Paul

This is a remarkable little book. I have a few tiny quibbles here and there, but I cannot argue with how forcefully and how well Wright's perspectives are argued. I appreciate how he tries to navigate a middle way between the extremes of right and left. The historical survey of how people have viewed scripture is somehow both robust and succinct, and he makes sure to show how both fundamentalism and deconstruction fall short of their stated aims and actually closer to one another than they think.

I knock a star off the rating for two reasons. First, I still think the book is a little longer than it needs to be. This book is an expansion of an incredible article that Wright wrote in the '80s, I believe. And that article contains most all of the most important points found here. Other than a few historical sections and answering some rebuttals, I don't see how his additions here were worth a whole book's length project.

Secondly, I don't know if Wright really has answered the question of the relationship between God's authority and scripture. He definitely gives a beautiful account for how we can live and treat scripture with the assumption that it is authoritative in some sense. And he effectively shows how other accounts of this relationship are inadequate even as they are full of their own certitude. But still, he doesn't quite nail down how this authority functions through scripture. He makes it a point time and again to say that scripture itself does not have the authority, but God exercises his own authority through it. This is undoubtedly right. But he doesn't get much more specific than that, I feel. Maybe he does, and it is pretty subtle. But the exact theological mechanics are still a mystery, and they may always be.

My one other quibble here is that he makes that same move that a lot of fundamentalists do where they assume that anytime the Bible says the phrase “word of God”, we can automatically apply that to the written Canon of scripture we have with us today. I think that is a huge error that leads to a lot of bad theology around scripture. Sometimes, when scripture says this, it is talking about the law in one sense or another. Sometimes it's referring to a very specific word that God spoke at a specific time. Sometimes it is the word of the prophets. Sometimes it is simply talking about the way that God communicates his presence to us and guides us in a more mystical sense and not in literal written words. But obey and over again, Wright here cites versus to support his claims that I do not think are talking about scripture. Again, this is more of a quibble than a broad criticism, but it's hard for me to know exactly where his tendency to do this may have led to conclusions I otherwise disagree with.

But still, I am so grateful that NT Wright is around and is offering the church books like this. In spite of any of my disagreements, I would not hesitate to put this book in the hand of any Christian or person seeking a framework to understand these questions. He is clear, he is faithful, he is balanced, and he refuses to settle for easy answers to complex questions. If every Christian used this book as their starting point for their theology of scripture, then subsequent adjustments or refinements would be much healthier and much more helpfully done.

What a terrible, irritating, profound failure of a play. It's no wonder this is considered one of Shakespeare's “problem” plays–no one knows what to do with it. Unless it is meant to be some farce or subversive allegory which I have deeply missed, this play has so little redeeming qualities going for it. It begins with an interesting abstract philosophical idea–not a premise, not a question, not a story. Just the idea of a society built on the black and white enforcement of the law to its extremis with no mercy in sight. He then tries to build some odd house of cards of a plot around this idea to turn it into a play and ends up saying nothing to the central premise. He belittles and treats sloppily what ought be treated with great care and seriousness, and treats seriously and with gravitas characters and plot points that are utterly ridiculous, distracting, and silly, lacking any resemblance to the actual human condition.

Maybe that's the my problem here. There's simply no humanity in this play. It is like a bunch of college stoners getting high and trying to write a play about a profound idea and failing miserably. It is “dumb” in every sense of that word. This play does not deserve finer language than that. Until I read something that makes me see this play in an entirely new light (which hey, it's Shakespeare–it's a real possibility) this will go down as my most disliked play in his canon.

“Burr” is a great little book, chronicling the life of Aaron Burr. It mostly succeeds in doing this in a compelling way. But at times, one can get distracted by pace, plot, and prose–both when those items excel, and when they drag.

Gore Vidal has such an ease with language and wit and voice. He's just such a good writer. It's easy to get lost in his prose much of the time, but other times, you can tell when he's trying to be clever, and you can see what he's trying to do, and this can get distracting.

I literally went straight to this book from reading the first Aaron Burr biography ever written by a professionally trained scholar (Nancy Isenberg's “Fallen Founder”), and it was difficult to engage with Vidal's treatment of Burr, as it seemed to fall into the caricatures and traps of Burr's portrayal which I had just spent many hundred pages hearing get debunked. Isenberg's Burr is much more introverted, thoughtful, and eccentric than Vidal's charismatic, swash-buckling dandy.

Nevertheless, he did give life to this character in a fascinating way, and the events of Burr's life unfold in this novel (through a device of Burr dictating his memoirs) in more clarity than other biographers have offered. There were parts that I still didn't understand that, in Vidal's retelling, came alive and became clearer than when shared in nonfiction telling.

As a novel, though, the book does an excellent job giving insight and color to all aspects of the American experience at the turn of the 19th-century. When history is being lived or recounted, it is fascinating, thrilling, and really makes you inhabit the time like no nonfiction account has been able to do. You realize just how many the world was, even then, and how little people really change generation to generation.

However, in order to tell history in a novelized form, Vidal has to jump through some excruciating hoops to create justifications, situations, and devices in which it makes narratival sense for a historical figure to simply recount their life (which, to us, is “history”). He does this primarily through a fictional main character, Charles Schuyler, who is an aspiring writer swept into the yellow journalism of the day and is encouraged to get dirt from Burr which can ruin Presidential hopeful Martin van Buren. This leads Schuyler to “interview” Burr for his “memoirs”, thus creating the conceit within which Burr can wax on about his biography.

This is all well and fine, as far as narrative devices go. But Vidal has to create a whole life, drama, and conflict for Schuyler that occurs outside and away from Burr. And this is where the novel drags, especially in the beginning (it takes far too long for the momentum to start). Vidal seems to fashion Charles as a Nick Carraway to Burr's Gatsby, but his life and thought is never really that interesting, and so the stretches of plot which focus on him really drag. It's always a little frustrating when literally every other character in a book is more interesting than the actual narrator and one in whose head you remain throughout the narrative.

