What do you think?
Rate this book
Amity and Prosperity: One Family and the Fracturing of America
Prize-winning poet and journalist Eliza Griswold's Amity and Prosperity is an expose on how fracking shattered a rural Pennsylvania town, and how one lifelong resident brought the story into the national spotlight. This is an incredible true account of investigative journalism and a devastating indictment of energy politics in America.
Stacey Haney, a lifelong resident of Amity, Pennsylvania, is struggling to support her children when the fracking boom comes to town. Like most of her neighbors, she sees the energy companies' payments as a windfall. Soon trucks are rumbling down her unpaved road and a fenced-off fracking site rises on adjacent land. But her annoyance gives way to concern and then to fear as domestic animals and pets begin dying and mysterious illnesses strike her family--despite the companies' insistence that nothing is wrong.
Griswold masterfully chronicles Haney's transformation into an unlikely whistle-blower as she launches her own investigation into corporate wrongdoing. As she takes her case to court, Haney inadvertently reveals the complex rifts in her community and begins to reshape its attitudes toward outsiders, corporations, and the federal government. Amity and Prosperity uses her gripping and moving tale to show the true costs of our energy infrastructure and to illuminate the predicament of rural America in the twenty-first century.
Stacey Haney, a lifelong resident of Amity, Pennsylvania, is struggling to support her children when the fracking boom comes to town. Like most of her neighbors, she sees the energy companies' payments as a windfall. Soon trucks are rumbling down her unpaved road and a fenced-off fracking site rises on adjacent land. But her annoyance gives way to concern and then to fear as domestic animals and pets begin dying and mysterious illnesses strike her family--despite the companies' insistence that nothing is wrong.
Griswold masterfully chronicles Haney's transformation into an unlikely whistle-blower as she launches her own investigation into corporate wrongdoing. As she takes her case to court, Haney inadvertently reveals the complex rifts in her community and begins to reshape its attitudes toward outsiders, corporations, and the federal government. Amity and Prosperity uses her gripping and moving tale to show the true costs of our energy infrastructure and to illuminate the predicament of rural America in the twenty-first century.
318 pages, Hardcover
First published June 12, 2018
About the author
Eliza Griswold
13 books113 followersEliza Griswold is an American journalist and poet. She was a fellow at the New America Foundation from 2008 to 2010 and won a 2010 Rome Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
(wikipedia)
(wikipedia)
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 594 reviews
June 26, 2021
Every year for the last couple of years, I've gone through the winners and nominees of the Pulitzer Prize for Nonfiction, and tried to read the ones that interest me, in the hopes that it will expand my horizons and introduce me to viewpoints I've never considered before. I'm so glad I picked up Amity and Prosperity.
It provides an in-depth look at fracking and the small towns that bear this burden so that the rest of us can have the energy we often take for granted. It specifically follows a few families near the poor Appalachian towns of Amity and Prosperity in Pennsylvania, first as fortune seemingly comes knocking in the form of a gas company looking to lease their land for fracking, then the fallout as their water and air become polluted, their animals die, and they cannot puzzle out the cause of their mysterious symptoms and flagging health.
What this book excels at is exposing the human toll of fracking. It juxtaposes the lure of easy money for an extremely poor region with the poisoning of its water and air. It pits neighbor against neighbor as some make it out with money while others must leave their now uninhabitable homes with a slew of health problems. It shows the extent that greedy corporations will go to make profits, even at the expense of real people's lives and livelihood.
This book also details the legal battle that ensued as these families' lawyers tried to fight for their right to clean air and water. It's a long and drawn out battle. And it emphasizes how important a state's laws and its legal/judicial systems are, either in helping the people it swore to protect in their fight for justice, or in helping the corporations that pay its coffers to maintain their right to expand and extract.
This book is timely and relevant. It made me realize that someone has to pay the price for the energy we take for granted. And for those people, being put on the other side of the balancing scale doesn't feel balanced or fair at all.
It provides an in-depth look at fracking and the small towns that bear this burden so that the rest of us can have the energy we often take for granted. It specifically follows a few families near the poor Appalachian towns of Amity and Prosperity in Pennsylvania, first as fortune seemingly comes knocking in the form of a gas company looking to lease their land for fracking, then the fallout as their water and air become polluted, their animals die, and they cannot puzzle out the cause of their mysterious symptoms and flagging health.
What this book excels at is exposing the human toll of fracking. It juxtaposes the lure of easy money for an extremely poor region with the poisoning of its water and air. It pits neighbor against neighbor as some make it out with money while others must leave their now uninhabitable homes with a slew of health problems. It shows the extent that greedy corporations will go to make profits, even at the expense of real people's lives and livelihood.
This book also details the legal battle that ensued as these families' lawyers tried to fight for their right to clean air and water. It's a long and drawn out battle. And it emphasizes how important a state's laws and its legal/judicial systems are, either in helping the people it swore to protect in their fight for justice, or in helping the corporations that pay its coffers to maintain their right to expand and extract.
This book is timely and relevant. It made me realize that someone has to pay the price for the energy we take for granted. And for those people, being put on the other side of the balancing scale doesn't feel balanced or fair at all.
August 21, 2019
"The 'Appalachian problem' doesn't seem to me to be political, economic or social. I believe
it is a spiritual problem and its name is greed."
- 'Our Appalachia: An Oral History' , edited by
Laura Shackelford and Bill Weinberg
Eliza Griswold, the journalist who wrote this book, 'Amity and Prosperity: One Family and the Fracturing of America', was awarded the 2019 Pulitzer Prize for general non-fiction. In an interview, she described how she came to report on this story which centers on two towns in southwestern Pennsylvania.... Amity and Prosperity. Ms. Griswold had spent much of her career reporting on issues in Africa and Asia. While in Nigeria, she experienced a collapse of a bridge. Two weeks after this bridge collapsed in Nigeria, the I-35 West bridge collapsed in Minneapolis, Minnesota, killing 13 people (August 2007). These events led Ms. Griswold to think about the idea of 'public poverty', the inability of cities and towns to repair or replace their crumbling bridges and infrastructure. On a purely statistical level, she discovered that southwestern Pennsylvania... specifically Washington County, which is located about 35 miles south of Pittsburgh... had the most structurally deficient bridges in the country. Upon arriving in Washington County, she happened upon a community meeting where residents were addressing the personal costs being experienced in the community due to the practice of hydraulic fracturing or 'fracking'.
This book was an eye opener to me. Although I'm a Pennsylvania resident and was born in this state, I realized from Eliza Griswold's reporting that I have huge gaps in my knowledge ... not only about the oil and natural gas industry and its relationship to the state, but also the extent to which this state has been a critical part of energy production for the country for more than a century. Ms. Griswold first provides a short history of mineral/resource extraction and this history is crucial to understanding the current attitudes and views of many of the people who inhabit this region. She begins this history of resource extraction after the end of the Civil War. Farmers, whose farms had become unprofitable, began selling their mineral rights to the coal which had been located on their land. The payouts for these mineral rights were small but combined with the mining jobs being offered by the coal companies, the area was able to flourish... for a time. Mostly (and not atypically), the wealth was concentrated in a few hands and once the land became depleted of its coal deposits, the prosperity of there disappeared, leaving behind economically decimated and bankrupt towns and residents faced with poisoned water supplies. These boom-and-bust cycles have been repeated.. over and over. These same cycles also apply to oil extraction and also the extraction of iron ore which was then used to produce steel, which for a time, made Pittsburgh one of the largest producers of steel. A pattern of resource extraction and exploitation had been established and this pattern contributes directly to the topic of this book... natural gas extraction.
When Eliza Griswold stumbled upon that community meeting, she met nurse and single mother, Stacey Haney, who owned an 8-acre farm in Amity, Pennsylvania, the area where Stacey's family had lived for 150 years. She lived on this farm with her 14-year-0ld son, Harley and 11-year-old daughter, Paige and had decided to attend the meeting because she and her children had been experiencing health problems and her son had just been diagnosed with arsenic poisoning. Over the first half of this book, Stacey Haney relates her dealings with the company which had been drilling for gas in her community.. Range Resources. Stacey and several of her neighbors had decided to lease their mineral rights to Range Resources in exchange for a signing bonus and small royalty checks. Stacey was raising a number of animals on her farm and she believed the extra money would allow her to build a new barn. Other neighbors needed the money for various maintenance projects on their own farms. Plus, Stacey made it clear that in her mind this was also a matter of doing her 'patriotic duty' in contributing to the need for energy independence in the United States. This seemed like a good idea to these cash-strapped farmers. Almost immediately though, problems began... Stacey and her children began suffering from constant headaches and bloody noses. Harley became so ill that he ended up missing nearly all of his 7th grade school year. He was constantly nauseous and his mouth was full of canker sores. Next, the Haney's animals and the animals belonging to neighbors began give birth to deformed offspring and some began to die. Something was clearly very wrong.
