PanThe Washington PostIf you’re in need of a cathartic read that distills the anger and exhaustion of America’s overburdened mothers and wives, this is not the book for you ... Davis sticks to the experiences of heterosexual married women, which means that many contemporary domestic arrangements go unexamined ... Housewife tries to do too much and accomplishes less than it could. Davis could have made a convincing case with fewer historical detours and more contemporary stories ... As for the “what to do instead” promise of the subtitle, she doesn’t really have a good answer.
Helene Stapinski, Bonnie Siegler
PositiveThe Washington PostA fast-moving American epic with a cast of refugees and starlets, publishers and bootleggers, comic-book creators and sports legends ... In Jerry and Joe’s comic-book universe, Superman... brought Nazis and fascists to their knees. But he couldn’t save the real-life victims of the Nazis’ genocidal antisemitism. Millions died; each of them had a story. The American Way never forgets that.
Maryanne Wolf
PositiveThe Washington PostEven as it keeps one eye on the future, Reader, Come Home embodies some old-fashioned reading pleasures, with quotes from Italo Calvino, John Dunne, Toni Morrison, Marcel Proust, Elie Wiesel and other illustrious word-workers. It unfolds as a series of letters addressed to \'Dear Reader\' from \'Your Author,\' a call to remember that books come alive as exchanges between writers and readers. That structure can make Reader, Come Home feel—in a corny but charming way—like a throwback to an era already gone, if it ever existed. Wolf offers a persuasive catalog of the cognitive and social good created by deep reading, but does not really acknowledge that the ability to read well has never been universal ... She’s also correct that we have a lot to lose—all of us—if we don’t pay attention to what we’re doing with technology and what it’s doing to us.
