Pat's Personal Page
I've been an activist on many issues including: womens' rights, unions, the environment and the struggle against inequality. Leave a message and let me know what you think of my books.
Novels should have a message. Literature should reflect the issues affecting peoples lives, protesting against war and destruction of the environment, defending workers' rights and the struggle against racism and sexism. This is the focus of my writing.
Authors that have influenced me:
Zora Neale Hurston - Their Eyes Were Watching God
Alice Walker - Color Purple
Amy Tan - Joy Luck Club
Rita Mae Brown - The Hand that Rocks the Cradle
Marge Piercy - Small Changes - Gone to Soldiers
Robin Morgan - Monster
Joyce Carol Oates - We Were the Mulvaneys
Barbara Kingsolver - Unsheltered, Poisonwood Bible
Edna St. Vincent Milay - Collected Poems
Leo Tolstoy - Anna Karenina
Charles Dickens - Great Expectations
Charlotte Bronte - Jane Eyre
George Bernard Shaw - The Inspector Calls
Jane Austin - Pride and Prejudice
George Elliot (Mary Ann Evans) - Middle March
Radclyffe Hall - The Unlit Lamp
Harriet Beecher Stowe - Uncle Tom's Cabin
Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens)- Huckleberry Finn
John Steinbeck - Grapes of Wrath, In Dubious Battle
Emile Zola - Germinal
Sinclair Lewis - It Can't Happen Here
Upton Sinclair - The Jungle
And many others....
I am a member of the
Pictures of the union organizing drive I led in 1980-1984 in Cleveland, Ohio with the Communications Workers of America. We just would not give up!
Yes, the picture to the right is me age 30.
Proof that I was there! Below is the certificate given to those who came to the 1981 Solidarity Day.
Here are some articles I wrote for New Directions for Women (Englewood, NJ):
July/August, 1991 - Corporate Boon: Family Disaster. About strawberry workers on strike in California.
January/February 1993 - Hero Rides Discrimination Out on a Rail. Interview with Corine Scott, a woman subway worker and TWU union activist.
September/October 1990 - Argentine Mother's Vigil. Book review about the Mothers of the Disappeared.