Stacey Haney contacted Pennsylvania's Department of Environmental Protection (DEP... which many in the state refer to as the 'Don't Expect Protection' agency) and although they promised to investigate, it didn't take long for Stacey to figure out that not only did they seem uninterested in what was happening to these families and the environment, but they also appeared to be a little too friendly with the Range Resources people.. the company which they were supposed to be regulating. Stacey also contacted Range Resources directly when, in 2010, she discovered that the water filter on her property's well was filled with black sludge and the water running from her tap smelled foul and was also black. A representative from the company collected samples and then told Stacey that the sludge and black water were nothing to be concerned about... just boil her water before she used it.
Finally, Stacey had had enough. Harley had been diagnosed with arsenic poisoning and the entire family's blood tests showed levels of ethylene glycol (a neurotoxin) and BTEX, which refers to known carcinogens.. benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylene.. all were chemicals which were present in frack water. This confirmation of her suspicions about her family's illnesses, the lack of assistance from the DEP and the Environmental Protection Agency, combined with the discovery that the horrible smell which had begun permeating the farms in the area was hydrogen sulfide gas (also toxic) was the last straw for Stacey. She and her children left the farm she had loved and would never live there again. Essentially, the Haney family became homeless. Stacey and her daughter, Paige lived in a camper which she parked in her parents' driveway and Harley was sent to live with her boyfriend, Chris in the city of Washington.
Stacey and her neighbors realized that the state and federal agencies that were supposed to protect them and their health were either unable or unwilling to do so. They felt their only recourse was to obtain legal assistance so they all signed on to be represented by a husband-and-wife legal team, John and Kendra Smith. Stacey had attempted to do everything possible to avoid a lawsuit because she was well-aware of what would happen.. the lawsuit divided the community. Some in the community were sympathetic to Stacey and her neighbors and what they had experienced; but there were also people who were angry, believing that the lawsuit was being filed simply to collect a big payout from Range Resources... who might then decide to retaliate against the community by moving their operations elsewhere... ultimately harming the community. The second half of this book deals with the work done by John and Kendra Smith on behalf of their clients. As the Smiths began working on this case, they discovered some data which alarmed them: there was evidence that Range Resources tampered with test results to hide the fact that particular chemicals from fracking had been leaking from their retaining pond and had ended up in the residents' drinking water. The Smiths were also able to conform Stacey's fears regarding the cozy relationship between the DEP and Range Resources. In fact, it seemed there was a kind of 'revolving door' between the DEP and the oil and gas industry. Many DEP inspectors ended up leaving the agency for more lucrative positions in the industry.
John and Kendra Smith worked tirelessly and enthusiastically for the Haneys and their neighbors and they ended up pursuing this case for many years. The biggest challenge they faced gets to the heart of what seems to be the central theme in this book. Eliza Griswold succinctly describes this theme in one sentence... "Exploiting energy often involves exploiting people." Despite their hard work on their clients' behalf, the Smiths faced an uphill battle. According to the EPA, no definitive conclusion could be reached regarding Range Resources' culpability or responsibility for the toxins found in the water supply because of the decades the land had been used for agriculture, coal mining, waste disposal and other industries. Plus, none of the plaintiffs had obtained a pre-drill report which would have provided an analysis of their water before drilling began. Ultimately, Range Resources and the plaintiffs agreed to a settlement, which was not disclosed in this book but was characterized by the Haneys as disappointing.
The Smiths did have ONE victory which had implication for all residents of the state of Pennsylvania. John Smith challenged the constitutionality of what was known as Act 13, a law which the state and the fossil fuel industry worked on together, which stipulated that the industry would agree to pay a fee to local governments for each well drilled. In exchange for this fee, the companies no longer needed to have approval for drilling by the local governments. This gave companies the right to drill a frack retaining pond, for example, next to a school and there was nothing the town could do about it. John Smith used the Pennsylvania Constitution to argue in front of the State Supreme Court that Act 13 was unconstitutional. He used Article 1, Section 27 which states that..... " The people have a right to clean air, pure water and to the preservation of the natural scenic, historic and aesthetic values of the environment. Pennsylvania public natural resources are the common property of all the people, including generations yet to come. As trustee of these resources, the Commonwealth shall conserve and maintain them for the benefit of all the people."
Eliza Griswold did a terrific job in presenting a myriad of opinions regarding the subject of fracking and the practice of energy extraction in southwestern Pennsylvania. I believe she tried to be fair and compassionate. She made 37 trips to this region beginning in 2010and the time she spent here shows in her research and her knowledge of not only the oil and gas industry but also her understanding of the people she met. I read this book with the desire to better understand this issue which has caused so much conflict and division in my state... and the country at large. I wanted to better understand the viewpoint of people with whom I strongly disagree. I suppose all I can say is that I DID come away from this book with greater knowledge of the issue. As for the people, I haven't been as successful and perhaps that failing is within myself. As the granddaughter of a coal miner, I am well aware of just how damaging coal extraction has been to the environment and to people's health. But I'm also aware that coal mining also allowed my grandfather to provide for his family... my family. I understand the complexity of this issue when it is viewed in economic terms. This town in Washington County has been exploited for more than 100 years for its resources..to provide energy not only for the people of that community but also for people who live hundreds of miles away. These towns have been left impoverished at the end of every boom-and -bust cycle. So I intellectually understand why the oil and gas industry appeared so attractive to people who just wanted their towns to survive. But as I continued to read about the worsening illnesses of the people, the contaminated, toxic well water and the deaths of beloved pets and other animals, i found it impossible to comprehend the trust that these people placed in a corporation which was clearly causing them so much suffering.. simply for greed. I understood that government has betrayed them... the corruption and ineffectiveness of the DEP, the overly-bureaucratic EPA... but after experiencing decades of environmental contamination created by the coal industry, why would anyone believe the oil and gas industry was different and worthy of consideration? I have thought and thought about this and I realized that I'm just not ever going to understand the thought processes which are so different from my own.
Ultimately, I believe this book is a must-read for anyone who is concerned about the environment (the very real current problem of tainted water supplies across the country) ... about climate change and what continued burning of fossil fuels means for our future... or if you are concerned about the exploitation of people and the land they love. One point which was made in this book provided food for thought. We need to actually start considering just where our energy comes from. We take energy for granted and most of us probably never think about it at all.. unless we lose power for some reason. The people in this book are very clear that they know we all spend little time thinking about energy... acknowledging the people who bore the hardship for its extraction and our own insatiable need for it.
it is a spiritual problem and its name is greed."
- 'Our Appalachia: An Oral History' , edited by
Laura Shackelford and Bill Weinberg
Eliza Griswold, the journalist who wrote this book, 'Amity and Prosperity: One Family and the Fracturing of America', was awarded the 2019 Pulitzer Prize for general non-fiction. In an interview, she described how she came to report on this story which centers on two towns in southwestern Pennsylvania.... Amity and Prosperity. Ms. Griswold had spent much of her career reporting on issues in Africa and Asia. While in Nigeria, she experienced a collapse of a bridge. Two weeks after this bridge collapsed in Nigeria, the I-35 West bridge collapsed in Minneapolis, Minnesota, killing 13 people (August 2007). These events led Ms. Griswold to think about the idea of 'public poverty', the inability of cities and towns to repair or replace their crumbling bridges and infrastructure. On a purely statistical level, she discovered that southwestern Pennsylvania... specifically Washington County, which is located about 35 miles south of Pittsburgh... had the most structurally deficient bridges in the country. Upon arriving in Washington County, she happened upon a community meeting where residents were addressing the personal costs being experienced in the community due to the practice of hydraulic fracturing or 'fracking'.
This book was an eye opener to me. Although I'm a Pennsylvania resident and was born in this state, I realized from Eliza Griswold's reporting that I have huge gaps in my knowledge ... not only about the oil and natural gas industry and its relationship to the state, but also the extent to which this state has been a critical part of energy production for the country for more than a century. Ms. Griswold first provides a short history of mineral/resource extraction and this history is crucial to understanding the current attitudes and views of many of the people who inhabit this region. She begins this history of resource extraction after the end of the Civil War. Farmers, whose farms had become unprofitable, began selling their mineral rights to the coal which had been located on their land. The payouts for these mineral rights were small but combined with the mining jobs being offered by the coal companies, the area was able to flourish... for a time. Mostly (and not atypically), the wealth was concentrated in a few hands and once the land became depleted of its coal deposits, the prosperity of there disappeared, leaving behind economically decimated and bankrupt towns and residents faced with poisoned water supplies. These boom-and-bust cycles have been repeated.. over and over. These same cycles also apply to oil extraction and also the extraction of iron ore which was then used to produce steel, which for a time, made Pittsburgh one of the largest producers of steel. A pattern of resource extraction and exploitation had been established and this pattern contributes directly to the topic of this book... natural gas extraction.
