University of Arizona Press Review by Brian Tanguay Mexico has a well-earned reputation for culinary excellence, and foodies all over the world recognize its local and regional food cultures. But…
Category: Nonfiction
The Coroner’s Silence: Death Records and the Hidden Victims of Police Violence by Terence Keel
Beacon Press Review by Brian Tanguay When I think of people who died while in state custody the first name that comes to mind is Sandra Bland, the 28-year-old Black…
A World Appears: A Journey into Consciousness by Michael Pollan
Penguin Review by Walter Cummin In A World Appears: A Journey into Consciousness, Michael Pollan makes an offhand reference to Plato’s cave, “where artificial agents are confined and forced to…
The Great Contradiction: The Tragic Side of the American Founding by Joseph J. Ellis
Knopf Review by David Starkey There’s something depressing about the fact that renowned historian Joseph J. Ellis felt the need to write The Great Contradiction: The Tragic Side of the…
The Secret War Against Hate: American Resistance to Antisemitism and White Supremacy by Steven J. Ross
Bloomsbury Review by Brian Tanguay I read The Secret War Against Hate when federal immigration agents were terrorizing the citizens of Minneapolis, which made the experience eerie and chilling. Steven…
When People Were Things: Harriet Beecher Stowe, Abraham Lincoln, and The Emancipation Proclamation by Lisa Waller Rogers
Barrel Cactus Press Review by Brian Tanguay Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin was published in forty-one installments by the National Era, a prominent abolitionist newspaper. The story of a…
A Long Game: Notes on Writing Fiction by Elizabeth McCracken
Ecco Review by Walter Cummins When first reading A Long Game, I kept wondering who the book was written for. The title and the author would attract those of us…
Decolonizing Ukraine: The Indigenous People of Crimea and Pathways to Freedom by Greta Lynn Uehling
Rowman & Littlefield Review by Brian Tanguay Because of the passage of time and the velocity at which events unfold, it’s understandable that Russia’s 2014 seizure of Crimea has fallen…
What Is Free Speech? The History Of A Dangerous Idea by Fara Dabhoiwala
Belknap-Harvard University Review by Brian Tanguay I confess to not having given much thought to the historical origins of free speech before reading Fara Dabhoiwala’s marvelous history, What Is Free…
The Future of Truth by Werner Herzog
Penguin Review by George Yatchisin Who better than Werner Herzog, the Bavarian mad genius, to take us on a heady time-travelling exploration on what truth might mean/be/permit? The Future of…