FOUNDATIONS SALE: Take 40% off required reading - 4 days
Skip Navigation

Seven Stories Press

Works of Radical Imagination

Book cover for Pancho Villa
Book cover for Pancho Villa

A wild ride and revealing portrait of the controversial Pancho Villa, one of Mexico’s most beloved (or loathed) heroes, that finally establishes the importance of his role in the triumph of the Mexican Revolution, by renowned writer Paco Ignacio Taibo II.

The last biography of Pancho Villa was published 25 years ago, and this new edition has been translated into English for the first time. This biography marks a kind of reinvention of the legendary Mexican figure of Pancho Villa. It is a masterful reevaluation and heavily researched account of his life. This book makes a new claim, finally giving Pancho Villa his due as the decisive figure in the success of Mexican Revolution. Here he is less the colorful bandito and more the incorruptible conscience that not only won key battles, but also maintained the revolutionary vision and led the way in terms of class consciousness.

Pancho Villa is a rollicking, sometimes hilariously comical, sometimes extremely violent, and always very personal portrait of the controversial Mexican historical figure Pancho Villa. Beloved crime writer Paco Ignacio Taibo II (a.k.a. PIT)—the prolific historian, biographer of Che Guevara and the founder of Mexican “neopolicial” fiction—brings his tremendous storytelling skills to an account of one of the Mexico’s greatest legendary characters.

With his vibrant narrative style, Taibo describes the adventures of Pancho Villa with incredible stories, the stuff of history and tragedy, backed up by tremendous research. Throughout, Taibo unveils secrets about the life of one of Mexico's most courageous and charismatic leaders. Includes period photographs that indelibly capture the rocky transition from the wild and agrarian past towards modern statehood.

Book cover for Pancho Villa
Book cover for Pancho Villa

Buying options

“From the solemn chronicles of archives to the myths burnished by campfire light; in photographs with their winking shimmer to the oral traditions carried in joke, anecdote, and rumor; from the steady and steadily assailed official record, Paco Ignacio Taibo II captures history as commotion. This narrative biography grants equal weight to what "actually" happened as to what was said to have happened – a lingering sediment of memory and desire. Taibo does not simply reconstruct the “true story” of Pancho Villa and the Mexican Revolution, he recovers the ache of a world without witness and the transformation of a man into legend.”

blog — January 18

Spring 2024 Political Non-Fiction

MSNBC's legal expert Barbara McQuade breaks down the ways disinformation has become a tool to drive voters to extremes, disempower our legal structures, and consolidate power in the hands of the few. 

A graphic biography of the local activist group Detroit Eviction Defense, whose work combatting — and beating — evictions in Detroit demonstrates the importance — and efficacy — of people organizing locally with their communities. The stories included in this book feature families struggling against evictions, organizing, taking to the streets, and winning their homes back.

An urgent, groundbreaking, and visually stunning new collection of graphic story-telling, edited by Persepolisauthor Marjane Satrapi, Woman, Life, Freedom is a collaboration of activists, artists, journalists, and academics working together to depict the historic uprising — with comics that show what would be censored in photos and film in Iran — in solidarity with the Iranian people, in defense of feminism.

For a new generation of activists, these are classic revolutionary writings by four famous radicals, including The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels; Reform or Revolution by Rosa Luxemburg; and Che Guevara’s Socialism and Man in Cuba. Includes an introduction by Cuban Marxist intellectual Armando Hart and a preface by US radical poet Adrienne Rich.

Italian economist and journalist Loretta Napoleoni explains how the heads of Big Tech companies like Uber, Amazon, Tesla, have effectively hijacked technological innovation on a grand scale, and how that unprecedented control is ruining our minds and the planet.

With great immediacy and poignancy, Aleida recounts the story of her epic romance with Che Guevara—their fitful courtship against the backdrop of the Cuban revolutionary war, their marriage at the war’s end and the birth of their four children, up through Che’s tragic assassination in Bolivia less than ten years later. Featuring excerpts from their letters, nearly one hundred never-before-seen photographs from their private collection, and a moving short story Che wrote for Aleida, here is an intimate look at the man behind the legend and the tenacious, courageous woman who knew him best—a story of passionate love, wrenching sacrifice, and unwavering heroism.

A collection of columns and essays that reveal Ralph Nader at his outspoken and prescient best, fighting the good fight against corporate corruption, unbalanced political power, consumer dangers, big pharma, and climate denialism. Featuring an introduction by Lewis Lapham. 

This classic manual on repression by revolutionary activist Victor Serge offers fascinating anecdotes about the tactics of police provocateurs and an analysis of the documents of the Tsarist secret police in the aftermath of the Russian revolution. With a new introduction by Anthony Arnove.

From renowned writer Paco Ignacio Taibo II, Pancho Villa is wild ride and revealing portrait of the controversial figure, one of Mexico’s most beloved (or loathed) heroes, that finally establishes the importance of his role in the triumph of the Mexican revolution. Published on the 100th anniversary of Pancho Villa's death.

In these three speeches on corporate globalism and imperialism, Ernesto Che Guevara offers a revolutionary view of a world in which human solidarity and understanding replace imperialist agression and exploitation. This collection of writings merges Che's philosophy, politics, and economics in his all encompassing, coherent revolutionary vision.

Paco Ignacio Taibo II

PACO IGNACIO TAIBO II, best known for his detective Héctor Belascoarán Shayne book series, is one of the foremost crime fiction writers in the Spanish-speaking world today. In 2019 he was named head of Mexico's Fondo de Cultura Económica., effectively a minister of literary culture. He is also the director of the acclaimed Semana Negra de Gijón, a literary festival in Spain. He is a tireless social activist, historian, and author of the best-selling biography of Ernesto “Che” Guevara, Guevara Also Known as Che. He has written more than forty books altogether, which have been published in twenty-eight countries, including '68: The mexican Autumn of the Tlatelolco Massacre. Some of his novels have been considered “Best Books of the Year” by the New York TimesLe Monde, and the Los Angeles Times. He has received several literary prizes, including the Premio Hammett for best crime fiction in Spain (three times), the 813 literary award for best foreign crime novel published in France, and the Premio Bancarella for the best book of the year in Italy. 

TODD CHRETIEN is an organizer, author, translator, and high school Spanish teacher. He has contributed to several books, including Socialist Strategy and Electoral Politics, and is editor of Eyewitnesses to the Russian Revolution.