When Eliza Griswold stumbled upon that community meeting, she met nurse and single mother, Stacey Haney, who owned an 8-acre farm in Amity, Pennsylvania, the area where Stacey's family had lived for 150 years. She lived on this farm with her 14-year-0ld son, Harley and 11-year-old daughter, Paige and had decided to attend the meeting because she and her children had been experiencing health problems and her son had just been diagnosed with arsenic poisoning. Over the first half of this book, Stacey Haney relates her dealings with the company which had been drilling for gas in her community.. Range Resources. Stacey and several of her neighbors had decided to lease their mineral rights to Range Resources in exchange for a signing bonus and small royalty checks. Stacey was raising a number of animals on her farm and she believed the extra money would allow her to build a new barn. Other neighbors needed the money for various maintenance projects on their own farms. Plus, Stacey made it clear that in her mind this was also a matter of doing her 'patriotic duty' in contributing to the need for energy independence in the United States. This seemed like a good idea to these cash-strapped farmers. Almost immediately though, problems began... Stacey and her children began suffering from constant headaches and bloody noses. Harley became so ill that he ended up missing nearly all of his 7th grade school year. He was constantly nauseous and his mouth was full of canker sores. Next, the Haney's animals and the animals belonging to neighbors began give birth to deformed offspring and some began to die. Something was clearly very wrong.
Stacey Haney contacted Pennsylvania's Department of Environmental Protection (DEP... which many in the state refer to as the 'Don't Expect Protection' agency) and although they promised to investigate, it didn't take long for Stacey to figure out that not only did they seem uninterested in what was happening to these families and the environment, but they also appeared to be a little too friendly with the Range Resources people.. the company which they were supposed to be regulating. Stacey also contacted Range Resources directly when, in 2010, she discovered that the water filter on her property's well was filled with black sludge and the water running from her tap smelled foul and was also black. A representative from the company collected samples and then told Stacey that the sludge and black water were nothing to be concerned about... just boil her water before she used it.
Finally, Stacey had had enough. Harley had been diagnosed with arsenic poisoning and the entire family's blood tests showed levels of ethylene glycol (a neurotoxin) and BTEX, which refers to known carcinogens.. benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylene.. all were chemicals which were present in frack water. This confirmation of her suspicions about her family's illnesses, the lack of assistance from the DEP and the Environmental Protection Agency, combined with the discovery that the horrible smell which had begun permeating the farms in the area was hydrogen sulfide gas (also toxic) was the last straw for Stacey. She and her children left the farm she had loved and would never live there again. Essentially, the Haney family became homeless. Stacey and her daughter, Paige lived in a camper which she parked in her parents' driveway and Harley was sent to live with her boyfriend, Chris in the city of Washington.
Stacey and her neighbors realized that the state and federal agencies that were supposed to protect them and their health were either unable or unwilling to do so. They felt their only recourse was to obtain legal assistance so they all signed on to be represented by a husband-and-wife legal team, John and Kendra Smith. Stacey had attempted to do everything possible to avoid a lawsuit because she was well-aware of what would happen.. the lawsuit divided the community. Some in the community were sympathetic to Stacey and her neighbors and what they had experienced; but there were also people who were angry, believing that the lawsuit was being filed simply to collect a big payout from Range Resources... who might then decide to retaliate against the community by moving their operations elsewhere... ultimately harming the community. The second half of this book deals with the work done by John and Kendra Smith on behalf of their clients. As the Smiths began working on this case, they discovered some data which alarmed them: there was evidence that Range Resources tampered with test results to hide the fact that particular chemicals from fracking had been leaking from their retaining pond and had ended up in the residents' drinking water. The Smiths were also able to conform Stacey's fears regarding the cozy relationship between the DEP and Range Resources. In fact, it seemed there was a kind of 'revolving door' between the DEP and the oil and gas industry. Many DEP inspectors ended up leaving the agency for more lucrative positions in the industry.
John and Kendra Smith worked tirelessly and enthusiastically for the Haneys and their neighbors and they ended up pursuing this case for many years. The biggest challenge they faced gets to the heart of what seems to be the central theme in this book. Eliza Griswold succinctly describes this theme in one sentence... "Exploiting energy often involves exploiting people." Despite their hard work on their clients' behalf, the Smiths faced an uphill battle. According to the EPA, no definitive conclusion could be reached regarding Range Resources' culpability or responsibility for the toxins found in the water supply because of the decades the land had been used for agriculture, coal mining, waste disposal and other industries. Plus, none of the plaintiffs had obtained a pre-drill report which would have provided an analysis of their water before drilling began. Ultimately, Range Resources and the plaintiffs agreed to a settlement, which was not disclosed in this book but was characterized by the Haneys as disappointing.
The Smiths did have ONE victory which had implication for all residents of the state of Pennsylvania. John Smith challenged the constitutionality of what was known as Act 13, a law which the state and the fossil fuel industry worked on together, which stipulated that the industry would agree to pay a fee to local governments for each well drilled. In exchange for this fee, the companies no longer needed to have approval for drilling by the local governments. This gave companies the right to drill a frack retaining pond, for example, next to a school and there was nothing the town could do about it. John Smith used the Pennsylvania Constitution to argue in front of the State Supreme Court that Act 13 was unconstitutional. He used Article 1, Section 27 which states that..... " The people have a right to clean air, pure water and to the preservation of the natural scenic, historic and aesthetic values of the environment. Pennsylvania public natural resources are the common property of all the people, including generations yet to come. As trustee of these resources, the Commonwealth shall conserve and maintain them for the benefit of all the people."
Eliza Griswold did a terrific job in presenting a myriad of opinions regarding the subject of fracking and the practice of energy extraction in southwestern Pennsylvania. I believe she tried to be fair and compassionate. She made 37 trips to this region beginning in 2010and the time she spent here shows in her research and her knowledge of not only the oil and gas industry but also her understanding of the people she met. I read this book with the desire to better understand this issue which has caused so much conflict and division in my state... and the country at large. I wanted to better understand the viewpoint of people with whom I strongly disagree. I suppose all I can say is that I DID come away from this book with greater knowledge of the issue. As for the people, I haven't been as successful and perhaps that failing is within myself. As the granddaughter of a coal miner, I am well aware of just how damaging coal extraction has been to the environment and to people's health. But I'm also aware that coal mining also allowed my grandfather to provide for his family... my family. I understand the complexity of this issue when it is viewed in economic terms. This town in Washington County has been exploited for more than 100 years for its resources..to provide energy not only for the people of that community but also for people who live hundreds of miles away. These towns have been left impoverished at the end of every boom-and -bust cycle. So I intellectually understand why the oil and gas industry appeared so attractive to people who just wanted their towns to survive. But as I continued to read about the worsening illnesses of the people, the contaminated, toxic well water and the deaths of beloved pets and other animals, i found it impossible to comprehend the trust that these people placed in a corporation which was clearly causing them so much suffering.. simply for greed. I understood that government has betrayed them... the corruption and ineffectiveness of the DEP, the overly-bureaucratic EPA... but after experiencing decades of environmental contamination created by the coal industry, why would anyone believe the oil and gas industry was different and worthy of consideration? I have thought and thought about this and I realized that I'm just not ever going to understand the thought processes which are so different from my own.
Ultimately, I believe this book is a must-read for anyone who is concerned about the environment (the very real current problem of tainted water supplies across the country) ... about climate change and what continued burning of fossil fuels means for our future... or if you are concerned about the exploitation of people and the land they love. One point which was made in this book provided food for thought. We need to actually start considering just where our energy comes from. We take energy for granted and most of us probably never think about it at all.. unless we lose power for some reason. The people in this book are very clear that they know we all spend little time thinking about energy... acknowledging the people who bore the hardship for its extraction and our own insatiable need for it.
May 4, 2019
One of the Pulitzer winners for this year, and though I often don't agree with their choices, this was a worthy one. Fracking, Pennsylvania and a town Amity, with few employment opportunities. Just the kind of place these natural gas companies like to plunder. They pretty much descend on those that are desperate money, sell them a bill of goods, insist they are environmentally friendly, and promise big financial returns.
This centers on a few families in Amity, a woman, divorced mother of two, who owns her own property, but could use additional money for improvements. What she didn't bargain for is what happens to the health of her family, the animals in her care, and the struggle she will have trying to get justice. Admit to disillusionment when I learned Obama allowed fracking to go on, but not surprised to learn Trump removed many of the EPA safeguards. An odd to the legal team of husband and wife and the way they fought a system that at every turn was firmly against them. A fine piece of investigative reporting. The audio book narrated by Tavia Gilbert who did a fantastic job.
This centers on a few families in Amity, a woman, divorced mother of two, who owns her own property, but could use additional money for improvements. What she didn't bargain for is what happens to the health of her family, the animals in her care, and the struggle she will have trying to get justice. Admit to disillusionment when I learned Obama allowed fracking to go on, but not surprised to learn Trump removed many of the EPA safeguards. An odd to the legal team of husband and wife and the way they fought a system that at every turn was firmly against them. A fine piece of investigative reporting. The audio book narrated by Tavia Gilbert who did a fantastic job.
September 9, 2018
This scientific and legal drama recounts the harrowing ordeal of several families suffering terribly from toxic chemicals leaching from storage pools of fracking waste into their drinking water and into the air in western Pennsylvania. New Yorker staff writer and journalist Eliza Griswold has excellent instincts for a story and she has honed her skills so that unwieldy real life is put into a clear timeline; we not only understand, we are desperate to learn the outcome.
