Okay so first of all, I almost forgot to add THE PUSHCART WAR to the bookshelf here because I listened to it on audiobook and it was zero effort, like negative effort really because it made me feel so energetic and warm. The guy who reads the audiobook does a great assortment of old New York accents, just: perfection. A real treasure.
Second of all, this is a great way to teach children about cleverly-written writing. Scenes from different perspectives, in different styles, using fictional 'first person accounts' of events. Chef's kiss. My favorite is the scene taken in bad shorthand by an office cleaner eavesdropping on the villains. What a fantastic cheat of a way to get a first person account of the bad guys conspiring! Just, damn. All that and some practical lessons on how to run an uprising. What a great book.
I picked this up because of two reasons: the nostalgia of it all, and because Malka Older re-posted her long thread about it, which was originally on Twitter but which she ported to bluesky: Malka Older on The Pushcart War. I strongly recommend reading the whole thing, because Older has some sharp insights into the text.
Also, I feel like I must say that I wish we still had pushcarts, in cities dense enough that they were practical. Zero-emission, friendly neighborhood vendors! There's a small literary joint here in Tacoma that has a bike-powered book cart, which I adore, but also I want one that will sell me shawarma and one that will sell me fresh apples and one that will take all my old crap away to a secondhand store! I don't believe in the Lost Golden Age, usually, but maybe in this respect I do.
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