With tales of dysfunctional families and idiosyncratic characters now dominating American fiction, entire novels take place outside of any particular social tableau. Fiction that depicts people as shaped by the politics of their times, or that discusses social and economic issues are increasingly rare. Phillip Roth’s The Plot Against America was a welcome exception to this trend, and Chris Bachelder’s U.S.! is another. Whereas Roth set his book in the 1930’s and 40’s to build a metaphor for the present, Bachelder brings a prominent writer from those years---Upton Sinclair—back from the dead to make an important point about America’s abandonment of progressive ideals. Bachelder’s account of Sinclair’s faith in the novelist’s capacity to spur Americans to action is one of the many reasons that U.S.! is one of the funniest and insightful novels that I have read in years.

Upton Sinclair wrote 87 books in his life, and is best known for The Jungle. The Jungle’s vivid description of the Chicago meatpacking industry did not improve worker safety but did lead to the passage of America’s first food protection laws. Sinclair responded with his famous quote, “I aimed for America’s heart but hit its stomach.”

Sinclair is also known for his populist candidacy for governor of California in 1934, a campaign he immortalized in his must-read “I, Candidate for Governor.” This was the campaign where Hollywood movie studios hired hoboes for movie newsreels to tell audiences---who had no idea these were actors paid by Sinclair’s opponents--- that they were moving to California because when Sinclair gets elected, people would be paid for not working.

I mention the above because if you have never heard of Upton Sinclair, this may be all you need to know to enjoy the book. If you do know about Sinclair, this book is an absolute joy.

In U.S.! Upton Sinclair is used to symbolize a bygone era in which Americans cared about social and economic justice. In those days, writers who promoted such themes—like Dos Passos, Lewis, Dreiser and Sinclair himself---were popular.

Bachelder’s plot involves his bringing back from the dead a writer (Sinclair) from an era where novels sought to impact social policy. Since changing political times have ostracized and isolated Sinclair’s populist ideas, he repeatedly comes back to life only to be regularly assassinated. Killing Sinclair is identified with liquidating the American left, and Sinclair’s assassins become national heroes.

Sinclair is the perfect embodiment of the decline of progressive ideals because his own influence steadily declined after the 1930’s, and by the 1950’s both he and the left had become politically irrelevant. Bachelder has fun with Sinclair’s ardent belief that he still has the capacity to ignite a progressive movement, but respects Sinclair’s ideals and satirizes the unreasonable fears that his successive revivals from death generates among Americans.

The challenge in using satire and metaphor to describe political attitudes is avoiding either cynicism or gross exaggeration. Bachelder succeeds, and subtlety advances his own message about America’s hostility to policies that would benefit the majority.

Bachelder uses several devices to show how conservatives remain frightened of progressive messages despite their lack of political support. He thus perfectly captures the corporate media’s increasing restriction on the expression of alternative voices despite conservative control of the national government.

Bachelder best captures the America of the past three decades when he has characters who are victims of corporate outsourcing, or who lack health care and decent wages, speak with venom against Sinclair’s promotion of greater economic fairness. The corporate propaganda machine has transformed the low-income workers who would benefit most from Sinclair’s agenda into its greatest opponents, with the price of their victory over progressive ideals the perpetuation of unfair social and economic policies..

Bachelder’s portrayal of working-class loyalty to policies that are hurting them is poignant. He is not contemptuous toward those whose lives are focused on extinguishing any hint of progressive policies; rather, he is understanding, and by book’s end convinces readers that Sinclair’s belief that people will one day see the truth is not farfetched.

Bachelder depicts Sinclair as someone enormously devoted to living a moral life, and who dedicated his life toward bringing justice to America. While he is often politically naive, and retains a massive ego despite his loss of audience, Sinclair is nevertheless a sympathetic and interesting enough character to carry the book.

The final irony of U.S.!---Bachelder has much fun with Sinclair’s use of the exclamation point---is that its author has proved the point that the plot of the book is designed to disprove. Namely, this is a book that will shape people’s attitudes, and it gives a well-deserved psychological boost to progressives whose electoral defeats are read to imply that they—not society---are on the wrong track.

Sinclair insists throughout the book that writers can impact the world, while other characters dispute this as the ravings of a man living in the past. By writing a book that forces readers to rethink what is happening in America, Bachelder provides the best possible confirmation of Sinclair’s analysis.

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