It is nearly impossible to imagine this kind of deceit and coercion happening today in ‘sacrifice zones’ around the country. After all, it is written in Pennsylvania’s own constitution that
When their lawyers, John Smith and his wife Kendra, finally argued a case about the pollution before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in October 2012, two years after they began researching the cases, the lawyers were afraid the conservative judge known to side frequently with Republican politicians would throw out the challenge to Act 13. [Pennsylvania is known today as the poster child for such severe political gerrymandering Republicans in state and national government far outweigh their Democratic challengers.] State governor Tom Corbett didn’t want “to send a negative message to job creators and families who depend on the energy industry.” Corbett was voted out in 2015.
Speaking of families who depend on the energy industry, the neighbors of these folks who had been so wrongly done by sometimes begrudged the families their lawsuits since it might lessen their opportunity to sell the rights to whatever gas or right-of-way lay beneath their own land. This is a horror story that is difficult to tear one’s eyes from.
Fracking waste is toxic, but much of the time so is what fracking dredges up from deep earth pockets holding Pleistocene-era bacteria and ocean salts. No one wants this waste. Range Resources paid Alan Shipman to truck away waste that didn’t fit in the holding ponds. Shipman was convicted in 2011 of mixing the fracking solutions with less lethal waste so technically it would fall under less stringent guidelines for placement and then he dumped it illegally into public waterways.
A few local public officials thought some of the difficulties lay in the corruption of government by money flowing from the gas companies to people in political office who thereafter tended to cater to those business interests. Even Obama changed his tune from “no fracking” during his campaign, to “gas is good” during his term. Some individuals argue that despite some pollution, gas extraction has made the U.S. practically energy independent, moving the U.S. from importing two-thirds of it’s oil needs to one-fifth. A degree of pollution here may prevent global ocean rise because gas is less carbon-emitting, etc, etc.
To all of this could be argued that the costs of gas are not adequately taken into account by companies operating by deceit. Have the companies pay the real costs and then go find investors. They will, and we will be protected. If gas is judged to be “just too expensive,” we may need to rethink the way we do business or the way we live.
One final note is a very short discussion Griswold adds about the Tragedy of the Commons. I’d never heard of this concept, so I quote her here at length:
It is nearly impossible to imagine this kind of deceit and coercion happening today in ‘sacrifice zones’ around the country. After all, it is written in Pennsylvania’s own constitution that
“The people have a right to clear air, pure water, and to the preservation of the natural, scenic, historic and aesthetic values of the environment. Pennsylvania’s public natural resources are the common property of all the people, including generations yet to come. As trustee of these resources, the Commonwealth shall conserve and maintain them for the benefit for all the people.”Residents who survived—many of their farm animals did not—had to leave their newly worthless property because the water was not fit to drink and the air was not fit to breathe. This is the story of how these families fought the state and federal agencies (EPA, DEP) charged with protecting them; Range Resources, the company responsible for the fracking work; the companies responsible for testing blood and water for chemical components causing the damage; their own neighbors; and the political leadership including the governor in Pennsylvania who instituted Act 13, giving zoning overrides to fracking companies.
When their lawyers, John Smith and his wife Kendra, finally argued a case about the pollution before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in October 2012, two years after they began researching the cases, the lawyers were afraid the conservative judge known to side frequently with Republican politicians would throw out the challenge to Act 13. [Pennsylvania is known today as the poster child for such severe political gerrymandering Republicans in state and national government far outweigh their Democratic challengers.] State governor Tom Corbett didn’t want “to send a negative message to job creators and families who depend on the energy industry.” Corbett was voted out in 2015.
Speaking of families who depend on the energy industry, the neighbors of these folks who had been so wrongly done by sometimes begrudged the families their lawsuits since it might lessen their opportunity to sell the rights to whatever gas or right-of-way lay beneath their own land. This is a horror story that is difficult to tear one’s eyes from.
“[Range Resources] tried to appeal to those who stood to make money with an unusual letter writing campaign. One mass mailing was addressed to a fictitious ‘Mr. and Mrs. Joe Schmo at 10 Cash-Strapped Lane.’ It urged residents to bring pressure on their local officials to allow companies wide latitude to drill where they needed to, or there’d be no gas, and ‘no gas means no royalties.’”The royalties, by the way, weren’t very impressive to someone who was going to lose their health, their livelihood, their land, their house, their way of life. This was farmland, so most of people discussed here in detail had barns, large animals, etc. This says nothing of the downstream pollution of the groundwater. People can drill on their own property, but not if it affects their neighbor.
Fracking waste is toxic, but much of the time so is what fracking dredges up from deep earth pockets holding Pleistocene-era bacteria and ocean salts. No one wants this waste. Range Resources paid Alan Shipman to truck away waste that didn’t fit in the holding ponds. Shipman was convicted in 2011 of mixing the fracking solutions with less lethal waste so technically it would fall under less stringent guidelines for placement and then he dumped it illegally into public waterways.
A few local public officials thought some of the difficulties lay in the corruption of government by money flowing from the gas companies to people in political office who thereafter tended to cater to those business interests. Even Obama changed his tune from “no fracking” during his campaign, to “gas is good” during his term. Some individuals argue that despite some pollution, gas extraction has made the U.S. practically energy independent, moving the U.S. from importing two-thirds of it’s oil needs to one-fifth. A degree of pollution here may prevent global ocean rise because gas is less carbon-emitting, etc, etc.
To all of this could be argued that the costs of gas are not adequately taken into account by companies operating by deceit. Have the companies pay the real costs and then go find investors. They will, and we will be protected. If gas is judged to be “just too expensive,” we may need to rethink the way we do business or the way we live.
One final note is a very short discussion Griswold adds about the Tragedy of the Commons. I’d never heard of this concept, so I quote her here at length:
“Economists describe the Tragedy of the Commons like this: cattle herders sharing a pasture will inevitably place the needs of their cows above the needs of others’, adding cow after cow and taking more than their share of the common grass. This ‘free rider’ takes advantage of the commons, and consumes it until it’s gone. This, the argument goes, is human nature, which sets individual gain over collective good. Traditionally, the Tragedy of the Commons has supported the case for individual property rights: since it’s impossible for people to act together to protect commonly held assets, we might as well carve up those assets and leave individuals to look after their own. But what if the commons did not need to end in tragedy? What if people were able to work out effective practices of sharing the commons and transmit those traditions to their descendants? Elinor Ostrom, a professor of political science at Indiana University, argued that the solution to the Tragedy of the Commons for the twenty-first century lies in common sense. Sharing has succeeded in the past and could succeed in the future. Ostrom was awarded the 2009 Nobel Prize in Economics for this work. She died in 2012.”This is a terrific, propulsive, horrifying, and important read you are not going to want to miss.
November 28, 2020
This is a very personal account of the suffering of a Western Pennsylvania family and their neighbors when a fracking operation began near their property. Griswold covers a period from 2011 to 2017. She follows the lives of the Haney family headed by Stacy a single mother with two school age children. Griswold portrays them and her community as simple country folk. The Haney’s live on a six acre farm where they raise a few animals that they show at the annual county fair. Stacy works as a nurse and she just makes ends meet. Her ancestors settled in the area long ago and she has many relatives and friends nearby. She is proud of her heritage and community where she believed everyone looks out for each other.
In 2011 fracking was growing rapidly and in Western Pennsylvania companies were leasing mineral rights and offering many landowners royalties. Some people with large holdings in the right place profited significantly pulling in thousands of dollars a month. But even those with smaller properties could net several hundred dollars a month which was very significant to families such as Stacy’s. After Stacy and her neighbors signed leases the fracking company, Range Resources, began operations leveling off the top of a hill and building a large waste water containment pond, disposal pit and well head just 1,500 feet from Stacy’s property.
Before long Stacy began noticing her children getting sick more frequently with unusual ailments that persisted. Her animals also got sick and even died. Her water was no longer drinkable. The air was contaminated. She heard similar complaints from her neighbors. Her son dropped out of school, sick all the time. Her young daughter was always upset and Stacy was a nervous wreck. Eventually she had to leave her farm which was now worthless. She began incurring large debts to stay afloat. She tried dealing with Range Resources, the state environmental agency and the EPA, but felt she always got the runaround. She was getting the reputation as a troublemaker. Many in the community didn’t believe her. Many of them were getting or hoped to get monthly checks for leases. Some saw their small businesses prosper with the increased activity. They saw her as trying to stop an economic boom.
Stacy became entrenched in her position and found a friendly competent legal team to take her case. This meant years of tests on the water and on her and her children. It was very difficult to prove the connection between the fracking and the contamination in their bodies and water. The law and the chemistry were very complicated. There were depositions, hearings, multiple court dates. Increasingly Stacy no longer felt part of the community. Her world had been turned upside down. The county fair received big donations from the fracking companies who used it to promote their interests. What had been an event she and her children had looked forward to all year was now one that made them uncomfortable. Her name was in the papers regarding her legal efforts. She got hate mail. Eventually she settled out of court. The settlement amount was not revealed but Griswold implies it was small.
Griswold’s book carries important messages. One was the environmental and human impact of fracking. While some may benefit, some others will be severely compromised both financially and physically, and there is little they can do about it. A second was about the collusion between big business and government agencies, in this case the state environmental agency and to a lesser extent, the EPA. The head of the state agency saw it as his job to promote fracking and energy development. State and federal inspectors often move on to work for the energy companies. A third was about the limits of the law and legal challenges. Large energy companies can hire the most experienced and best connected legal talent and defeat or just wear out almost any challenger. A fourth was Stacy’s poignant realization about her community and just where she stood in it. When she needed everyone’s support, aside from close family, a few of her friends, and the similarly afflicted, she received none. Rather she found the community she had had so much faith in had become hostile. She realized she was on her own.