Additionally, there are moments when you can tell Vidal is offering a wink and a nod and bit of cleverness, and it can be distracting. When you start reading about all of these early Americans, you quickly realize an odd feature: American was SMALL. Everyone you've ever heard of intersected with everyone else you've ever heard of. And so you can't tell any story of any one's life without name dropping constantly. You can tell that sometimes Vidal revels in finding a reason for a name to be dropped so you can see the connection and other times he plays coy with names that he either assumes you know or wants to be mysterious.

This can be distracting from the book as a novel on its own terms and leads to just a few too many moments of “I see what you did there, Vidal”. And then you remember you're fundamentally reading a history book.

And this leads to my last little quibble with the book–or rather this KIND of book. This isn't historical fiction. Burr is self consciously trying to novelize history. He writes in his Preface–and conveys in his prose–a certain commitment to history such that you can trust him as a historian. And yet, there HAS to be license taken at points, even if it's in making up the style of conversation in which otherwise accurate facts are conveyed. The fundamental frustration for someone wired like me is that I can't really know which parts he's making up and which is “history”. He'll drop little details that I did not read about in any other biographies of these early Americans. So when that happens, what should I think? Should I implicitly trust it as historical (as he seems to want me to do), or should I not make a big deal out of it, for it could very be creative license? This line is never clearly drawn.

Nevertheless, I am probably trying too hard to find fault in this book, as the novel is so celebrated and extoled by most. And it is certainly worth reading. You will grow in your understanding and intuitive sense of early America. You will see how politics and the media have always been the way they are now, and very little has changed. You will be awed, encouraged, and dismayed all at once. There were beautiful moments, tragic ones, and humanizing turns throughout these pages. You will enjoy it and grow in your appreciation of this country and understanding of its darker, more human moments.

This is only the first volume, and admittedly, this is the part of Jefferson's life about which there's the fewest records (due to his early life and Benedict Arnold's destruction of papers when he invaded Richmond), but I still don't know that I have a feel for Jefferson's psyche. Perhaps that's a very modern desire when reading biography (and this book is from an older school style of history writing–is from the 1940s). On its own terms, it's a remarkable feat. The pace is interesting. Knowing he will take many volumes to tell this story, he is in no rush. It's a leisurely pace with some pleasant detours and asides now and then. He treats Jefferson as a man to respect and study as a specimen, and not so much a beloved icon to love, defend, and explain away. I like that. This is plain, spoken storytelling, going into the weeds in a way that does not grow old or stale. Still I wish I knew the man Jefferson just a BIT more.

As I restart my journey through Presidential biographies, I re-read this book. Man, is it so good. Comprehensive, well-written, authoritative, etc. However, on this second reading I realized how much I had forgotten about Washington's life, only two years since my first reading. This being the longest non-fiction book I've ever read, I'm unsure how reasonable it is to think this about a book of such breadth, but I feel it should be possible for a written work to stick with you more than this did–if written well enough. I feel what sticks with you is not the overall contours and story of Washington's life as much as an intuitive sense of the man himself and some notable anecdotes. Maybe that ought to be the highest goal of a good biography–to capture the subject's essence, even at the expense of clarity regarding the events of his life. But I do wish that my mental picture of his life were more whole; something about this book and how it's written loses me in its forest in its emphasis on the trees. But still, it is a book worth reading, with meaning lessons on leadership, history, politics, and culture. It does not avoid the unflattering parts of Washington, nor is it a hit piece. Chernow obviously cares for this man deeply, and respects him profoundly, but not to the point of clouding his assessment of him. In short, it's a fantastic, wonderful book that all should read–even if they have little hope of retaining every specific part.

Full review can be found at my blog

Most Bibles are translated with the assumptions of systematic theology undergirding them, acting as if what makes the Bible divine is that is has this particular combination of these particular words. The Voice, on the other hand takes seriously the assumptions of biblical theology, that the Bible is divine because of the true God and true story of redemption it testifies to. In translating The Voice, biblical scholars and theologians are teamed up with artists, writers, poets, novelists, memoirists, playwrights, lyricists, and other creative minds in order to make the translation both beautiful and unique for each book of the Bible.

In this book, they have succeeded tremendously with the Psalms. In short, I love this book. I'm using the Lent reading guide in this season to aid in my meditations and prayers. And that's what this book is best for — stirring your devotional heart for God. This Bible is not for proper systematic biblical study. The Voice will never be the primary text for citation in scholarly works, but that's not it's purpose. If you've never “prayed Scripture” or have a hard time trying to do so with the relatively wooden translations of most Bibles, this is the perfect book to begin. If you, like me, use some sort of Lectionary like the Book of Common Prayer to guide daily or seasonal readings that are heavy in the Psalms, let me encourage you to purchase this book to use in those readings. It could change the dynamism of those times.

I really can't commend this book enough to all of you that want to start cultivating a deeper, richer, and more intimate relationship with the God of Christianity. For those tired sojourners in the desert of doctrine wars needing an oasis, reading and praying these Psalms — in such beautiful prose as this — can do nothing but benefit your soul in every way.

As a therapy modality, I love ACT. Though it's a cohesive theory in it's own right, I find it really brings together the best parts of a multitude of therapy modalities. It takes from some therapy techniques I love (motivational interviewing, mindfulness, and even a sort of pastoral approach to values) and even takes the good and disregards the bad of therapies I don't resonate with as much (here's looking at you, CBT and Narrative Therapy). So as a way to grow and treat others, I really like ACT.

