About Book Marks
Recent Reviews
Jeff Madrick
Positive The New York Review of Books Invisible Americans synthesizes the work of dozens of researchers (to whom it is dedicated), rather than presenting original scholarship or reportage. It’s a summons to action in the spirit of Michael Harrington, whose book The Other America, from 1962, is often credited with inspiring the War on Poverty and whom Madrick cites on the first page ... Madrick rightly emphasizes the long-term damage child poverty inflicts and correctly notes in passing that child poverty ranks curiously low among progressive concerns ... While Madrick makes many important points, several elements of his style may limit his reach. For a book on child poverty, Invisible Americans is largely devoid of poor kids. The few who appear are mostly drawn from secondhand sources or masked behind pseudonyms. Not every work on child poverty needs fresh reporting, but some humanization here would have deepened readers’ interest and understanding ... Madrick also limits his reach by adopting a dismissive tone toward those of a different ideological bent ... Lastly, Madrick is too reluctant to acknowledge the progress that had been made ... Still, Madrick’s book is not only valuable but more timely than he could have possibly imagined or desired. Invisible Americans performs a service: it elevates an issue of moral urgency, at times with eloquence, and makes recommendations that would benefit millions of children.
Arlie Russell Hochschild
Positive The New York Times Book Review ...an energetic, open-minded quest to understand ... Hochschild is a woman of the left, but her mission is empathy, not polemics. She takes seriously the Tea Partiers’ complaints that they have become the 'strangers' of the title ... While her hopes of finding common political ground seem overly optimistic, this is a smart, respectful and compelling book.
Matthew Desmond
Positive The New York Review of Books Desmond, a Harvard sociologist, cites plenty of statistics but it’s his ethnographic gift that lends the work such force. He’s one of a rare academic breed: a poverty expert who engages with the poor. His portraits are vivid and unsettling...It’s not easy to show desperate people using drugs or selling sex and still convey their courage and dignity. Evicted pulls it off.