Jeanne Marie Laskas

4.41081 learners

Jeanne Marie Laskas pulls back the curtain on America’s invisible backbone in *Hidden America*, taking readers on immersive, on-the-ground journeys with unsung workers who power daily life. From Ohio’s coal mines, where miners risk collapse and methane explosions to fuel half the nation’s electricity, to Maine’s blueberry fields, where migrant laborers harvest the state’s iconic fruit while navigating immigration fears, Laskas spends months living alongside these communities. She debunks stereotypes: NFL cheerleaders hold construction jobs to make ends meet, air traffic controllers work in crumbling towers to keep skies safe, and Alaskan oil rig workers find redemption in the frozen north. Each story captures raw humanity—pride in labor, struggles with loss, and quiet resilience—while highlighting the cultural divides and shared bonds that define these overlooked groups. This book is a powerful reminder of the people we pass by every day, whose unseen work sustains our homes, tables, and freedoms.

Don DeLillo

4.4957 learners

Don DeLillo’s *Underworld* spins a sweeping, immersive narrative of 20th-century America, anchored by the 1951 baseball playoff where Bobby Thomson’s legendary home run collided with the Soviet Union’s first nuclear test. Spanning decades, the novel weaves together interconnected lives: Nick Shay, a waste management executive haunted by a teenage manslaughter conviction; Klara Sax, an artist transforming decommissioned B-52 bombers in the desert; and Matt Shay, Nick’s brother entangled in top-secret nuclear weapons research. DeLillo digs into the quiet chaos beneath American prosperity—Cold War paranoia, the weight of unspoken secrets, the absurdity of consumer excess, and the fragile line between public spectacle and private despair. Through gritty vignettes of Bronx street life, comedy clubs during the Cuban Missile Crisis, and nuclear test sites, the novel reveals how history’s shadows shape ordinary lives, turning a single baseball into a symbol of a nation’s hidden underworld.