However, some of the same caveats to most talk therapies apply here. It's not good with severe mental health disorders, nor with people on the autism spectrum. is very complicated and very big. There's a process based therapy and not a technique. So it's not linear.

But this is a review of the book, not the treatment. And this is maybe the best therapy modality textbook I've ever read. It is clear, winsome, comprehensive, realistic, and even funny. This is surprising, as ACT is a process based therapy modality, and not a technique based one. So it is not linear at all. That makes the task all the more difficult to write a textbook about it, and this is done with amazing clarity and succinctness in this book.

It's a fun read, but it's a lot. Some chapters are only a page or two, as it touches on one topic before changing gears into the next. This shotgun approach, while necessary with such a modality and done very well here, makes information retention near-impossible. The author says as much, saying these things really need to be practiced as you learn it, otherwise it'll never sink in.

The book, therefore, seems to straddle between being a treatment manual, reference work, and general audience nonfiction how-to. It's best to read this once all the way through, accept that you won't remember much, and then use the book as a reference tool moving forward. I also appreciate the copious amount of free online resources available that accompany the content of this book. This is all very, very well done. I encourage every therapist and therapist-to-be to at least check out ACT, and this textbook is the best way I know to do it.

Well, I did it. I finally did it. I finished “Fellowship of the Ring”. I had a few other times in my life and just couldn't do it. But with some Amazon TV-show inspiration, an adult appreciation for slower narratives, and the help of Andy Serkis' incredible narration, I did it!

And I really loved this book, especially once I slowed down and accepted it on its own terms. I still think Tolkien could have tightened this narrative quite a bit (many first-time readers have crashed on the rocks of its long travel sections or Tom Bombadil–still a baffling character to me). But Tolkien makes it all worth it in the end and makes me excited for more..

I came with minimal Tolkien or fantasy experience. I read and enjoyed “The Hobbit” as a middle-schooler, and I watched its creepy 1970s cartoon version a bunch. I've watched the theatrical versions of the movies once or twice, but mostly forgot them. I grew up hearing bad “Lord of the Rings” sermon illustrations. So if you are like me, what should you know about the book?

First, before we really get into it, this truly is a sequel to “The Hobbit”. I had forgotten some of the specifics of that book, but “Fellowship” begins with a prologue that summarizes all of it, spoilers and all; so if you ever plan on reading “The Hobbit”, do that first. This book flows directly from that one.

Second, as you may know from just general cultural osmosis, this is more a travel book than an adventure tale. The characters travel many miles for many days on the journey in these pages, and nearly every day and region is described here. This creates a weird pacing to the book. Lots of slow, meandering days, full of beautiful descriptions of landscapes and geography accompanied by little bits and hints of lore and history. Tolkien really is a beautiful writer–not just a profound thinker.

And then there are the action scenes. Some are striking and suck you in. Others are confusing, leaving with an impression of what happened but not the clearest mental picture (for example, what on earth happens in the barrow-downs?). The action is also spaced out amidst sporadically without much rhyme or reason. At times they make sense; at others they feel a little arbitrary, as if an editor had told Tolkien, “they've been walking and talking too long. Throw in some inconsequential peril to liven things up.”

On one hand, this adds suspense as the stakes rise and you never know what's going to happen and when. On the other, this all deeply challenges us modern readers. We are used to information dumps or action-filled narratives that fit particular rhythms and templates for such things.

But “Fellowship” is different. Even in all its fantasy, it's much closer to real life than modern books. Most of life is boring. It's moving from place to place or having conversations that serve no immediate purpose or “plot”. The most perilous things we encounter are often unpredictable, random, and seemingly disconnected from our “real” life.

For example, if you've seen the movies, you know the whole point of all this travel is to take The Ring to Mount Doom to destroy it. And yet, this entire book goes by without them coming to that conclusion! When they start walking, they just know that some bad people want the ring, so they flee. They are literally aimless. Even by the end, they still have no idea where they should go or what they should do! They get up each morning, ask “okay, what now?”, head in a direction, and respond to things that happen along the way.

It's fascinating to experience a book like this. It forces you to slow down, settle in, and receive the book on its own terms. Even as the mystery deepens and you want answers, you're forced to wait. Apparently, the next two books are much faster-paced, but I wonder if having been made to sit and pace yourself makes those books all the more beautiful and exciting.

But that's all about the plot and pacing. But as someone completely unfamiliar with “high-fantasy”, what did I think about the world-building and lore?

I am in awe of what Tolkien has accomplished here. This is truly a fully-fleshed out alternative world at every level. Its history, cultures, languages, geography, and mythology are completely realized in Tolkien's brain in a way similar to a god creating a world in its totality out of nothing. It's astonishing. This world is not built off of a single clever conceit or proposal or small twist added to our world. It is wholly other and unique.

It does not feel nearly as nerdy or inaccessible as I expected. In the book it all unfolds much like real human conversation. People with their own histories and stories travel together and as different things remind them of songs or tales, they mention it to the rest of the group (and us). Then the narrative moves forward.

There are very few grand speeches or exposition dumps. You can tell there is (literally) a whole world of lore and knowledge behind this story that is only given to us in carefully portioned out doses. It really draws you in and makes you curious for more. “Fellowship” is an excellent fantasy gateway drug.

One key to my reading success was that I listened to the audiobook version narrated by Andy Serkis. And it is amazing. I listened to some of every audio version available–even a well-regarded fan-produced one that incorporates music and sound effects from the movies–and Serkis' was by far the best. It will be the new standard for a very long time.

Serkis, who played Gollum in the movies, provides voices, acting, emotion, and singing (so much singing) that really keeps you enthralled. Save for a few characters, his voices tend follow the movie accents pretty closely. (One funny feature of Fellowship in this regard is that Gollum never has a speaking part, so I haven't yet heard if Serkis does the same voice!)

