MICHAEL PATRICK F. SMITH IS A WRITER AND MUSICIAN.
His first book, The Good Hand, a memoir about working the rigs during North Dakota's Bakken oil boom, was released on Viking Press, a division of Penguin Random House, in February of 2021.
His journalism has appeared in The New York Times, Washington Post Magazine, and The Guardian.
As a musician, Smith has released several albums and shared the stage with folk luminary Ramblin' Jack Elliott and many others.
Smith has also worked as a guitar player, an actor, a bartender, junk hauler, furniture mover, book store clerk, contractor, event producer, driver, sailor, stage hand, gardener, waiter, security guard, set fabricator, grocer, and oil field hand.
The Good Hand: Memoir of Work Brotherhood Transformation in an American Boomtown Michael Patrick F. Smith Viking Press Penguin Random House Starred Kirkus Publishers Weekly Woody Guthrie Jack London Sam Shepard George Orwell The Good Hand The Good Hand The Good Hand The Good Hand: Memoir of Work Brotherhood Transformation in an American Boomtown Michael Patrick F. Smith Viking Press Penguin Random House Starred Kirkus Publishers Weekly Woody Guthrie Jack London Sam Shepard George Orwell The Good Hand The Good Hand The Good Hand The Good Hand: Memoir of Work Brotherhood Transformation in an American Boomtown Michael Patrick F. Smith Viking Press Penguin Random House Starred Kirkus Publishers Weekly Woody Guthrie Jack London Sam Shepard George Orwell The Good Hand The Good Hand The Good Hand
American writer musician folk music singer songwriter playwright Woody Guthrie Van Morrison Bob Dylan Jack London Ernest Hemingway Viking Press Jack Kerouac John Steinbeck Literature book Ramblin' Jack Elliott Tom T. Hall Oilfield Oil Fracking North Dakota Teddy Roosevelt Boomtown Williston Boom Town Crane operator Trucking Rigging Roughneck Roustabout Permian Bakken Energy Efficiency Workers Working class New York Brooklyn Rockaways The Great Away The Good Hand