RaveNew York Journal of Books... revealing and well-written ... Brooks manages to see all this clearly ... Tangled Up in Blue helps us see the deep complexities of policing and their effects on men and women in uniform ... Provocative, intelligent, and useful, Tangled Up in Blue will help many readers understand the nuances shaping the present crisis in American policing.
Wendy A. Woloson
RaveNew York Journal of BooksWhile great fun, [Woloson\'s] book is a serious, lively, and brightly illustrated account of cheap commodities and how they have been marketed, sold, and consumed ... A tireless researcher, she has rummaged through the American attic to write Crap, and offers enough clippings and photos of gadgets and whatnot to make her book a nostalgic romp.
Thomas Healy
RaveNew York Journal of BooksToday, a crumbling ghost town, Soul City is hard to find. What happened? In this sympathetic, deeply researched, and heartbreaking account, Healy, a professor at Seton Hall Law School and author of The Great Dissent, details the innumerable obstacles that blocked the way for a bold venture in racial equality.
Sarah Jaffe
MixedThe New York Journal of BooksThe author offers no solutions to the problems she describes, although clearly, in her view, capitalism is not the ideal system for encouraging worker satisfaction. Instead, rather abruptly, she concludes what’s needed is a world that allows us to \'value the relationships we have with others.\' To create such a world, we must free love from work ... Far too long, a bit heavy on the politics, yet bound to make many readers reexamine their working lives
Carl Hoffman
PositiveNew York Journal of Books... quite revealing. First, it captures the frenetic atmosphere of the rallies ... Second, it offers a good sense of the attendees ... Third, the book gives Hoffman an opportunity to celebrate blue-collar life and the teamwork and brotherhood of many workers ... A sobering, scarifying account that leaves the reader exhausted and in awe at the author’s endurance during these ritual gatherings of the MAGA tribe.
Jennifer Taub
PositiveThe New York Journal of BooksTaub offers a smart overview of white collar crime, a term coined in 1939 by sociologist Edwin Sutherland. She notes that in eras when \'the people\' have more influence and control, corporate leaders are held responsible. In the Progressive Era, for instance. In our own time—the Trump era—not so much ... Taub urges reforms, including creation of a new Justice Department division focused on big-money criminals, establishing a nationwide registry of white collar criminal offenders, and staffing up the IRS so it can audit tax evaders and collect billions of dollars in already identified tax receipts ... The author is a realist. \'From prep school and beyond, the elite cover for each other,\' she writes. Nonetheless, strengthening government’s ability to act can only help. It might even prevent future Donald Trumps. A timely, eye-opening tale of elite white privilege run amok.
David Michaelis
RaveNew York Journal of BooksMichaelis details innumerable stories of people and events in Eleanor’s life, from her years as the increasingly engaged first lady to her roles in Democratic Party politics to her work as a newspaper columnist and speaker after Franklin’s death in 1945 ... Much of Eleanor will be familiar to many readers, but Michaelis’s rendering is especially bright and a pleasure to read. Few other books reveal the fascinating inner journey that transformed Eleanor from an emotionally choked-off young woman into a mature leader who inspired millions.
Sarah Smarsh
PositiveThe New York Journal of Books... warm ... revealing ... A small, fun, and insightful book, She Come By It Natural can be enjoyed on its own or as a perfect companion to Marsh’s Heartland.
Ernest Freeberg
RaveThe New York Journal of Books... Freeberg offers a full, brightly written, anecdote-filled account of the career of Henry Bergh ... Freeberg offers absorbing stories of Bergh’s conflicts with notables of the day ... Highly readable.
Jennet Conant
RaveThe New York Journal of Books... splendid ... highly readable, deeply researched ... The author does a fine job depicting Alexander’s intense determination to learn the reason for the unexpected deaths ... Conant segues nicely into the introduction of chemo amid the medical rivalries and cancer-treatment complexities of the past-war era ... From tragedy to triumph, The Great Secret traces these extraordinary wartime and medical events with a grace and authority certain to please readers.
Kerri Arsenault
PositiveNew York Journal of Books\"Arsenault’s portrayal of the devastating impact of unregulated capitalism on the lives of poor, mainly dark-skinned people is a serious indictment of the American way ... Anyone who has ever tried to understand their hometown will be drawn to this wrenching debut ... Despite her rambling narrative, the author’s appealing writing—graceful, discerning, and compassionate—will keep many readers turning the pages. A decidedly downbeat story for this difficult moment, then, but undoubtedly a revealing exploration of America’s overlooked and forgotten.\
Jason Diamond
PositiveThe New York Journal of BooksEngaging and provocative, Diamond’s encyclopedic meditation will certainly help readers—no matter where they live—think about what lies ahead for the outlying areas of our cities.
Steve Olson
PositiveThe New York Journal of BooksIn accessible prose, [Olson] explores all the scientific complexities, offering a vivid picture of the dawning nuclear age ... Olson considers important questions, from whether the horrific bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were needed to end the war, to the unforeseen problem of the possible adverse health effects of nuclear waste left at the Hanford site ... This well-researched book can be a bit heavy on science at times for general readers, but it is a solid, valuable work on a critical aspect of America’s wartime quest for an atomic bomb.
David Paul Kuhn
RaveThe Washington PostKuhn argues persuasively that the riot sparked a vast national political shift driven by a widening divide between the working class and the educated elite that has led to the era of the Trump presidency ... Kuhn’s accounts of the violence are vivid and raw. It was a brutal, ugly day, with instigators on both sides. For those of us who lived in New York at the time, the book rekindles painful memories. For me, then a young opponent of the Vietnam War, Kuhn’s narrative brought a new understanding of the spontaneous, \'demonstrably sincere\' actions of the hard hats ... The author concludes with a sharp analysis of how the revolt of the White working class almost immediately reshaped American politics.
Edward Ball
PositiveThe Star Tribune... exquisite research ... Ball sifts through the uncertainties, fills in gaps using inference and implication, and successfully renders a disturbing story of a Klansman.
Olga Khazan
MixedThe New York Journal of BooksKhazan tries to do much too much in her well-written, often absorbing work of memoir and reportage ... Contrary to her claim, Khazan is not weird. Nor are many, if any, of the three dozen unusual individuals she has interviewed. They are all different, by virtue of some combination of appearance, behaviors, or circumstances, or all of the above. Their stories are fascinating. But don’t expect a parade of the ultra-strange. They’re not here ... An interesting account of often painful lives, then, but hardly an occasion for celebrating your inner weirdness.
David Carr
RaveThe Star TribuneWe have sorely needed the grounding provided by Final Draft ... In sentences \'as clear and straight as spring water,\' to borrow a phrase from Rudyard Kipling, he wrote about media, politics, popular culture and other topics with an honest, often blunt, sometimes biting style that eviscerated phoniness, especially when it besmirched the craft he loved ... in lengthy profiles, [Carr] could embrace gifted celebrities, often addicts, with understanding ... In an unexpected gift to young journalists, the book contains the engaging syllabus for a communications class Carr taught at Boston University in 2014. Filled with knockout reading lists ... His own hard-won prism illuminates much of this gratifying book.
Erika Lee
RaveThe New York Journal of Books[Lee] offers overwhelming evidence that xenophobia is not an aberration, but a \'constant and defining feature\' of U.S. life ... Timely, well-written, and essential reading.