He is dynamic, and truly performs the book in a way that is moving, but not distracting, and still maintains integrity to the text. He takes you on a ride. His voice can be soft and trembling (like when Frodo realizes he needs to the leave the Shire), and screaming to the point of his voice cracking in others (Gandalf's epic “You shall not pass!” He kills that scene. Dang). I cried multiple times reading the book, was actually scared in others, and deeply shaken elsewhere. It's that good.

This has been a long review. I mean, it's “Lord of the Rings”: there's both so much to say, and also nothing really needs to be said. It saturates our world and culture. But still, reading it for the first time makes you realize just how much you really don't get it if you've only seen the movies.

This is not cheesy, nerdy, socially-awkward (or even escapist) fantasy work. This is truly literature that shows you the best and worst of the world, challenging your intellect and moral reasoning, drawing you into something higher. And it does it all with sophistication, beauty, complexity, and humanity.

As long as you accept the book on its own terms and settle in for a long read, you will get through it. And you will love it. I can't wait to finish the whole series, and then read these books to my kids someday.

As Tolkien's bff once said: “onward and upward!”

The Takeaway
Smart Brevity is fantastic and game-changing for what it is and what it tries to be, though it's helpfulness is much more limited than its authors seem to realize.

The Big Picture
The authors of this book are the founders of both Politico and Axios. If you've ever been to the Axios website, you know what “smart brevity” is. It is the philosophy they use in their writing and visual design. It's a way to communicate the most things in as brief a way as possible to respect the time and limited attention spans of readers online.

Go Deeper
The book itself unsurprisingly follows these same principles. It is short, but not shallow. It offers sobering statistics about how little time people spend actually reading things online, and gives simple, clear, actionable advice for communicators to implement these principles in a wide range of applications and mediums. It also serves as a mini-advertisement of their AI program they built to help businesses implement this throughout their work.

The Upside
They apply these principles to many, many areas–and I'm convinced! For businesses, newsletter writers, marketing and communications, social media, leaders and supervisors of all kinds, I see how smart brevity is the way the current world needs to function.

It feels like a superpower once you start trying to work with it, but it's a muscle that needs to be exercised. I have been trying to use it in emails, text messages, and conversations with my wife and she has really appreciated it. (I am naturally very wordy).

Yes, But...
Smart brevity's applications are more limited than the authors imply. They offer smart brevity as the greatest way of communicating and transmitting information today. But outside of a brief mention of fiction and poetry in the introduction, they don't talk about where they think smart brevity doesn't work well.

I mainly communicate in academia, religious preaching, and this blog. I am often not just sharing facts, but making an argument–a form of communication which, in a polarized world, is dominating more of our interactions. They never talk about this.

One can no longer just say a perspective and leave it there. They must anticipate rebuttals, demonstrate their knowledge of the subject, show their work logically and intellectually to show how they got somewhere. And this takes words. Not just bolded headings and bullet points.

My Take
So yes, Smart Brevity is already having a hugely positive effect on my life. Even a cursory scan of my writing shows I need to do this more. I write and say way too much.

But words still matter. The beauty of words still matter. I know the authors would say they also love words and think smart brevity can be beautiful. And that is all true. But there are realms and topics of communicating for which “short” really does mean short-changed.

This really threw me for a loop. It is a pretty provocative book that challenges a lot of aspects of the social justice orthodoxy of today. It gives language and voice to a lot of the questions, confusions, and difficulties that many feel intuitively about “deference politics”: does focusing on identity markers or trauma histories actually get us closer to reshaping the material reality that created those traumas? Or is it just an easy way for people (or more specifically, elites) to feel like they are “good people” while not actually changing the status quo?

I really appreciate the sense in which Taiwo's goal is to actually radically change the world, and he feels this is done at the institutional and societal level and less at the individual dialogue or small group “spaces”-level. As one review of the book put it, “While deference politics identifies the main problem as a lack of black female CEOs, constructive politics critiques the very existence of a CEO class.” I really resonate with his sense that communal organizing based around the liberative goal at hand ends up producing more results than policing who is in the room and how they exist there.

I always enjoy books that challenge all the usual “sides” of an issue. He's saying a lot of the same things that, for example, a Tucker Carlson might say. From my right-leaning friends, family, and media sources, I have often heard these sorts of sentiments. “Focusing so much on different identity markers gets in the way of seeing us as just human—it just divides, it doesn't unite us into a group that can do things.” “To whatever extent there are still problems among these groups, simply ‘representation' isn't going to fix it.” “Why would we want ourselves or our credentials to be defined by the worst thing that have ever happened to us or people like us?” “Why don't we choose the best person or group to get the job done and less on all the identity markers?” “Can I only talk about an issue I'm concerned about if I am a marginalized member of that minority? I can't have an opinion or say in this?” “The problem is more about class and economics, not race and identity.” Etc. Etc. Etc. I'm sure you know what I'm talking about.

However, I love that Taiwo can say things along these lines but then says them even as he promotes the black radical tradition, liberation politics, environmentalism, redistribution of material goods, and a Marxist seizing of the means of production by the organized common people.

It also matters that he is the one saying these things. Even if my gut agrees with much of what he is saying, I still don't think it is my place to say it. I still think that my own intuitions are largely shaped by my limited cultural perspectives, so I do have to listen to others' voices (also known as deferring to them) before my own in these matters. So, if there is any truth to these sentiments that roll around inside of me (and other white people) sometimes, that needs to be voiced from within that marginalized community and tradition and not from outside people like me.

