“A fast-paced, well-researched narrative. . . . Bread and Roses is packed with facts, but Watson makes it an exciting read.” — New York Times.

“A skilled storyteller, Watson offers a moving and compelling account of radical dreams, conservative nightmares, and immigrant aspirations that informed the making of modern America.” — Chicago Tribune

“A spirited account.” — Boston Globe

They were an army twenty-three thousand strong, haling from some fifty-one nations — and they had had enough. On January 12, 1912, they left their menial jobs in the massive textile mills of Lawrence, Massachusetts. Storming the streets, they began what would become one of the most tumultuous and sensational strikes in American history. Bread and Roses is the first full-length account of this watershed event, in which desperate workers — many of them women — battled with the most powerful forces in America in a struggle that defined an age and captured the attention of the world. Not just a history of Labor but a story of issues that still trouble us — immigration, inequality, women’s rights, and the struggle for the American Dream.