Some more great reads on migration

By now most monthly members should have received our inaugural book of the month in the mail—and I hope you've had a chance to dig in.

I was inordinately pleased when one person wrote me back and said they were excited to read it, especially given that the book "is something that I would probably never pull the trigger on myself." Because, really, that's the point of this whole enterprise: to introduce folks to material they would benefit from reading but probably wouldn't get otherwise.

A reminder: If you aren't yet a Curious Reading Club Member and are interested in getting a crispy fresh hardback edition of A Map of Future Ruins, you can sign up in the next week and score a copy for just $25. (The RRP is $28)

Membership is easy, and you can cancel at any time. Every single subscription really counts a lot at this early stage.

And even if you're not interested, then perhaps you know some people who are! If you post about the club on social media and tag us (@readcurious on most platforms) I'll bung you a different free book as a reward.

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Last week I met up with May's author of the month, Lauren Markham, and it was a truly fascinating conversation. Sitting outside a Berkeley cafe in blazing sunshine, we discussed some of the big topics that her book brings up, such as migration, as well as some of the more indirect ones that drive her work—like how she finds stories to write about, and how she juggles a writing career with other jobs.

It made me even more excited to host our virtual gathering with her next week on May 16, and I hope that you'll all join us to benefit from her wisdom and perspective. And this just in: if you can't make it on the day, we'll be recording the conversation and sharing it in our forthcoming members-only section.

In the meantime, if you're interested in the topic of migration, then Lauren's book isn't the only great title out there: here are a few more I think you might enjoy.

I just finished Petra Molnar's forthcoming The Walls Have Eyes, which shows the way new technologies are use to constantly experiment upon and screw over migrants and refugees. Molnar is a lawyer and anthropologist who has worked on the front lines of migration activism in Canada and Europe, and it's a solid read, if a little up and down: some parts of the prose are really vivid and powerful, other sections are a little repetitive and a bit more functional. But overall it's a strong argument with some vital first-hand perspective, and feels particularly important right now. It comes out in a couple of weeks, and you can preorder it through Bookshop here.

Stories about migrants and their families rarely get told with the sensitivity and perspective of Karla Cornejo Villavicencio's The Undocumented Americans, one of my favorite reads of the last few years. A young undocumented writer herself, she really goes inside the system to show how it grinds away at people. She doesn't shy away from her anger, or the heaviness of the subject... and yet somehow her eye and her ability to capture the real people that she's meeting propel you through and on to the other side.

Lastly, when my son (who was in 4th grade at the time) recommended When The Stars Are Scattered by Victoria Jamieson and Omar Mohamed a couple of years ago, I was a bad dad: I picked it up, scoffed, and figured a graphic novel for 10-year-olds would be a quick tour of duty that would be forgotten as soon as I'd turned the final page. Instead, I was utterly captivated by this true story of two very young Somalian brothers who end up in a Kenyan refugee camp—and in tears at the end.

These are come highly recommended, but please note: if you buy any of the books I recommend through these Bookshop links, it will not only support independent bookstores, but also drop some money in my tip jar to keep the Club up and running. This doesn't affect any of my choices, of course!

I’ll send out more details about our first Q&A session next week. In the meantime…

Onwards

Bobbie