I also really like how his account of the “elite” is more dynamic than the usual critique. While some people talk of this “elite” as almost an organized conspiracy trying to keep people down to maintain power, Taiwo talks more about eliteness as such. It almost sounds like the way many people speak of white supremacy and structural racism: you don't have to be a racist to be perpetuating or acting out of racism and doing racist things. Similarly, in Taiwo's account, the identity of the “elite” is slippery and shifting and can change context to context. It's not always the rich white male at the top of an organization. It can be whoever is wielding power in a given space—including the marginalized individual that's been given deference, the group microphone, and the authority to declare who is in and out of the “room”. “Eliteness”—and who benefits from identity and whatever space they're in—shifts and morphs, perhaps even moment-by-moment, based on a lot of different factors. And there are no easy answers.

So Taiwo's book is an excellent critique of the cultural situation as it is and gets us closer to having good guardrails on our justice efforts. Having his thinking in mind might give us at least a little more pause before abandoning a certain legislative effort because it doesn't go far enough, or before declaring someone “lost” to the cause or “canceled”. I know my own privilege makes it too easy for me to say this, but I am all for anything that gets us more coalition building and less bitter division.

However, I've got a good number of questions, confusions, and critiques of this book that keeps me from going all in with Taiwo.

First, I think his account has a lot of internal contradictions. He'll beautifully articulate how even in small groups this sort of eliteness and elite capture happens, but then doesn't seem to recognize how this still exists within the examples he gives. Nearly every example and story of someone's life who embodied these principles is the story of someone who at various times, in various settings, were themselves elites through whom good things were accomplished as a function and direct consequence of them being an elite.

Carter Woodson was able to be published and be in the leadership of numerous entities. The revolutionaries of the various countries he mentions all became the Presidents and leaders of those countries, and they had to force and coerce a lot of their changes onto citizens that may or may not have consented to that rule and those changes. In the Flint water crisis, they still had to form groups with leaders and PR representatives and lawyers—and even then, progress only happened by pressuring the existing power structures to use their power towards better ends, not by tearing down the power structures and creating an entirely different material world. Even the labor unions, which Taiwo speaks of as almost the purest form of coalition building and constructive politics, have many layers of bureaucracy, leadership, committees, and power. You simply cannot escape the existence of elites and the necessity to try and use it to better ends.

And I think this critique flows from maybe the essential, foundational difficulty I have with his entire view: his Anarcho-Marxist commitment to a materialist account and analysis to everything. That philosophical commitment guides the entire book. To him, the unequal material ordering of society is the problem and reordering those material conditions to a greater amount of equality is the solution—no matter how that comes about. In the book, there seems to be no difference in how he tells these “success stories”—whether a group educates kids into liberation or uses guerilla warfare to slaughter thousands of the “oppressors”. What seems to matter is “getting shit done” by whatever means seems most effective in bringing the redistribution of material resources.

I think this is why he almost rolls his eyes at all the “identity politics” and “deference” afforded to marginalized folks—it's not about changing the material reality, but reordering society through changing immaterial structures, cultures, dynamics, and relationships.

And this is where I cannot follow Taiwo. My account of reality is wrapped up in both material and immaterial aspects of the world. In fact, I don't think I can give a coherent account of why I would want to change material realities for others if it weren't for immaterial aspects. And not just religious ones. Even abstract secular ideas of human rights and human dignity don't get a lot of attention in Taiwo's book, which is seeking a purely pragmatic and materialist politics.

He says in passing two times in the book, I believe, that a coalitional politics is inherently a moral politics because it would be about accomplishing moral ends, but he doesn't go further than that. I think he anticipates people being like, “wait, you want me to have a coalition with that person who has done those things to people like me?”, and he seems to just sort of wave off the concern saying, “don't worry—if we're trying to accomplish good things, it'll attract good people.”

But that's not how it works. Human societies are greater than the sum of their materialist conditions. On Taiwo's terms, we've had coalitional politics for most of this country's history and it has not ended up more just or materially equal. That's precisely what has given rise to “deference politics” in the first place. “Justice” is itself an immaterial, undefined value and good which you cannot pursue, give an account of, or fight for on purely materialist, pragmatic grounds. It is wrapped up in ethics and morality—ideas notably absent from Taiwo's writing.

Taiwo's account (and Marxism in general, I believe) has an incredibly deficient view of human psychology. Not only is it almost exclusively limited to material interests of people, but it narrows those interests too much. History has shown us that when you don't give actual attention, focus, and intentionality to the makeup of “the room”, it's almost always going to end up being powerful people that look like one another making decisions on behalf of others without that power who do not look like them. It seems like Taiwo would say this is fine as long as their goal is ultimately material justice and liberation. But humans (and groups) don't have just one interest or goal at a time. That group may have come together to accomplish a good, liberative goal, but their individual beliefs on the why and how will differ greatly based on their interests, experience, and identities.

Within my faith tradition, it matters how and why good things are accomplished. It is simply not worth it to (as one writer once put in) “build God's kingdom using the devil's tools”. No matter the goal, the flow of power, dignity, and voice are foundational to the “goodness” of the good in question. I would love to see Taiwo engage Black liberation theology. There, he would find the idea of the “blackness of God”, where God is found in whatever group is marginalized, powerless, and in need of liberation. Power, then, flows from the bottom-up. On one hand it is, in a sense, uber-deference politics: we not only recognize authority based on identity, but we recognize God based on it. But at the same time, it emphasizes the suffering nature of history that brought us here. Divine deference to “the lowly” is not a gleeful, plundering, victorious process, but one where God has entered suffering to bring good from it, not to make the suffering itself good or a badge of honor. It is a deference borne of compassion, not privilege.

If I were to try and synthesize the good I take from Taiwo's book with other convictions of mine, I would maybe go int his direction. Not a “coalitional politics”, but a “compassional politics”, where no one's hands are clean and everyone requires compassion—even the oppressors (this is also Paulo Freire's belief—an activist whom Taiwo endorses wholeheartedly without engaging the entire moral and ethical structure of this thinking). The “deference” in this case is not artificially lending expertise, power, or privilege to people based on trauma or identity, but is an exercise of love, lament, and recognition. But the slipperiness of this eliteness and privilege from which we need liberation means that this all needs to happen with a profound and difficult ethic of mutuality among us. The compassion has to be tenaciously from all sides, for all sides.

