs to be updated, it is also clear that immigrants are a net positive to society for economic, social and cultural reasons.

The downside is that we’re likely to start seeing mass deportations anyway, due to Trump’s campaign promises, and we’ll be powerless to do anything about it. We are living in a time when fear of immigrants has been stoked to an all-time high for political gain.

If only everyone could read this book. We’d like to think it would make a difference, but who knows. Perhaps fear is just an easier sell.

One of the main takeaways is that both sides of the typical immigration debate are wrong, or at least short-sighted. One side claims that immigrants are a drain on society’s resources and dangerous to “our way of life.” The other side tends to counter by whispering the victim narrative, that taking in immigrants is the right thing to do because of the violence and oppression that causes people to flee their home countries. The truth is actually far more powerful than the victim narrative: Successful societies welcome newcomers. Unfortunately, that information is rarely part of the discussion. It takes more time to explain, and therefore is harder to break through.

Zeke Hernandez is very thorough in his presentation of the details, and although the book is heavy on facts, it is readable for the average American who has not experienced the immigration system first-hand. Another round of editing before publishing might have eliminated some repetition of ideas and made the information that much more digestible. His various stories and anecdotes, some from friends and others from his own experience as an immigrant from Uruguay, are a welcome illustration. We applaud his effort to enlighten readers with the truth.

— Julie Feirer

The Underneath, by Kathi Appelt

Kathi Appelt’s novel The Underneath (with illustrations by David Small) is a beautifully told story about pretty much everything all the time: life, death, love, hate, forgiveness, jealousy, generosity, cruelty, loyalty, betrayal, hope . . .

When the story opens, a mama cat and her two tiny, not-yet named kittens are in a bad way.

There is nothing lonelier than a cat who has been loved, at least for a while, and then abandoned at the side of the road. A small calico cat. Her family, the one she lived with, has left her in this old and forgotten forest, this forest where the rain is soaking into her soft fur.

But mama cat soon finds a lonely, chained-up old hound, Ranger, who offers them hospitality in the “dark and holy Underneath,” where he is safe from the beatings of Gar Face. The cat family is safe there too. Cozy, even. Ranger names his kittens, immediately choosing Sabine (for the Sabine River) for the girl. And tentatively choosing Possum for the boy, then changing it to Puck when the boy, who has lots of puck, protests. Ranger sings his kittens to sleep every night. And Appelt’s lyrical writing makes us feel the preciousness of the odd little “found” family of cats and a dog.

But as in all good stories, something must go wrong. And because it’s in his nature, Puck leaves the safety of the dark and holy Underneath, and the scary, harrowing adventure begins: mama cat is drowned and Puck is left muddy, lost, and miserable on the wrong side of the river.

He isn’t alone on his journey back to Sabine and Ranger, which he had promised his mother. He walks with thousands of years of history, with old grudges and loves and wrongs and betrayals and friendships and alliances of the shape shifters and Grandmother Moccasin and the hundred-foot-long Alligator King. And, of course, Gar Face, the brutal man who is ultimately, and very appropriately, eaten by Alligator King at the end.

Appelt creates this narrative tapestry of trees and rivers and denizens of the bayou who bring thousands of years of love and loss and opinions and passions into Puck’s journey to find Ranger and Sabine. The outcome of the story rests not only on the bravery and love of Ranger and the kittens, but on the very personal choice Grandmother Moccasin makes after a thousand years of raging in a big clay pot, tangled in the roots of an ancient loblolly pine.

When she is finally freed, will Grandmother choose hate (and everybody dies) or love (and almost everybody lives)? Appelt keeps the reader wondering until the very last moment when Grandmother finally chooses love and frees Ranger from his rusty chain. And even that satisfying resolution is not really the end.

For trees, stories never end, they simply fold one into another. Where one begins to close, another begins to open, so that none are ever finished, not really. For Puck and Sabine and Ranger, this old story was the beginning of their new one.

. . .

If you could ask the trees about them, the sweet gums and tupelos, the sycamore and oaks, oh, if only you cold decipher the dialects of tallow and chestnut and alder, they would tell you that here, in this lost piney woods, this forest that sits between the highways on the border of Texas and Louisiana, here among the deep paths and giant ferns, along the abandoned trails of the Caddo, here in this forest as old as the sky and sea, live a pair of silver twins and an old hound who sings the blues, right here . . .

Puck . . .

Sabine . . .

. . . and Ranger.

Here.

A timeless and universal story, indeed.

One of the most interesting parts of our discussion of this novel was about whether it’s really a book for kids. (The publisher recommends it for ages ten and up.) Our conversation about suitability evolved from a semi-serious Maybe this book should actually be banned! to a But wait. No book should be banned. But maybe some books should be read only with adult helpers who can offer context. Or maybe it’s a matter or not every book being for every reader.

I fondly remember being a Godly Play storyteller for K-2 kids back in the day. One of the things I enjoyed most was the “wondering” questions at the end—particularly: “I wonder where you are in the story?” Most kids would usually find themselves somewhere. But occasionally, a child would shrug and say Nowhere. I’m not in that story.

I wish there were no children who could see themselves in The Underneath. But unfortunately, because of the way of the world, I imagine many can. I think of immigrants, refugees, kids from broken families, homeless kids, abused kids. Kids in foster care, kids in seemingly odd, atypical families, kids who have lost a parent or feel responsible for siblings. Kids whose parents are incarcerated. Those young readers may see themselves in Puck and Sabine’s story, and—in some sense—be at home even with the terrifying parts. And I think those readers may find hope and community in the dark and holy Underneath.

— Sharelle Moranville