The Pooles of Pismo Bay

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This richly detailed novel introduces Reuben Poole, labor organizer and idealist. It is a saga of the end of the International Workers of the World movement in the U.S. as seen through the Poole family in the 1930s; its failed aspirations are described through the characters of two warring women. Cora Elliot Poole is a short-fused 70-year-old ex-Wobbly leader in self-imposed exile from politics. By contrast, Reuben's wife, Roselle, is a self-styled princess. And Reuben himself is a rabble-rouser. Cora and Roselle struggle for his soul and heart, and his idealism.

​Paperback, 412 pages, 5.5 x 8.5", 1990, 1-878352-05-9
For the clothbound edition, go here.
Volume One of The False Messiah Trilogy.
A Raymond Saroff Publication
  • Reviews
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"A secret masterpiece. . . .Here is a book that alternately upholds the bourgeoisie as the end-all, and as infernally corrupt; the lumpen-proletariat as worthless pawns of revolutionaries . . . , and simultaneously the only people worth saving; religiosity and atheism as virtually interchangeable; the American labor movement as a scam of the owners and also as an uplifting force; and the Wobbly cause itself as a worthy melange of transcendence, idiocy, nobility, thoughtlessness and compassion." — Hudson Valley Literary Supplement

"This fictionalized view of the history of the IWW includes real characters, such as Emma Goldman, the American anarchist. The complexity of the political arguments in this novel make it suitable for mature readers interested in the history of labor movements."
— Vandelia VanMeter, American in Historical Fiction: A Bibliographic Guide