Thinking about this, I'm reminded of the idea of right-of-way in the law. My understanding is that, technically, no road laws say who “has” the right-of-way. No one ever has it; the laws only say who is supposed to yield it. That would be my view here with regard to privilege and power.

Especially in micro (and maybe even mezzo) contexts and interactions, privilege and eliteness are too shifting to say with confidence at any particular moment who has it, who doesn't, and who needs to act differently based on it. Instead, in my view, we need a radical mutual commitment to yielding privilege one to another. I as a white straight cis male yield space and privilege to those marginalized so I can see divinity itself and integrate their experience into mine; but I also do this in hope that they can yield the privilege that affords them so they may also take in my experience and voice.

This mutual self-giving ethos is idealized and difficult, but shooting for it is a much better way, I think, than simply saying our stories and identities and histories just get in the way of making our lives better. Because honestly, my suspicion is that humans crave knowing and being known more than they long for better material circumstances. And frankly, I'm also guessing that sort of ethos would lend itself to even more fruitful coalitions that can change material reality more than Taiwo imagines.

So in the end, like I said, I really appreciate how Taiwo's thinking complexifies these newish social justice norms that we've maybe implemented too simplistically. The world is simply not separated so neatly into good and bad people, or elites and regular people. Marginalization is not itself a privilege or qualification, and some ways of focusing on or emphasizing that can be performative and actually further entrench powerful interests. We definitely should have less policing of ever-more granular aspects of society, speech, intent, and position, and we should seek new kinds of coalitions with tangible goals in mind.

But to neglect these factors altogether is to go too far and to reduce reality even more simplistically than identity politics might. Human interests are far more complicated than arrangements of mere resources and materials. We ought not get inordinately focused or stuck on one side of that reality to the detriment of the other, but we should keep both in mind. We fight for and attend to material realities not as ends in and of themselves, but as ways to support immaterial human dignity and flourishing; and likewise, we attend to “identities” and privilege and oppression in order to see the effects of material reality as it is now and to imagine what it could be and how to get there—together.

What an odd book. You see all the elements that will mark the work of Murakami in the future, but they are in their early form. Especially with this one, which is the second in a series of four books, three of which I have read (and am currently also reading the fourth). Those latter two are giant novels of oddity, mystery, and pursuit, that is mostly disconnected entirely from these first two books. (In fact, Murakami took these first two novels out of circulation in English, presumably out of embarrassment over his earliest writing style.) In these first two novels, a milder version of his later oddity is there, but only in the last small portion of this book does a completely unrelated mystery plot pop up into the narrative that has nothing to do with what comes before it, but that mirrors much of the mystery aspects of the later books in this series. It's interesting to watch a master writer finds their voice in their first novels. For any fan of Murakami, this is interesting reading, though not necessary. But still, it's a fast read and really enjoyable. Funny and moving, and extremely quirky and charming.

It's not everyday you finish a book that you don't really know what to do with. Overall, I enjoyed reading it. I don't regret having done so. But having finished it, do I walk away from it with some lingering feeling or impression? Not really.

This book is about a mother, Frida, who has “one very bad day”, and leaves her infant daughter alone at home for a few hours. Child protective services is called, the child is removed, and Frida is sent to a year-long reeducation pilot program for “bad mothers”. This school has much of the dystopian features that we associate with books like the “Handmaid's Tale” or “1984”, and much of the narrative is getting to know each of the women at this school and how they survive and what they endure, so on and so forth. Many similar books have been written since Atwood's novel–and that's not to diminish the quality of this book, but to lay the scene in order to ask if she really contributes something new.

This is Chan's debut novel. She's been a short story writer for some time, so she knows how to write. The book does not suffer many of the habits that more underdeveloped writers have in their first novels. However, something about it still feels like it is the first book written by the author. It's a little meandering, and its year-long timeline necessitates us being removed from the story for fairly large swaths of time, to be dropped back and zoomed in to a specific period of time with a brief summary of what happened between those moments. This lessens the horror that we are to feel about the nature of this school. Maybe if all of this were compacted within 6 months, it would have a greater sense of dread. But the pacing of the book is kind of odd, with some moments being unnecessarily drawn out and slow and others being so briefly summarized, that we start to feel like we don't in fact know these characters, or their lives, very well.

If there is one new thing that Chan brings to this general genre, it is some of the racial commentary. Chan herself is Asian, as is her protagonist here. I think Western mainstream audiences are still growing in their understanding of Asian Americans within the racial complexities of our society. The book skillfully shows us how the world is much more complex than simply all minorities being in tension with all white people, or Asians being lumped in with whites as “model minorities”. There are fascinating racial calibrations and navigations amongst the women at the school that are interesting to watch, even if nothing much happens or comes out of those tensions.

Additionally, I do appreciate how a lot of these characters are more fleshed out than in most debut novels. I especially appreciate that none of the characters were purely evil or righteous, with attempts at complexity and nuance being brought to different people's mindsets and actions. (But more on this in a minute.)

I do end the book with a sense of frustration, though. As the year progresses in the novel, I grew a growing interest in what was going to happen once her time at the school was over, but purely on an intellectual level. I don't think there was much about the text itself that was effectively ratcheting up the tension. Some of those latter months of the school program are really rushed through, almost as if Chan was on deadline and needed to finish the book and didn't quite know what to do with it.

But then, the ending comes. And it really falls flat. I'd read this whole book wondering if it was building up to something. And rather than ending with a bang, it does so with a whimper. It does attempt to make it interesting at the very end, but I don't think it works.