In 2011 fracking was growing rapidly and in Western Pennsylvania companies were leasing mineral rights and offering many landowners royalties. Some people with large holdings in the right place profited significantly pulling in thousands of dollars a month. But even those with smaller properties could net several hundred dollars a month which was very significant to families such as Stacy’s. After Stacy and her neighbors signed leases the fracking company, Range Resources, began operations leveling off the top of a hill and building a large waste water containment pond, disposal pit and well head just 1,500 feet from Stacy’s property.
Before long Stacy began noticing her children getting sick more frequently with unusual ailments that persisted. Her animals also got sick and even died. Her water was no longer drinkable. The air was contaminated. She heard similar complaints from her neighbors. Her son dropped out of school, sick all the time. Her young daughter was always upset and Stacy was a nervous wreck. Eventually she had to leave her farm which was now worthless. She began incurring large debts to stay afloat. She tried dealing with Range Resources, the state environmental agency and the EPA, but felt she always got the runaround. She was getting the reputation as a troublemaker. Many in the community didn’t believe her. Many of them were getting or hoped to get monthly checks for leases. Some saw their small businesses prosper with the increased activity. They saw her as trying to stop an economic boom.
Stacy became entrenched in her position and found a friendly competent legal team to take her case. This meant years of tests on the water and on her and her children. It was very difficult to prove the connection between the fracking and the contamination in their bodies and water. The law and the chemistry were very complicated. There were depositions, hearings, multiple court dates. Increasingly Stacy no longer felt part of the community. Her world had been turned upside down. The county fair received big donations from the fracking companies who used it to promote their interests. What had been an event she and her children had looked forward to all year was now one that made them uncomfortable. Her name was in the papers regarding her legal efforts. She got hate mail. Eventually she settled out of court. The settlement amount was not revealed but Griswold implies it was small.
Griswold’s book carries important messages. One was the environmental and human impact of fracking. While some may benefit, some others will be severely compromised both financially and physically, and there is little they can do about it. A second was about the collusion between big business and government agencies, in this case the state environmental agency and to a lesser extent, the EPA. The head of the state agency saw it as his job to promote fracking and energy development. State and federal inspectors often move on to work for the energy companies. A third was about the limits of the law and legal challenges. Large energy companies can hire the most experienced and best connected legal talent and defeat or just wear out almost any challenger. A fourth was Stacy’s poignant realization about her community and just where she stood in it. When she needed everyone’s support, aside from close family, a few of her friends, and the similarly afflicted, she received none. Rather she found the community she had had so much faith in had become hostile. She realized she was on her own.
October 15, 2024
Engaging, well written and infuriating. Engaging, well written and infuriating. A revealing yet age old account for modern times. This is a story about fracking in Pennsylvania. It a hard story to recount because it is so familiar. Corporations are allowed to pollute the water and land with abandon because...jobs! When the fatal effects of their actions becomes apparent (in the form of cancer) to a family, they begin civil actions to protect the environment and the community by attempting to curtail the corporate waste. The corporation fights back with an almost unlimited amount of legal representation (see money) to litigate for years against a formally middle class family. The community sides with the corporation despite the fact that they are also affected by the toxic environment because ... jobs! The people are also hobbled by their own ideology and rugged independence and self-determination. They refuse to believe their own eyes because of the economic benefits. The sense of community is diminished in pursuit of capitalism. In fact the community thinks the person who demands accountability from the corporations is the problem. They are too in love with the fantasy that allows them to believe that they alone are responsible for any good that comes their way. If you have misfortune, it's not the corporation it's you. And this philosophy of individual determinism kills community progress. Because the community's displayed principles discourage looking out for health of human beings to encourage worrying the wealth of the community. And when every body is down it's due to cultural reasons rather than to blame the corporations or the shareholders that demand profit.
Valuing a community by measuring your accumulated wealth is a road to extinction. In this world health has little value if you have no money. But what value is money if you can't enjoy it and you've doomed your children to a toxic landscape. Health and wealth shouldn't and doesn't need to be mutually exclusive. And basically they sold too cheaply. I mean it's not enough for the families to move elsewhere. A vicious cycle. And far be it from me to cast judgement as I do not live where they frack though I do live near two superfund sites that were old military bases. I do know something about the effects of toxic chemicals in the soil and water supplies.
This is fundamentally the same things we in the US are wrestling with today some 20 years later. Exactly the same. Except the stakes really are more dire. Not just fracking but climate change and environmental factors like clean water and air among many other things. In the US we still can't get people to believe their eyes. Only the fantasy of ideology matters. Must be a bug not a feature of humans.
4.5ish stars
Listened to the audio book. Tavia Gilbert was excellent!
Valuing a community by measuring your accumulated wealth is a road to extinction. In this world health has little value if you have no money. But what value is money if you can't enjoy it and you've doomed your children to a toxic landscape. Health and wealth shouldn't and doesn't need to be mutually exclusive. And basically they sold too cheaply. I mean it's not enough for the families to move elsewhere. A vicious cycle. And far be it from me to cast judgement as I do not live where they frack though I do live near two superfund sites that were old military bases. I do know something about the effects of toxic chemicals in the soil and water supplies.
This is fundamentally the same things we in the US are wrestling with today some 20 years later. Exactly the same. Except the stakes really are more dire. Not just fracking but climate change and environmental factors like clean water and air among many other things. In the US we still can't get people to believe their eyes. Only the fantasy of ideology matters. Must be a bug not a feature of humans.
4.5ish stars
Listened to the audio book. Tavia Gilbert was excellent!
November 8, 2021
Great title. Important subject. Horrifying reality. Disappointing reading experience.
This book is marketed as a work of literary investigative journalism, a claim strengthened by the fact that it won a Pulitzer Prize in 2019. Heavy on subjectivity, and not light on authorial manipulation of sentiment, the true category it occupies is narrative nonfiction. While that is unlikely to create issues for many readers, it proved to be a problem for me. I want clear, fact-based information placed before me in as logical a fashion as possible. I want a forensic argument applied to the subject at hand and not a mood-lit, hand-tinted emotional appeal. Over the course of the many years Griswold spent with the participants of this drama, things seem to have become blurred in this regard. She didn't just make a few excursions across the boundaries that separate a journalist from her subject; she boldly crossed most of them and proudly planted her flag in one particular camp. The fact that she chose the same campground I would have is irrelevant: I'm not a journalist.
Most of the community-based "fractivists" she features are perfectly sympathetic to begin with. They have no need of being portrayed in the best possible light in order to elicit compassion from the reader. They are real people, of course, with idiosyncrasies, foibles, and contradictions, but this merely shows them to be human. Griswold, however, becomes an apologist for most of them, and this leads to the ironic consequence of encouraging those absorbing this saga to view them with more suspicion than would otherwise have been the case; to focus on their character flaws more than their strengths. The children continue to exert a certain charm throughout the book but several adult litigants grow tiresome and event exasperating.
There is also a fair amount of repetition. When this involves complicated scientific data, it is both necessary and helpful. There's a lot to absorb in order to fully understand what is happening in the sociopolitical, environmental, and legal circles of rural Pennsylvania. What I didn't need were reminders of the fact that a particular character drives a white Cadillac Escalade, or that Stacey works three jobs, or that mechanization led to the closure of glass factories, or that Kendra likes to surround herself with hundreds of legal documents while curled up on a red sofa on her porch. These factoids were already provided. I got it the first time.
Finally, there are inaccuracies related to some medical diagnoses, conditions, and medications. Not everything, but enough to give me pause. This always forces me to question the veracity of information an author provides on subjects with which I do not have as much familiarity.
In summation: I learned a lot about fracking, my pre-existing political and environmental beliefs were reinforced, my heart goes out to those living with this tragedy daily, and the package here is mediocre despite that Pulitzer.
This book is marketed as a work of literary investigative journalism, a claim strengthened by the fact that it won a Pulitzer Prize in 2019. Heavy on subjectivity, and not light on authorial manipulation of sentiment, the true category it occupies is narrative nonfiction. While that is unlikely to create issues for many readers, it proved to be a problem for me. I want clear, fact-based information placed before me in as logical a fashion as possible. I want a forensic argument applied to the subject at hand and not a mood-lit, hand-tinted emotional appeal. Over the course of the many years Griswold spent with the participants of this drama, things seem to have become blurred in this regard. She didn't just make a few excursions across the boundaries that separate a journalist from her subject; she boldly crossed most of them and proudly planted her flag in one particular camp. The fact that she chose the same campground I would have is irrelevant: I'm not a journalist.
Most of the community-based "fractivists" she features are perfectly sympathetic to begin with. They have no need of being portrayed in the best possible light in order to elicit compassion from the reader. They are real people, of course, with idiosyncrasies, foibles, and contradictions, but this merely shows them to be human. Griswold, however, becomes an apologist for most of them, and this leads to the ironic consequence of encouraging those absorbing this saga to view them with more suspicion than would otherwise have been the case; to focus on their character flaws more than their strengths. The children continue to exert a certain charm throughout the book but several adult litigants grow tiresome and event exasperating.
