Kindle Edition Download to your Nook (eBook) Amazon Barnes & Noble.com Kitty Kroger Category:  Literary Fiction Publisher: Division Street Books ISBN-10:  0984928804 Type: Fiction Pages: 303 Copyright: March 1, 2012 ISBN-13: 9780984928804 Dancing with Mao and Miguel is a riveting love story set against the backdrop of radical politics in the 1970s. Jenny, an organizer in a refinery in New Jersey, falls in love with a Dominican immigrant. As she’s drawn ever closer to him, she struggles with political doubts, longtime fears of intimacy and sex, and personal betrayal on the way to discovering her own path. Dancing with Mao and Miguel  is a relationship story set against the backdrop of radical politics in 1970s New Jersey. Middle-class Jenny Apple has cast off her “class privilege” to work in a copper refinery and organize workers for a revolution that is to occur within ten years. One night at work she meets Miguel, an immigrant from the Dominican Republic who participated in the revolution there in 1965 against the dictator Trujillo. Jenny is captivated by Miguel while torn by political doubts about the dogmatism of the Maoist collective she belongs to. Her increasingly destructive relationship with Miguel, her long-standing fears of sexual intimacy, and her political misgivings all collide to threaten a breakdown. Dancing with Mao and Miguel presents a page-turning and fascinating glimpse into a little-known slice of American history through the eyes of a self-conscious, at times amusing , and always unflinchingly honest protagonist. Excerpt BECAUSE I SUSPECT that my co-worker Juan at the next furnace is an informant, I wait until he turns his back, then extract a stack of leaflets from between the pages of the Daily News, which I always bring in with me to work. I slide the leaflets underneath my blue work shirt where they nestle snugly against my ribs over my thermal underwear. Heading down the shed for my 2 a.m. break, I shiver from the icy gusts that shoot through the open ends of the long building. The chill seeps into the marrow of my bones and holds fast there, like a visitor who’s outworn her welcome and shows no sign of leaving. I'm working in a copper refinery in Central New Jersey on the graveyard shift. Perfect name for it. Buried alive. Solitary figures in silver asbestos jackets huddle next to far-flung furnaces that glow like tiny havens in a frigid, post-nuclear wasteland. On the way to the break room I hand out leaflets to a few trusted co-workers, urging them to attend a meeting next week at a local bar: we’re organizing a caucus to run in the union election, to oppose the incumbents, who are selling us down the river. As I enter the break room, at first I notice nothing different. The clock on the wall behind the cracked plastic tells me there are only five-and-a-half more hours to go. Common wisdom in the plant: ignore the clock. Harsh fluorescent lights illuminate the dingy space. A heater in the corner sputters, straining to deliver each wisp of lukewarm air. The radio on the cigarette machine plays John Lennon’s latest: “Whatever Gets You Through the Night.” Mm-hmm. Then I see him—a worker I’ve never seen before—sitting at a table staring into his coffee. The first thing I notice is his skin. A dark shade of brown. He appears about my age—in his late twenties or early thirties. Like most workers he’s probably an immigrant from the Caribbean, but he could be Afro-American. Seeing a new man or woman in the break room always animates me. A fresh worker to scope out. Will he or she turn out to be advanced, a person who grasps intuitively that bosses and workers have nothing in common? Discovering an advanced worker is like winning the lottery. Or will he be a middleworker, satisfied to have a union job that “pays a decent wage.” He doesn’t look as if he’ll be backwards--those are the racist workers, anti-communists, sometimes in league with the bosses, sometimes anti-union. Unlike most men I run across in the plant, something about this one sends a thrill through me, a frisson of apprehension and anticipation, an impulse to flee offset by a curiosity that nails me to the spot. What will unfold--or unravel?

A Story of Self-discovery
Kitty Kroger's debut novel is the moving story of a young radical activist trying to find her path in life while infatuated with two inspiring but unreliable dance partners. Filled with multi-dimensional characters and compelling description of New Jersey working class life in the 1970s, Dancing with Mao and Miguel is above all a story of self-discovery. Readers who decide to follow the novel's heroine on her roller coaster journey will discover some new ways of looking at the world along with her.

–Max Elbaum, author, Revolution in the Air


Deeply Engrossing
Jenny, the youthful protagonist of the deeply engrossing Dancing with Mao and Miguel, lives at a time of major social and cultural transition. The "sexual revolution" is evolving (at least for some) into the woman's liberation movement. The era of "vanguard" left-wing political formations in the U.S. is facing some major practical and ideological challenges. Jenny's personal struggles as she navigates her way through these tumultuous times makes for an exciting and thoughtful read.

----Adele Wallace
Co-founder and co-manager, Sisterhood Bookstore, Los Angeles, CA 1972-1999