I am very comfortable with sad or unresolved endings in novels. I really love them, in fact. And I think that's what Chan is trying to do here. I think she's wanting to talk about how the system almost always wins, how there is not really any catharsis against injustice, and how no system and no person is completely good or completely bad.

And this ties back to my earlier statement about the characters being complex. I think Chan wants to stress the messiness of humans and systems. Not everything that this school does is horrifying. And many of the women at the school are women that we would not want to sympathize with or that we may think should be sent to a school like this. I appreciate that no one really has any sort of narrative arc–neither the systems nor the people.

From the beginning of the novel, I really liked Frida as a narrator, because she really was complex and on the spectrum between good and bad, we would probably think she was a little more on the selfish and narcissistic side. We actually do feel like she she is not well equipped or prepared to be a mother. She says thoughts that I'm sure every parent has, but never utters out loud. And yes, by the end, she wants to be a mother whereas there is some ambivalence in the beginning. But I cannot tell you how she got to that place. I don't actually think she has come to terms with any of the weaknesses or dysfunctions inside of her. Honestly, I am not rooting for her at the end.

I think throughout the novel, Frida really is screwed by the system unjustly, but I don't know that she's any different of a human coming out of this year-long hell than she went in. In fact, it seems like she may have collapsed in on herself and her narcissism all the more while there.

Maybe that is Chan's point: unjust systems, even if they are intended to help, will often make people worse than better, perhaps even to justify their own existence. But even if so, the contrast and the arc and the movement to that place is not well executed, in my opinion. This may be one of those books where inconsistency and a lack of vision and clarity is confused for complexity, nuance, and ambiguity. But I think there's a way to clearly demonstrate complexity, even if you want to do it with a “less is more” sensibility. I just don't think it was successful here.

I believe I read somewhere that this book has already been chosen to be made into a TV series. I'll probably watch it, and maybe they can flesh all of this out and create much more tension and depth. And I still am looking forward to Chan's later works. But though I mostly enjoyed the pros in this novel, I feel it was a bit thin and lacking depth which I feel Chan is capable of giving us. And that's a little frustrating. Or perhaps I am a bad reader. But I am learning to be good.

Good gracious, this volume covering Jefferson's first term goes at a million miles an hour. It only covers four years, but they were surely event-filled. The same period in single-volume biographies usually covers only a chapter or two. But there's a lot. However, at the same time, I somehow don't know if this book needed to be this long. At times I enjoy the leisurely pace at which Dumas writes, but when I look back at the long book I just read and realized it just covered four years, it's a little mind-boggling.

As continues to be the case through all these biographies, I don't know that I have a fully formed impression of who Jefferson is as a human. He is so aloof, and so frequently moves against the principles and values that he promotes in his writings, philosophy, theoretical declarations that he's so known for, it's difficult to get a read on the guy. He obviously knew that he was going to be well-known throughout this country's history, so it seems that every one of his letters and diaries and journals were written to obscure what is really going on inside of him in favor of what he wants posterity to think of him.

And what further obscures this is that Dumas continues to act as Jefferson's chief apologist to explain and expound upon this man whom he has already deemed to be worthy, good, and righteous.

Nevertheless, it is a fascinating time which is covered in this book. It was the real beginning of party politics in America, where the President was also buying into the machinations and movements of the party spirit. Our first two presidents were very intentional and self-conscious about not giving in to party passions, and deliberately went against them when they could. You could not look at the actions and platforms of Washington and Adams and say they neatly fit either of the emerging parties.

Jefferson, however, is different. He was the first president nominated and elected on the basis of party platforms and affiliations. What's a bit frustrating in these volumes by Dumas is that he vividly portrays the partisanship of every single person and part of the national political culture and institutions, but seems to believe that Jefferson transcends and floats above them. Then when people just happen to do the things he wants or when he makes moves that absolutely further entrench and empower his party and destroy the other, Dumas writes about it as if he was just following his own ideals and trying to be a good president while all these other people were taking advantage of it for their own partisan gain.

Reading other biographies, though, it is clear that Jefferson was rabidly partisan and would sometimes do things just for the sake of party even if it went against his own previously expressed principles. Indeed, much of the Federalist criticisms levied at Jefferson were that he was hypocritical to the very Declaration of Independence he wrote.

This volume covers some exciting events in America's history, including the conflict with the Barbary pirates, the Louisiana purchase, and the removal of Aaron Burr from the vice presidential spot for the 1804 election (although admittedly, this was a much less dramatic affair than one would assume, even without having seen the musical “Hamilton”). And I'll be honest: I'm a little split in how what I think of how Dumas covers these events.

Dumas is good about telling these stories in excruciating detail, at points going day by day, and admirably juggles the acts of different people happening concurrently (especially when it comes to the Louisiana purchase). The artistic side of my brain was a little frustrated that he did not add some novelistic flair and drama to these inherently dramatic ordeals. More contemporary biographers have had fun writing these stories of espionage, war, and intrigue in ways that are far more gripping.

And yet, my more analytical side really does appreciate the way Dumas captures how relatively mundane these things were for the real people as they were happening, and how they were more stressful than exciting for those involved. History often just isn't that dramatic when experienced in real time.

So if you want some of the most comprehensive accounts of these events and their accompanying political intrigues and constitutional arguments, and have an ability to import your own sense of drama into receiving those facts, then you can't do much better than this. But if you need someone to get you excited about history, then maybe look elsewhere.

I will end with my biggest frustration of this particular volume. More than any other, this one seems to have no awareness of any existence of the world other than Thomas Jefferson.