There is also a fair amount of repetition. When this involves complicated scientific data, it is both necessary and helpful. There's a lot to absorb in order to fully understand what is happening in the sociopolitical, environmental, and legal circles of rural Pennsylvania. What I didn't need were reminders of the fact that a particular character drives a white Cadillac Escalade, or that Stacey works three jobs, or that mechanization led to the closure of glass factories, or that Kendra likes to surround herself with hundreds of legal documents while curled up on a red sofa on her porch. These factoids were already provided. I got it the first time.
Finally, there are inaccuracies related to some medical diagnoses, conditions, and medications. Not everything, but enough to give me pause. This always forces me to question the veracity of information an author provides on subjects with which I do not have as much familiarity.
In summation: I learned a lot about fracking, my pre-existing political and environmental beliefs were reinforced, my heart goes out to those living with this tragedy daily, and the package here is mediocre despite that Pulitzer.
June 30, 2018
My rating may be somewhat skewed because I was engrossed by the story of how a new extraction industry impacted the people I went to middle and high school with. Some of the non-sequiturs in the story telling annoyed me, but the writing captures what I know to be true about the people of Amity and southern Washington County. Amity and Prosperity lays out the real challenges and conflicts facing Americans in resource rich but economically challenged regions of the country. Unfortunately, it is clear that the power large industries continue to wield often harms those in its path.
July 4, 2018
There were other impacts from the fracking boom and the Haneys were feeling them. Over the course of eight years, as Eliza Griswold tracks this family in this powerful book, they lose their health, their animals, their house, and their trust in just about everyone except a pair of crusading lawyers who tilt at the windmills of industry and the government agencies that should be protecting them.
Amity and Prosperity is the kind of propulsive read that marks our great story-telling journalist/writers today. Griswold uses her extensive visits to the region and understanding of this one family to tell a story that is much larger. She is telling us about small things like county fairs, hard-working single mothers, the ties that bind together neighbors, and the persistent pleasures of small town life. But she’s also telling us about God, politics, government, industry, and the perils of living in a resource-rich, desperately poor region.
It’s about America, and given the state of things at the moment, that makes it a tumultuous read.
Read my full review on Heartlands...https://alexjoyner.com/2018/07/03/fra....
Full disclosure: Farrar, Strauss & Giroux provided a copy in exchange for an honest review.
Amity and Prosperity is the kind of propulsive read that marks our great story-telling journalist/writers today. Griswold uses her extensive visits to the region and understanding of this one family to tell a story that is much larger. She is telling us about small things like county fairs, hard-working single mothers, the ties that bind together neighbors, and the persistent pleasures of small town life. But she’s also telling us about God, politics, government, industry, and the perils of living in a resource-rich, desperately poor region.
It’s about America, and given the state of things at the moment, that makes it a tumultuous read.
Read my full review on Heartlands...https://alexjoyner.com/2018/07/03/fra....
Full disclosure: Farrar, Strauss & Giroux provided a copy in exchange for an honest review.
April 27, 2019
I squeezed this excellent piece of longform investigative journalism into my schedule. It won a Pulitzer this year for a reason. The book reads like an environmental legal thriller, but the story is entirely true. The author spent six years of research and interviews to piece together the story. In her "notes on sources" at the end of the book, she says she had been in Nigeria, a place where "some of the poorest people in the world live on some of the most resource-rich land " (p.307), when she read of the bridge collapse in 2007 in Minneapolis and knew there were places in the USA with problems similar to those of poor people in the Global South. In this book she focuses on what fracking did to one family and their small community at the edge of Appalachia in southwestern Pennsylvania. The chemical contamination of living near an extraction site caused a multitude of illnesses, eventually forcing the family she profiled to abandon their farm. A married pair of lawyers took on their case, fighting for years against the industry which equivocated at every turn, insisting there was no definitive proof their chemicals had fouled the water and air of the small community. The suit pitted neighbors against each other, as some financially benefited from their gas leases, while others suffered a cascade of medical problems. At every turn, both local and federal agencies tasked with protecting the environment sided with industry as employees seemed to make use of the revolving door between government and industry jobs. The heroes of the story were the two lawyers who doggedly spent years of their life reading through reams of reports and legal judgments to find a way to hold industry accountable. The story was maddening, but perhaps not shocking since, as we all know, money casts its long shadow over everything in this country. Highly recommended.
September 16, 2019
When 2019's Pulitzer prizes were announced, I was a little underwhelmed. Compared to previous years, the topics just didn't excite me the way I'd hoped they would. Still, in my quest to read all of the Pulitzer winners, I put them on my list. I had wanted to try to keep up with the winners each year (I did manage this in 2018 for fiction and all three nonfiction categories), so I bought a copy of each and planned to read them.
I have to admit that this book, based on its title and what I thought it was about, didn't appeal to me. I didn't think I wanted to read it as a top priority. I'm a little bit unsympathetic to many stories I hear of people in Appalachia, I admit, and so I pushed it down the list. After hearing from a Goodreads friend that this book was very well done, I moved it up a little, and then this week, I decided to go ahead and give it a go. I wanted something that wasn't too long and that might break up the other books I've been reading, which remarkably all seem to be either related to slavery or to World War II (and not on purpose).
I was surprised to find that I really loved this book. It was written very well, keeping me turning the pages almost as if I was reading a thriller. It wasn't what I expected, and what was more surprising is that this story was and is happening in my backyard. I live about 40 miles, give or take, from Amity and Prosperity, towns I'd never heard of but which I've probably driven past dozens of times on my way to somewhere else. The issue of community enforcement of zoning rules for fracking has been one that's come up in my own town, as a company has started fracking near a park one town over. The laws being decided because of the Haneys and Range Resources directly apply to me.
And yet, despite news coverage of the case, I hadn't ever heard anything about it. It's not a complete surprise because I don't tend to follow many local news sources — I really don't need to be inundated with sports news and dire reports of local crimes every day. Still, it isn't often that one of the nonfiction books I read happens so closely in time or space to me, and I think that may have added something to its excitement for me.
What was really striking is that even if the Haneys and Voyleses hadn't signed mineral leases with Range, they almost certainly would have experienced the same problems and level of impact. Additionally, fracking was so new and relatively unknown when their issues started that they didn't necessarily know (and couldn't have known, although they might have guessed) how dangerous it would be for their health and their water.
I found myself being frustrated with the EPA, DEP, and FBI, with the entrenchment of corporate interests and the energy lobby in our government, with the entire state of Pennsylvania, where I've lived most of my life, for their failures to protect the land and the people and for their complete unwillingness to penalize "job creators" like Range. The obsession with corporations as "job creators" is ridiculous. Range can't make money without the natural resources they want to exploit. Those are in a specific location. What are they going to do if you regulate them, pick up the shale and walk it over to Ohio? It's a dumb argument especially re: energy companies. Politicians are more concerned with whom the companies will spend money to elect, which is completely unacceptable, and cases like this help illustrate why that is.
As a note, I did look up the case and discovered that the settlement (which the local newspaper managed to find and publish) was a paltry $3 million. That's in total, for all three families involved. That's before legal fees of 25-33% were taken (well-deserved for the Smiths, but still a deduction) and before taxes. Not to mention the other terms of the settlement, which release Range from all liability and give them the right of first refusal to purchase the land the plaintiffs owned if they sell, and a clause that the plaintiffs (Haney et al) can't say anything disparaging about Range. It's a pretty terrible settlement, though I can see why they would want to take it so they could move on with their lives.
I highly recommend reading this (and have already recommended it to close friends and family). It's well-written and informative, and a good look at how fracking (especially when done recklessly) has impacted one community in America. It's a favorite for the year and highly deserving of the praise it's gotten.
I have to admit that this book, based on its title and what I thought it was about, didn't appeal to me. I didn't think I wanted to read it as a top priority. I'm a little bit unsympathetic to many stories I hear of people in Appalachia, I admit, and so I pushed it down the list. After hearing from a Goodreads friend that this book was very well done, I moved it up a little, and then this week, I decided to go ahead and give it a go. I wanted something that wasn't too long and that might break up the other books I've been reading, which remarkably all seem to be either related to slavery or to World War II (and not on purpose).
I was surprised to find that I really loved this book. It was written very well, keeping me turning the pages almost as if I was reading a thriller. It wasn't what I expected, and what was more surprising is that this story was and is happening in my backyard. I live about 40 miles, give or take, from Amity and Prosperity, towns I'd never heard of but which I've probably driven past dozens of times on my way to somewhere else. The issue of community enforcement of zoning rules for fracking has been one that's come up in my own town, as a company has started fracking near a park one town over. The laws being decided because of the Haneys and Range Resources directly apply to me.
And yet, despite news coverage of the case, I hadn't ever heard anything about it. It's not a complete surprise because I don't tend to follow many local news sources — I really don't need to be inundated with sports news and dire reports of local crimes every day. Still, it isn't often that one of the nonfiction books I read happens so closely in time or space to me, and I think that may have added something to its excitement for me.
