PositiveThe New York Times Book Review... is both an empathetic portrait of all sides — legislators, developers, pro-housing and anti-gentrification activists — as well as a masterly primer on the fight for new construction in California ... Dougherty expertly explains the confluence of microeconomic and historical forces that have created a housing shortage so severe that it’s rendered the most prosperous state in the country the poorest when adjusted for cost of living. To challenge readers to consider how change might be achieved, he features two very different YIMBYs ... essential reading for every Californian, new or native. But will outsiders care? Dougherty’s introduction lays out why they should ... I wish he had continued to connect what’s happening in California with what’s going on elsewhere.
Sarah Smarsh
RaveThe New York Times Book ReviewWe all have our best registers, our natural octaves, and Smarsh’s is the grounded, oral, anecdotal range of her hardscrabble Kansas kinfolk. Fortunately, the tales of their adventures and misadventures make up the majority of her elucidating first book ... The memoir flickers to life ... Smarsh is an invaluable guide to flyover country, worth 20 abstract-noun-espousing op-ed columnists ... A deeply humane memoir with crackles of clarifying insight, Heartland is one of a growing number of important works.
