Alex Cohen is a 26-year-old American, primed to take over
his father’s shoe factory in China. He
falls in love with Ivy, a seamstress in the factory, who is working to unionize
the plant. The conditions there are
horrific, and Alex, thanks to Ivy’s prodding, is beginning to notice. He finds himself pulled in several
directions. The union organizers want
his help in allowing a strike; the mayor wants him to rat out the union
organizers; his friend Bernie wants Alex to join him in creating a new brand of
shoe, using Alex’s factory; and Alex’s father stubbornly wants to retain the
status quo, including kickbacks to corrupt officials. When a despondent worker
commits suicide, Alex starts to lean in the direction of change, knowing that
sparring with his father is going to require him to summon courage that he has
never displayed in the past. Despite the
weighty subject matter, the author keeps the tone light, especially in the
dialog between Alex, who has a knack for design, and his father, who refuses to
initiate change but may, in fact, embrace it if it helps his bottom line. One particularly funny scene plays out near
the beginning when Alex replaces their usual 60-year-old size 6 foot model with
the beautiful Ivy. This book made me
wonder which of my shoes were manufactured in China, and my guess is that all
of them were, or at least, in Asia. The
Cohens are not directly involved in the production of leather, but that work is
even more disturbing, if that’s possible.
Synthetic shoes are looking better and better, but the factories
probably still reek of glue and dye.
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