What was really striking is that even if the Haneys and Voyleses hadn't signed mineral leases with Range, they almost certainly would have experienced the same problems and level of impact. Additionally, fracking was so new and relatively unknown when their issues started that they didn't necessarily know (and couldn't have known, although they might have guessed) how dangerous it would be for their health and their water.
I found myself being frustrated with the EPA, DEP, and FBI, with the entrenchment of corporate interests and the energy lobby in our government, with the entire state of Pennsylvania, where I've lived most of my life, for their failures to protect the land and the people and for their complete unwillingness to penalize "job creators" like Range. The obsession with corporations as "job creators" is ridiculous. Range can't make money without the natural resources they want to exploit. Those are in a specific location. What are they going to do if you regulate them, pick up the shale and walk it over to Ohio? It's a dumb argument especially re: energy companies. Politicians are more concerned with whom the companies will spend money to elect, which is completely unacceptable, and cases like this help illustrate why that is.
As a note, I did look up the case and discovered that the settlement (which the local newspaper managed to find and publish) was a paltry $3 million. That's in total, for all three families involved. That's before legal fees of 25-33% were taken (well-deserved for the Smiths, but still a deduction) and before taxes. Not to mention the other terms of the settlement, which release Range from all liability and give them the right of first refusal to purchase the land the plaintiffs owned if they sell, and a clause that the plaintiffs (Haney et al) can't say anything disparaging about Range. It's a pretty terrible settlement, though I can see why they would want to take it so they could move on with their lives.
I highly recommend reading this (and have already recommended it to close friends and family). It's well-written and informative, and a good look at how fracking (especially when done recklessly) has impacted one community in America. It's a favorite for the year and highly deserving of the praise it's gotten.
May 2, 2020
Pulitzer Prize Nonfiction - 2019. Well, I had a strange coincidence with this one. I guess I hadn't noticed that I had just read a book very similar to this. Toms River: A Story of Science and Salvation. They both won the Pulitzer recently (I guess the committee likes these industry-pollution-causes-illness stories), they both focus on big companies in New Jersey and Pennsylvania contaminating local groundwater, and they both cite the difficulties in discovering, researching, then litigating and/or resolving the problems.
Originally, as I began reading, I was relieved to see it was much shorter than Toms River, and the writing was much less technical and less detailed. In fact, I mistakenly thought, oh, this one will read more like a human interest story, good. But get this: I liked the more difficult, heavier read better.
In fact, I found Ms. Griswold's writing style to be as technical and reportorial as Mr. Fagin's, if not more. So it did NOT read like a story to me. Both authors were good about keeping their objectivity; however, in doing so, Griswold also lost her passion; Fagin did not. Griswold's report sort of fizzled and felt tired at the end. Fagin's report was eye-opening and thought-provoking until the last page.
I didn't mean for this to become a compare/contrast review. I liked this book, I learned a few things about fracking, and I'm glad I read it. Yet it wasn't "gripping" as the book jacket describes. It's great for the reader who just wants a brief summary of a family & community dealing with fracking. But boy, if you really want some suspense and freak-out moments of American greed and early histories of the correlation between industry and illness - plus never drink out of the tap again -ha! - it's Toms River all the way!
Originally, as I began reading, I was relieved to see it was much shorter than Toms River, and the writing was much less technical and less detailed. In fact, I mistakenly thought, oh, this one will read more like a human interest story, good. But get this: I liked the more difficult, heavier read better.
In fact, I found Ms. Griswold's writing style to be as technical and reportorial as Mr. Fagin's, if not more. So it did NOT read like a story to me. Both authors were good about keeping their objectivity; however, in doing so, Griswold also lost her passion; Fagin did not. Griswold's report sort of fizzled and felt tired at the end. Fagin's report was eye-opening and thought-provoking until the last page.
I didn't mean for this to become a compare/contrast review. I liked this book, I learned a few things about fracking, and I'm glad I read it. Yet it wasn't "gripping" as the book jacket describes. It's great for the reader who just wants a brief summary of a family & community dealing with fracking. But boy, if you really want some suspense and freak-out moments of American greed and early histories of the correlation between industry and illness - plus never drink out of the tap again -ha! - it's Toms River all the way!
June 9, 2019
I have a weird background going into this book. My ex husband has worked for the State Environmental Department for the state of TN for over 20 years. I knew coming into this book the sorts of things he ran into in rural areas of that state, including locals dumping hazardous waste on family farms. So I knew that state agencies don't always have the resources to investigate and enforce the state laws. So the situation in PA saddened, but did not surprise me.
Still, even knowing that, I feel for the families shown in this book. I feel as a country, we can do better....need to do better to protect ALL of our citizens, especially ones like Buzz who are less able to protect themselves.
I also appreciated the broader view afforded by this book. What price do Stacey and her family pay for me to be able to turn on my lights whenever I wish. And the every glass of water I consume...and every shower I take, every load of laundry I wash....every breath of air I breath.
Still, even knowing that, I feel for the families shown in this book. I feel as a country, we can do better....need to do better to protect ALL of our citizens, especially ones like Buzz who are less able to protect themselves.
I also appreciated the broader view afforded by this book. What price do Stacey and her family pay for me to be able to turn on my lights whenever I wish. And the every glass of water I consume...and every shower I take, every load of laundry I wash....every breath of air I breath.
March 11, 2019
I pray the American oil and gas industry and everyone associated with it receives a horrible comeuppance one day. Stacey Haney is made of steel and it broke my heart to read about what Range Resources stole from her and her kids--not just property, not just every last dollar they had, but their health, their sanity, their livelihood. The failures of the EPA are terrifying. Protection, my ass. The refusal, as ever, of the American court system to do anything meaningful to remedy gross injustice: also terrifying.
A baby goat born in three pieces. Puppies poisoned to death by their own mother's breastmilk. It'd be great if we could all stop pretending there is anything remotely acceptable about fracking. Excellent book.
A baby goat born in three pieces. Puppies poisoned to death by their own mother's breastmilk. It'd be great if we could all stop pretending there is anything remotely acceptable about fracking. Excellent book.
July 13, 2018
If you live around Pittsburgh, you need to read this book.
It reads like a novel, following one family who "lost" - a sacrifice for extractive industries. The book lays out how daily hardships, even small ones, can add up to destroy a home. Lots of Pittsburgh content in this one, with a shocking/not shocking description of how the DEP and EPA operate hand in hand with industry.
It reads like a novel, following one family who "lost" - a sacrifice for extractive industries. The book lays out how daily hardships, even small ones, can add up to destroy a home. Lots of Pittsburgh content in this one, with a shocking/not shocking description of how the DEP and EPA operate hand in hand with industry.
July 24, 2018
I don't even know where to start. It is shocking to me that this kind of systematic failure by Government to protect its own citizens is taking place in America. This is the kind of thing that happens in third world countries, not here in our own backyard.
While I fully realize Amity and Prosperity certainly has an agenda, the blatant disregard by government agencies, local government and corporations coupled with the general lack of public outcry should make everyone angry. I still cannot wrap my head around the fact that Range Resources basically got off scott free. There is documented evidence of their failure to protect the people of the community as well as their obvious disregard for rules and regulations.
I felt that Griswold laid out the facts rather clearly. Everyone should read this. This is not just a cautionary tale, these practices are still taking place. It's not of matter of "it could happen to you" so much as a matter of when. Thank you to NetGalley for providing an ARC for review.
While I fully realize Amity and Prosperity certainly has an agenda, the blatant disregard by government agencies, local government and corporations coupled with the general lack of public outcry should make everyone angry. I still cannot wrap my head around the fact that Range Resources basically got off scott free. There is documented evidence of their failure to protect the people of the community as well as their obvious disregard for rules and regulations.
I felt that Griswold laid out the facts rather clearly. Everyone should read this. This is not just a cautionary tale, these practices are still taking place. It's not of matter of "it could happen to you" so much as a matter of when. Thank you to NetGalley for providing an ARC for review.
April 29, 2019
A blog post to come! There are a few spoilers in this review. ^^
The book is about how fracking business brought wealth into Amity with large scale consequences to the natural land. Few, poor families were affected adversely from the fracking. Most people were not affected, government thrived on its profits, and the small towns were aided financially to the fracking agreement.
The water, air, and ground became contaminated with all kinds of poisons. For the families living near the Yeager site, they were poisoned everyday!
Two courageous lawyers and few families band together to raise awareness of the risks of fracking. They file suit against the company. It was tough battle, which led to losing the lawsuit. They won in a way that spreaded awareness to surrounding states and countries! The company changed their methods in efficiently extracting the gas with minimal pollution.
This book is definitely worth the read!
The book is about how fracking business brought wealth into Amity with large scale consequences to the natural land. Few, poor families were affected adversely from the fracking. Most people were not affected, government thrived on its profits, and the small towns were aided financially to the fracking agreement.
The water, air, and ground became contaminated with all kinds of poisons. For the families living near the Yeager site, they were poisoned everyday!
Two courageous lawyers and few families band together to raise awareness of the risks of fracking. They file suit against the company. It was tough battle, which led to losing the lawsuit. They won in a way that spreaded awareness to surrounding states and countries! The company changed their methods in efficiently extracting the gas with minimal pollution.
