BookBrowse Editorial Review
An Inventory of Losses by Judith Schalansky
(11/4/2020)
The book is a hand-selected museum of oddities, united only by their temporal existence. Because of this story-by-story, object-by-object structure, casual readers will enjoy dipping in and out at their leisure. Instead of simply describing the objects, animals and places that no longer exist and explaining their significance – what one might expect from nonfiction – Schalansky chooses distinct fictionalized voices for each chapter. Although this narrative style allows her to be historically acc
BookBrowse Editorial Review
After the Last Border: Two Families and the Story of Refuge in America
by Jessica Goudeau
(8/5/2020)
On a storytelling level, this book is remarkable for honoring the voices of refugees. Few books are able to so clearly and empathetically show the relationship between policy and people. After the Last Border is an urgent and necessary book, especially for American readers. Powerful and compassionate, these women's stories linger in the mind and provide a greater understanding of the plight of refugees around the world.
BookBrowse Editorial Review
Of Bears and Ballots: An Alaskan Adventure in Small-Town Politics
by Heather Lende
(7/15/2020)
As a politically impassioned reader, I found some of Lende's recommendations too idle. Particularly at a time when very real social injustices are inspiring mass organized action focused on race and police brutality, trying to convince readers that "it's just politics, not real life," feels unsettling and silencing. The personal is political. Despite this point of criticism, Of Bears and Ballots is an interesting and optimistic look at local politics in America. Although there are some un
BookBrowse Editorial Review
Death in Mud Lick: A Coal Country Fight against the Drug Companies That Delivered the Opioid Epidemic
by Eric Eyre
(5/20/2020)
By looking at the opioid endemic as a multifaceted public health matter, Eyre is successful in bringing visibility to the issue and its many layers. He places it in a national context, sharing not only West Virginia's specific relationship with opioids, but also data about nationwide drug distribution. Thanks to his investigative work, the public has new information showing a side of addiction that is seldom understood, one that looks beyond individuals and into the larger systemic factors that
BookBrowse Editorial Review
Race Against Time: A Reporter Reopens the Unsolved Murder Cases of the Civil Rights Era
by Jerry Mitchell
(3/18/2020)
Mitchell's writing is engaging and impactful from start to finish. Though told largely in his own words from a present point-of-view, Race Against Time is a fascinating mixture of interviews, court transcripts, testimonies, personal conversations, article excerpts, secret files, dead-of-night tip-offs and secret meetings. Readers are drawn directly into the hearts of these cases, stunned by breaking revelations right alongside the reporter.
BookBrowse Editorial Review
A Bookshop in Berlin: The Rediscovered Memoir of One Woman's Harrowing Escape from the Nazis
by Françoise Frenkel
(1/22/2020)
Frenkel has a remarkably grateful spirit. She chooses to emphasize the kindness of strangers and friends that made her survival possible. A Bookshop in Berlin is an unusual, beautiful type of war story, one that is far less graphic and brutal than many others the reader may have encountered. Instead of violence, she turns her attention to the goodness that can illuminate dark times, the small and large acts of resistance that webbed together to shield her through years of dislocation and
BookBrowse Editorial Review
Your House Will Pay by Steph Cha
(10/30/2019)
The walls between victim and shooter dissolve as the story develops. Cha effectively captures the nuances, because rather than vilifying either party, she accounts for the struggles, moral ambiguities and motivations of each character. Still, she does not deflect from the racism and classism of the past and present, refusing to deny the awful truths that people often choose to ignore to make sense of what happens to them. In this way, she crafts a story that is potent with honesty and urgency.
BookBrowse Editorial Review
Fake Like Me by Barbara Bourland
(7/10/2019)
Barbara Bourland's voice is sharp and satirical. She nudges readers to think about weighty topics: the formation of identity, the commodification of people, the desire to succeed, the pressure to be authentic and the potentially devastating consequences of greed. Fake Like Me is an unconventional thriller with an unreliable narrator that demands the reader's full attention, but provides plenty of rewards in exchange.
BookBrowse Editorial Review
The Age of Living Machines: How Biology Will Build the Next Technology Revolution
by Susan Hockfield
(5/29/2019)
A champion of interdisciplinary research and development, Hockfield sees a compelling new future in science: bioengineering. The Age of Living Machines provides an incredible glimpse of the future for science novices and intermediates, pop-science readers, science trend followers, futurists, and life-long learners interested in exploring notes and references.
BookBrowse Editorial Review
Exhalation: Stories
by Ted Chiang
(5/15/2019)
Although this may not be a great choice for readers who find comfort in thematically-oriented stories that have tidy resolutions, those with more experimental tastes will find a lot to enjoy in Exhalation. The book offers nine distinct and fascinating worlds, making it perfect for either dipping in-and-out or devouring in one go. Sci-fi fans will appreciate the different experimental lenses through which to view humanity.
BookBrowse Editorial Review
Disappearing Earth by Julia Phillips
(5/15/2019)
With transportive, immersive prose, Phillips synthesizes her characters' world, creating something that is sharp and clear. Striking a balance between immersive fiction and realistic contextual elements—in geographic accuracy, cultural attentiveness and more—there is something here for every reader.
BookBrowse Editorial Review
Instructions for a Funeral: Stories
by David Means
(4/3/2019)
Means approaches his characters' tensions and torments with refined, yet digressive prose. Depicting fights, affairs, illnesses, addictions, deaths and murders, this collection critiques how people remember things and explores why we need stories. For readers who are drawn to the cutting, focused form of short stories and contemporary, unconventional voices in the medium, Instructions for a Funeral is a worthy read.
BookBrowse Editorial Review
Solitary by Albert Woodfox
(3/20/2019)
Albert's unwillingness to break—his strength and determination—is a lesson bestowed to those who are just entering the world of social struggle, as well as a reminder to those who have been fighting these battles for decades. Whether it's prison reform, racism and classism, or other ideologies and causes, the message is the same: Do what can be done, wherever it can be done, to better the world.
BookBrowse Editorial Review
Watch Us Rise by Renée Watson and Ellen Hagan
(2/20/2019)
One of the things I enjoyed most about Watch Us Rise is that the characters are bright, dynamic and complex. [The authors] approach this dual narrative from points of view that are unique, making the voices of Jasmine and Chelsea—who are also simultaneously similar and different in their marginalization—thoughtful and authentic.
BookBrowse Editorial Review
The World According to Fannie Davis: My Mother's Life in the Detroit Numbers
by Bridgett M. Davis
(2/6/2019)
The World According to Fannie Davis speaks to broader social struggles related to class, race, gender and migrancy. This memoir captivates, balancing between the relatability of inter-generational family relationships—the admiration, tension, struggle and loss within them—and the magnetism of lucrative, risky black-market business.
BookBrowse Editorial Review
The Inflamed Mind: A Radical New Approach to Depression
by Edward Bullmore
(1/9/2019)
In light of the contradictions to Western medical ideology and funding cuts to mental health, Bullmore is hopeful but measured about the potential results of his findings, admitting that this connection between the immune system, stress and mind may not ever seep into standard medical practice. Still, he concludes with an optimistic image of what the future might look like if these revolutionary developments are embraced: new treatments, new medications, new biomarkers, new therapies, new doctor
BookBrowse Editorial Review
The Spy and the Traitor: The Greatest Espionage Story of the Cold War
by Ben Macintyre
(10/17/2018)
Spy stories are seldom conveyed with such accuracy and depth. The Spy and the Traitor might be appealing to readers with an interest in nonfiction books about politics and international affairs, as well as those who enjoy thrillers and crime fiction.