This is your Friday update, which takes a quick look at the week ahead and some developments that El Paso Matters is following.

El Paso Matters Book Club: El Paso Matters is starting a new book club whose main goal is to introduce residents to great authors from this region. The first bi-monthly book will be announced on Feb. 1. Those who sign up for the book club newsletter will get the first look at the books the community will be reading together. Members will also get author Q&As and book reviews of upcoming releases. At the end of the two-month reading period, El Paso Matters will host a gathering with the author to discuss the book at El Paso Public Library branches.

Health care workers unionize: A group of workers at the Hospitals of Providence Sierra Campus voted overwhelmingly to unionize this past week. Service Employees International Union will represent the group, which includes more than 200 full-time and part-time service, maintenance and technical workers. Another group of employees at the hospital, which includes professionals such as therapists and lab scientists, voted against unionizing. Those results are under review after the employer challenged more than a third of the ballots. The National Labor Relations Board tallied the mail-in votes on Tuesday.

El Pasoan Named Texas Institute of Letters Fellow: At its January 2023 meeting, the Council and Past Presidents of the Texas Institute of Letters voted unanimously to name Sergio Troncoso, an El Pasoan, a Fellow of the Institute. In its 86-year history, the TIL has appointed only 17 previous fellows, an honorary designation meant to distinguish TIL members for their service and contributions to the organization. Troncoso is a recent past president of the TIL (2020-22), who previously served as vice president, secretary, contest judge and councilor of the organization. At the January meeting, Troncoso was also appointed to the newly created position of investment officer of the TIL.

Troncoso is the author of eight books. His most recent publication, “Nobody’s Pilgrims,” (2022) is a novel about three teenagers in pursuit of their American dreams who drive across the country in a stolen pickup as evil people are after the contraband hidden in the truck. The El Paso City Council in 2014 renamed the public library branch in Ysleta as the Sergio Troncoso Branch Library. A Fulbright Scholar, Troncoso teaches at the Yale Writers’ Workshop.