This book is definitely worth the read!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 28, 2020
This is an excellent albeit heartbreaking book. It tells the story of a single mom, her two kids, and her neighbors that grow sick due to a fracking site up the road and take the company to court. The writing is superb — a complex situation made easy to follow with compassionate descriptions and intricate details that make you root for the individuals.
I want to recommend this book to anyone who has western PA connections, to those interested in the law, and to those interested in environmental protection. It felt so close to home and yet I learned about my neighbors in ways I’ve been to blind and privileged to see.
I want to recommend this book to anyone who has western PA connections, to those interested in the law, and to those interested in environmental protection. It felt so close to home and yet I learned about my neighbors in ways I’ve been to blind and privileged to see.
August 10, 2019
In this Pulitzer Prize winner novel, fracking takes the controversial center. Maimed and dying animals, repulsive odors, and chronically ill children plague three families of Amity and Prosperity, Pennsylvania. Years embroiled in an on-going lawsuit against the city and federal government as well as the local drilling company, this story shows how many hope to make a profit at the expense of many Americans regardless of the health cost. Truly alarming and horrifying. For those who enjoy Erin Brockovich or Rachel Carson.
July 30, 2018
This was probably more of a 4.5. Great book, sad/frustrating story but well told.
August 31, 2018
A powerful, revealing look at how fracking shattered a rural Pennsylvania town, and how one of its lifelong residents brought national attention to the story.
April 7, 2020
3.5 stars
December 24, 2021
One of the best, most horrifying books I’ve read this year. Review to come.
July 27, 2020
As a naturalist, scientist, environmentalist, and dyed-in-the-wool Leftist, this book should have been right up my alley. But given not only that it's a Pulitzer-winner, but also that the author spent 5 years in the region with her main subject - a nurse - and an abundance of scientists, the frequent inaccuracies, even if small, regarding both environmental and medical science are inexcusable for a prize-winning book. Whether by ignorance or by intellectual dishonesty, I don't know which one would be worse. Rather than provide a compelling argument or narrative, the author goes for cheap, eye-rolling sentimentality in this environmental science case study.
Not only is this bad investigative reporting, not only is it bad science journalism, but it's also bad in the same way that local interest stories written by nubile news anchors are bad. To boot, she arguably picked the wrong story to tell: the husband and wife legal team who actually took on Goliath is only obliquely referenced. Facing long odds, potential ruin of their reputation, personal danger, and at incredible financial risk - working pro-bono for many side cases, including on an actual contract with an entire municipality - this husband and wife team took the powerful natural gas lobby all the way to the Supreme Court, and won! That's not interesting enough to be the main story of a book? Instead, it's the continuous suffering of a local rural family who, for whatever reason, are painted as an anomaly in their own town?
So many questions are raised by how this story is told: if fracking is so bad, and its poisoning is so prevalent, then why is it that the children are the only ones who seem to be sick at school? Why can't the mother's co-workers relate? Why do they seem to be so isolated in their experience?
There is a surely a good reason - I happen to know why fracking is bad because of my own ties to family in Oklahoma - but Griswold never clarifies that. For that matter, I have no idea if Griswold bothered interviewing other town members other than the neighbors.
Perhaps the trials and tribulations of a wealthy, local, lawyer power couple wasn't good enough for a literary audience so removed from reality that they'll happily give out awards for fetishizing white poverty. Taking on fracking and corporate energy interests is noble, and fracking is awful for the environment, but important work is different than a well-executed work. The irony is Griswold proves the opposing, local argument regarding outsiders: they don't understand the issues involved, and they don't understand what is valuable to their communities.
Rural America is worth protecting, and because fracking is awful, and because these topics are indeed important, these topics deserved better than a bad understanding of science nested within an exploitative melodrama.
I would have given this two stars, but it won a Pulitzer prize, and compared against its peers, it falls to one.
Not only is this bad investigative reporting, not only is it bad science journalism, but it's also bad in the same way that local interest stories written by nubile news anchors are bad. To boot, she arguably picked the wrong story to tell: the husband and wife legal team who actually took on Goliath is only obliquely referenced. Facing long odds, potential ruin of their reputation, personal danger, and at incredible financial risk - working pro-bono for many side cases, including on an actual contract with an entire municipality - this husband and wife team took the powerful natural gas lobby all the way to the Supreme Court, and won! That's not interesting enough to be the main story of a book? Instead, it's the continuous suffering of a local rural family who, for whatever reason, are painted as an anomaly in their own town?
So many questions are raised by how this story is told: if fracking is so bad, and its poisoning is so prevalent, then why is it that the children are the only ones who seem to be sick at school? Why can't the mother's co-workers relate? Why do they seem to be so isolated in their experience?
There is a surely a good reason - I happen to know why fracking is bad because of my own ties to family in Oklahoma - but Griswold never clarifies that. For that matter, I have no idea if Griswold bothered interviewing other town members other than the neighbors.
Perhaps the trials and tribulations of a wealthy, local, lawyer power couple wasn't good enough for a literary audience so removed from reality that they'll happily give out awards for fetishizing white poverty. Taking on fracking and corporate energy interests is noble, and fracking is awful for the environment, but important work is different than a well-executed work. The irony is Griswold proves the opposing, local argument regarding outsiders: they don't understand the issues involved, and they don't understand what is valuable to their communities.
Rural America is worth protecting, and because fracking is awful, and because these topics are indeed important, these topics deserved better than a bad understanding of science nested within an exploitative melodrama.
I would have given this two stars, but it won a Pulitzer prize, and compared against its peers, it falls to one.
June 27, 2018
A very well written book . I learned a lot about fracking. Certainly not as harmless as we are led to believe. The author did not beat us over the head with "science." Some of course, but the main focus of the book was about the personal struggles of those involved with this ecological disaster.
I would recommend this book to others.
I would recommend this book to others.
July 17, 2018
A great look at what is actually "Trump country." (Fuck you, "Hillbilly Elegy.")
The poor puppies :(
The poor puppies :(
December 11, 2021
Every few years a David & Goliath story involving corporate malfeasance and injured citizens draws lots of attention, particularly when it comes to cases involving public health and "simple" things like whether water is drinkable or not, and why are people and animals dying of cancer. Think, for example, of the movie "Erin Brockovich,", or books like "A Civil Action" and "Toms River." Such works touch a nerve, as they should. They probe where true power lies, where corruption quietly resides, how legal contests are gamed. Sometimes such works have happy endings -- because we really do long for assurance that justice can prevail -- and sometimes they don't. I won't say which of these categories "Amity and Prosperity" falls in. I'll simply say that it deserved the Pulitzer Prize it won. It is smartly and sensitively written, astonishingly well researched, and perhaps most impressive of all, Grisworld lets the facts speak for themselves; she doesn't throw expressions of moral outrage into the reader's face.
Very highly recommended. With one observation: Although, as I noted, such stories are told with regularity, exposing misdeeds, lies, and apathy at numerous corporate and governmental levels, and the stories wins awards and garner praise and calls for action, it seems that not much changes. Because if things had changed in any meaningful way, the books and movies wouldn't still be coming out with regularity.
Very highly recommended. With one observation: Although, as I noted, such stories are told with regularity, exposing misdeeds, lies, and apathy at numerous corporate and governmental levels, and the stories wins awards and garner praise and calls for action, it seems that not much changes. Because if things had changed in any meaningful way, the books and movies wouldn't still be coming out with regularity.
August 18, 2019
Disgust and outrage kept me company as I read this 2019 General Nonfiction Pulitzer prize winner. And there was gratitude (and shame), too, that I had never had to choose between clean, healthy water and economic survival. The author noted at the end that "[s]o many of the problems of collective poverty plaguing Africa and Asia were becoming more evident in America", and that she decided to turn her attention to domestic shortcomings as a result. I found it hard to put this book down, and hope it frames my thinking about our society for years to come.
January 11, 2019
This is a good book I enjoyed reading. It reminded me in many ways of Jonathan Harr's very good book A Civil Action but it lacks the depth of Harr's book and I can't help compare the books and rate this one a star lower.
September 19, 2019
Audio book narrated by Tavia Gilbert 10 hrs 34 mins
This is primarily the story of how fracking destroyed the lives of a family in a rural Pennsylvania town and how gas and oil corporations with their crooked and/or careless energy politics, sell us their poisons and destruction under the guise of "the greater good".
Its amazing how many people will accept it all as long as they are paid well and the resulting unintended casualties are not their own.
This book was well researched, easy to follow and beautifully narrated. I recommend it to those that like me knew very little about fracking and the destruction it brings to rural towns struggling to survive.
This is primarily the story of how fracking destroyed the lives of a family in a rural Pennsylvania town and how gas and oil corporations with their crooked and/or careless energy politics, sell us their poisons and destruction under the guise of "the greater good".
Its amazing how many people will accept it all as long as they are paid well and the resulting unintended casualties are not their own.
This book was well researched, easy to follow and beautifully narrated. I recommend it to those that like me knew very little about fracking and the destruction it brings to rural towns struggling to survive.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 594 reviews