Adult Non-Fiction

This list of fiction and nonfiction material, compiled by Matt Pettit at the Topeka & Shawnee County Public Library, provides a range of perspectives on the issues raised by the POV documentary Landfall. Through shard-like glimpses of everyday life in post-Hurricane María Puerto Rico, Landfall is a cautionary tale for our times. Set against the backdrop of the protests that toppled the governor in 2019, the film offers a prismatic portrait of collective trauma and resistance as Puerto Ricans navigate dismantled social services and newcomers eager to profit.

Adult Non-Fiction

“Blackout in Puerto Rico.” Frontline, written, produced and directed by Rick Young, Public Broadcasting Service, PBS Distribution, 2018.
An investigation into FEMA's failure to provide adequate relief in Puerto Rico following Hurricane María in 2017. Looks at the role Wall Street and a debt crisis fueled by the U.S. government have played in Puerto Rico's ongoing humanitarian and economic crisis.

Bonilla, Yarimar and LeBrón, Marisol. Aftershocks of Disaster: Puerto Rico Before and After the Storm. Chicago, IL: Haymarket Books, 2019.
An in-depth look at Puerto Rico in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria and the preexisting crisis that conditioned this historic disaster.
Two years after Hurricane Maria hit, Puerto Ricans are still reeling from its effects and aftereffects. Aftershocks collects poems, essays and photos from survivors of Hurricane Maria detailing their determination to persevere.
The concept of "aftershocks" is used in the context of earthquakes to describe the jolts felt after the initial quake, but no disaster is a singular event. Aftershocks of Disaster examines the lasting effects of hurricane Maria, not just the effects of the wind or the rain, but delving into what followed: state failure, social abandonment, capitalization on human misery, and the collective trauma produced by the botched response.

Gil, Guillermo Rebollo. Writing Puerto Rico: Our Decolonial Moment. Palgrave Pivot, 2018.
This text, an autoethnography and practice in intersectionality, discusses new ways to engender radical political thought and activism that challenge PROMESA and austerity measures in Puerto Rico. The author analyzes art, literature, and activism to show their innovative epistemologies, which emerge even in precarious circumstances.

Klein, Naomi. The Battle for Paradise: Puerto Rico Takes on the Disaster Capitalists. Chicago, IL: Haymarket Books, 2018.
In the rubble of Hurricane Maria, Puerto Ricans and ultrarich “Puertopians” are locked in a pitched struggle over how to remake the island. In this vital and startling investigation, bestselling author and activist Naomi Klein uncovers how the forces of shock politics and disaster capitalism seek to undermine the nation's radical, resilient vision for a “just recovery.”

Klein, Naomi. Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. New York: Picador, 2008.
In this book Naomi Klein explodes the myth that the global free market triumphed democratically. Exposing the thinking, the money trail and the puppet strings behind the world-changing crises and wars of the last four decades, The Shock Doctrine is the gripping story of how America’s “free market” policies have come to dominate the world-- through the exploitation of disaster-shocked people and countries.

La Brega: Stories of the Puerto Rican Experience.(Podcast). A co-production from WNYC Studios and Futuro Studios. https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/la-brega/about
A seven-part podcast series that uses narrative storytelling and investigative journalism to reflect and reveal how la brega has defined so many aspects of life in Puerto Rico. Available in English and Spanish. Created by a team of Puerto Rican journalists, producers, musicians, and artists from the island and diaspora; hosted by On the Media's Alana Casanova-Burgess.

Morales, Ed. Fantasy Island: Colonialism, Exploitation and the Betrayal of Puerto Rico. Bold Type Books, 2019.
Since its acquisition by the US in 1898, Puerto Rico has served as a testing ground for the most aggressive and exploitative US economic, political, and social policies. The devastation that ensued finally grew impossible to ignore in 2017, in the wake of Hurricane María, as the physical destruction compounded the infrastructure collapse and trauma inflicted by the debt crisis. The author emphasizes that the only way to stop Puerto Rico from being bled is to let Puerto Ricans take control of their own destiny, going beyond the statehood-commonwealth-independence debate to complete decolonization.

Pasch Richard J., et al. National Hurricane Center Tropical Cyclone Report: Hurricane María. https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/data/tcr/AL152017_María.pdf. Accessed 28 May 2020.
Official United States government meteorological analysis of Hurricane María that includes charts, graphs, illustrations and images.

The Puerto Rico Syllabus. Critical Thinking about the Puerto Rican Debt Crisis. https://puertoricosyllabus.com/
The goals of this collaborative and interactive project - #PRSyllabus - are to support people in their journeys to: To understand how the contemporary Puerto Rican debt crisis has its roots in the colonial and capitalist relationship between Puerto Rico and the United States; (2.)To show how the debt crisis is affecting the lives of millions of Puerto Ricans in the territory and the diaspora; and (3.) To provide examples of Puerto Rican groups organizing against the austerity measures being imposed upon them by Washington and Wall Street.

“Rise of the Superstorms.” Nova, written, produced and directed by Liesl Clark. Public Broadcasting Service, PBS Distribution, 2018.
In summer 2017, three monster hurricanes swept in from the Atlantic one after another, shattering storm records and killing hundreds of people. Dive into the devastation wrought by Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and María. How can scientists better predict these storms, and what does the 2017 season tell us about the likelihood of similar storms in the future?

Vita Ayala, Puerto Rico Strong: A Comics Anthology Supporting Puerto Rico DisasterDiamond, 2018.
This comics anthology includes art and writing by many Puerto Rican authors. In both realistic and fantastical ways, the stories in this text explore different forms of being Puerto Rican, either on the Island or in the Diaspora. All its proceeds go towards disaster relief.

Zambrana, Rocío. Colonial Debts: The Case of Puerto Rico. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2019.
With the largest municipal debt in US history and a major hurricane that destroyed much of the archipelago's infrastructure, Puerto Rico has emerged as a key site for the exploration of neoliberalism and disaster capitalism. In Colonial Debts Rocío Zambrana develops the concept of neoliberal coloniality in light of Puerto Rico's debt crisis. Drawing on decolonial thought and praxis, Zambrana shows how debt functions as an apparatus of predation that transforms how neoliberalism operates. Debt functions as a form of coloniality, intensifying race, gender, and class hierarchies in ways that strengthen the colonial relationship between Puerto Rico and the United States. Zambrana also examines the transformation of protest in Puerto Rico. From La Colectiva Feminista en Construcción's actions, long-standing land rescue/occupation in the territory, to the July 2019 protests that ousted former governor Ricardo “Ricky” Rosselló, protests pursue variations of decolonial praxis that subvert the positions of power that debt installs. As Zambrana demonstrates, debt reinstalls the colonial condition and adapts the racial/gender order essential to it, thereby emerging as a key site for political-economic subversion and social rearticulation.