This book has forever changed how I feel about immigrants and how they were treated.

I remember hearing about this book in my high school Literary Criticism competition studies (I always got Upton Sinclair and Sinclair Lewis). I knew he'd written about poor conditions in meat packing plants, but I didn't realize that the book was a novel with a plot. Frankly, it was pretty depressing. Listening to descriptions of the lives of the characters, often barely scraping by and nearly starving, made me feel incredibly privileged to be in my current position, having quit a job of my own volition and being able to comfortably spent 4 months looking for one I like better. ( )

Disturbing! ( )

Rarely is a book truly too good to put down. I must just love reading about misery, because this book really did it for me. I found myself hoping the characters would just die to escape the miseries of life--as though that would be their triumph over those who oppressed and exploited them. If only it had not puttered out at the end. I almost thought Sinclair was indulging in a bit of self-targeting satire with regards to his beloved Socialism by the way he presented it as (practically) a religion, but I think he was in earnest. I wonder if they make kids read this in school. Probably not--too dangerous to make them see too much behind the curtain. ( )

Some books are pleasures, some are works of stunning artistic beauty. Some are tools, like a cookbook, or the Bible, or Atlas Shrugged. This book is a tool, meant to instruct people about capitalism and socialism.

And is it just me, or does anyone else think that Sinclair was being disingenuous when he said “I aimed at the public's heart, and by accident I hit it in the stomach?” It's kind of like saying, "SEX!!! Now that I've got your attention..."

Full disclosure, too...I made it over halfway through the audiobook version, then resumed with the graphic novel version. Plus I don't eat meat. ( )