PositiveThe New York Times Book ReviewDispiriting premise notwithstanding, Waste Wars does manage to live up to the adventurous ring of its subtitle; trash’s afterlife is wild indeed. Readers follow the author on a whirlwind tour to discover what, exactly, happens to the things we chuck in the bin ... Serves up a stirring picture of the deliberate and surprisingly profitable despoliation of one half of the planet by the other ...
There are moments, in Clapp’s book, of great sweep and humanity, and even a few of surprising levity. But these must be looked for, bobbing forlorn amid the computer parts and zip-lock bags stretching clear to the horizon.
Jerry Brotton
PositiveThe New York Times Book ReviewWith so much ground to cover, and with a device as mutable and evidently subjective as the compass to lead him, the author has set himself no easy task. His work, and ours, is made easier by the chronological structure of the discrete sections, and to some degree of the book as a whole ... If some passages in Four Points can feel disorienting, that would appear to be the objective — and it’s one that gets its creator to places prior practitioners never did ... The author hits a surprisingly elegiac note as he considers our current fallen state.
