The City Is Up for Grabs

How Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot Led and Lost a City in Crisis

De: Gregory Royal Pratt

Narrado por: Christopher Douyard

Chicago is a world-class city, but it is also a city in crisis.

Crime is up, schools have repeatedly shut down due to conflict between City Hall and the powerful teachers' union, and COVID-19 only deepened the entrenched poverty, institutional racism, and endless tug of war between the city's haves and have nots.

For four years, the person at the center of this storm was Lori Lightfoot. A groundbreaking figure—the first Black, gay woman to be elected mayor of a major city and only the second female mayor of Chicago—she knew the city was at a critical turning point when she took office in 2019. But the once-in-a-lifetime challenges she ended up facing were beyond anything she or anyone else saw coming.

Chicago Tribune reporter Gregory Royal Pratt offers the first comprehensive behind-the-scenes look at the tumultuous single term of Mayor Lightfoot and the chaos that roiled the city and City Hall as she fought to live up to her promises to change the city's culture of corruption and villainy, reform its long-troubled police department, and make Chicago the safest big city in America.

©2024 Gregory Royal Pratt (P)2024 HighBridge, a division of Recorded Books

Lightfoot Sux

Lightfoot sux but didn’t need to listen to a book about it to figure that out. I was hoping for more. Instead, it was a gossipy account by a writer looking to supplement his income. PS. Fuck Paul Vallas & Brandon Johnson as well.

Windy City Politics

Great look into city during beetle juice’s tenure. I’m not a fan of the lady but found the book extremely interesting

One of the best books on Chi politics

This is the best accounting of Chicago politics 2016-2023 that we’ll likely ever get. Pratt deserves all the credit in the world for keeping the pace of the book moving without skipping over major events.

The one quibble I have is the lack of detail on Lori’s upbringing and early life which Pratt skips over, yet spends considerable time on her term in the obscure OPS. It is one of the instances where Pratt’s bias is revealed - but mostly he does a great job.

With that small complaint out of the way I’ll reiterate that this book is living proof why local journalism is so crucial to cities well-being. Only an experienced, talented, and plugged in reporter like Pratt could deliver something like this and if the city had 5 more Gregory Pratt’s in our media landscape we’d be better served for it. Easy 5 stars and anyone tangentially related in city politics (or how government works) needs to listen to this.