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A Story of Class, Solidarity, and Two Women's Epic Fight to Build a Union
by Daisy Pitkin
On the Line takes readers inside a bold five-year campaign to bring a union to the dangerous industrial laundry factories of Phoenix, Arizona.
Workers here wash hospital, hotel, and restaurant linens and face harsh conditions: routine exposure to biohazardous waste, injuries from surgical tools left in hospital sheets, and burns from overheated machinery. Broken U.S. labor law makes it nearly impossible for them to fight back.
The drive to unionize is led by two women: author Daisy Pitkin, a young labor organizer, who addresses this exhilarating narrative to Alma Gomez García, a second-shift immigrant worker, who risks her livelihood to join the struggle and convinces her fellow workers to take a stand.
Forged in the flames of a grueling legal battle and the company's vicious anti-union crusade, including the retaliatory firing of Alma, the relationships that grow between Daisy, Alma, and the rest of the factory workers show how a union, at its best, can reach beyond the workplace and form a solidarity so powerful that it can transcend friendship and transform communities. But when political strife divides the union, and her friendship with Alma along with it, Daisy must reflect on her own position of privilege and the complicated nature of union hierarchies and top-down organizing.
Daisy Pitkin looks back to uncover the forgotten roles immigrant women have played in the U.S. labor movement and points the way forward. As we experience one of the largest labor upheavals in decades, On the Line shows how difficult it is to bring about social change, and why we can't afford to stop trying.
"An intimate and moving account ... Enriched by Pitkin's sharp character sketches and sincere grappling with issues of class, race and privilege, this is a bracing look at the challenges facing American workers." —Publishers Weekly
"Intimate and touching ... A much-needed spotlight on the daily struggles of a vulnerable population." —Kirkus Reviews
"Part memoir and part rallying cry, this is a gripping tale of the birth of a union today ... Poetic, stirring ... A heartfelt and persuasive argument for organized labor now more than ever." —San Francisco Chronicle
"Captivating ... Remarkable ... Beautifully written ... An intimate look at the volatile work of union organizing." —Minneapolis Star Tribune
"Compelling. In this stirring debut, Daisy Pitkin deftly renders the intimate work of union organizing, demystifying the process as she takes care to ensure the focus remains on the workers themselves. Ultimately, On the Line is a ringing endorsement for the power of a union, and an essential read for anyone who's ever been inspired to fight for a better world." —Kim Kelly, labor journalist and author of Fight Like Hell: The Untold History of American Labor
"It is hard to imagine a more humanizing portrait of the American labor movement. Rendered with lyric, incandescent prose, On the Line is both deeply personal and profoundly political, with an acute sense for the ebb and flow of history. With this remarkable debut, Pitkin has given us a riveting and intimate meditation on power, class consciousness, and the true meaning of solidarity." —Francisco Cantú, New York Times bestselling author of The Line Becomes a River: Dispatches from the Border
This information about On the Line was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Daisy Pitkin has spent more than twenty years as a community and union organizer, working first in support of garment workers around the world, and then for U.S. labor unions organizing industrial laundry workers. Her essays have been awarded the Montana Prize, the DISQUIET Literary Prize, the New Millennium Award, and the Monique Wittig Writer's Scholarship. She grew up in rural Ohio and received an MFA from the University of Arizona. Pitkin lives and writes in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where she works as an organizer with an offshoot of the union UNITE. Find her at daisypitkin.net.
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