In the introduction, Dumas explicitly says that he wrestles with this. He points out that for biographers, it's always a balancing act, but in the end he had to err on the side of this being the history of one man and not the history of an entire country. But still, the country is just as much a product of Jefferson's person and presidency as he is a product of the country itself. And so throughout the book Dumas makes very odd decisions on the secondary people and events he chooses to zoom in on and those he chooses to ignore all together.

Aaron Burr, for example, is one of the most important people in the political life of Thomas Jefferson, and his actions dramatically shape and guide Jefferson's story for over a decade, and yet Dumas seems to go out of his way to say as little about Burr as a person as possible, perhaps out of a fear that if he starts going down the Aaron Burr rabbit hole he may never come out. (Luckily, the next volume that covers Jefferson's second term will force his hand to discuss Burr at length.)

Yet even as Dumas says so little about Aaron Burr, he goes so much in depth into the impeachment trial of judge Samuel Chase, going through Chase's individual opinions on each partisan thing that contributed to his impeachment, and goes through every partisan move surrounding the impeachment and the speeches and the charges over each day of his trial.

And yet Dumas himself makes it clear that Jefferson was intentional to not have anything to do with this trial. The President made no comments about it, neither public nor private, he was not present for the trial, and he played no role in the impeachment being considered nor tried.

Other than being a headache for his own political party, the impeachment literally has nothing to do with Thomas Jefferson. Yet Dumas chooses to focus in on the granular minutiae and ignore other people and events that were far more influential in Jefferson's life.

Previous volumes have had a lot of information about the world at large–America's earliest days and the cultural and philosophical forces and people that created Thomas Jefferson.

This volume, however, has none of that. You pretty much just follow Jefferson and his discussions with his cabinet members and his partisans arguing in the media. We have no idea who is managing Monticello while he is gone and how that's going. We have no insight into the continuing building and development of Washington DC and how that might be a shaping the politics there. We aren't even given insight into Jefferson's finances or personal relationships and friendships at this time. It's just the political story of Thomas Jefferson for these four years, and an overtly biased apologetic for him at that.

Some sort of eye towards the broader world and how they are experiencing Jefferson's presidency would go a long way in giving insight to the man himself and how aware he was or not of his place in the world. But there's literally no discussion along those lines in this entire volume.

Still, this is still the most comprehensive account of these years of Jefferson's life that have ever been written, and for that they are still valuable, even if I do feel that this is perhaps the weakest volume I've read so far. I'm hopeful for the next one though.

What a remarkable and moving book. It is one of the funniest books I have read in a long time, without being cynical or snarky. You will both laugh and cry. It is an incisive snapshot of the contemporary mind and experience of the world, relationships, and human difficulties that transcend all technological epochs. Through the lens and filter of our unique media and technological eccentricities, Lockwood gives us a meditation and celebration of what it means to be human underneath and behind all of the posts, likes, and stories. It is neither an indictment of our social media-obsessed age, nor a fetishization of it. Simply a poignant exploration of its limits and the parts of the human soul and experience it cannot adequately capture, share, nor affect. I cannot recommend this book more highly, especially to all of my fellow millennials trying to find meaning and rest in our current age.

This is still the best, most thoughtful book on sex and chastity I've ever read. I know there are more theological books, and more recent books, but this has just the right balance of theology, pastoral wisdom, winsomeness, groundedness to really speak to sexuality in the church in this day and age (when if some of the cultural references and language is a bit dated now).

At times Winner says things a little more starkly than I would, it should definitely speaks very much more conservative place. But this is hands down the best articulation and defense of the traditional Christian sexual ethic you will find, and I would wholeheartedly endorse this book to anyone who wants more clarity on what the church teaches about this topic and why. I would especially recommend this to high school and college students.

My only hesitation in recommending this book now would be my lack of clarity on how Winner currently views what she wrote in this book. She finished this book right after getting married, and some really beautiful parts of the book are about her transition from being single to being married. However, the handful of years after this book, she divorced that guy and experienced a real season of doubt in her faith, which she writes about in her beautiful memoir, “Still”. And I mentioned this not to judge her or say that her words here no longer hold weight. Not at all. I'm only making a pastoral point. I simply don't know if she herself would still endorse most or all she wrote in this book, and therefore there is some hesitancy there. If somebody read this book, was incredibly helped by it, and really had their opinions changed in these matters, and then found out that she rejects most of the book, what would that do?

Lastly, for anyone interested in this book, she covers the traditional Christian sexual ethic around sex, chastity, and a theology of singleness and marriage. At no point in the book does she speak to LGBTQ issues one way or another. This book could fully be read and appreciated by all Christians whether they are LGBTQ affirming or not. I see no reason that someone's conscience would be especially bothered either way from this book.

What a remarkable book. A beautiful exercise in narrative theology, weaving moving memoir with substantive theological reflection about how the landscape of women's bodies and motherhood nights reflect and point us to the divine.

I admit, though. I myself have both a strong post-enlightenment rigid intellectual side and an equally strong creative, intuitive, artistic side reading within me. Well there were moments of robust academic theology woven throughout this book, much of the book peels more towards one's poetic, artistic, and more flexible impulses. I've described this book to friends as being more than a little “woo woo” at parts; meaning, there are times when a very flexible approach to certain texts is taken to interpret scripture, or things are said that are more often associated with the hippie, crunchy all natural vibes you find along your “weird” friends in Instagram. You know the type.

I have seen this tension in other Goodreads reviews of this book. A lot of people criticize it for being advertised as “theology” but (in their view), it is “just” a memoir. With all due respect, this is incorrect. Each chapter begins with a memoir-ish entry into a topic, but then real theology is done around that topic. If you can allow yourself to be more flexible with scripture, interpretation, and a more intuitive and larger view of theology, then this book will move you and teach you profoundly.

If you hear me write that sentence, and your brain immediately starts wanting to plant flags in the ground about strict narrow techniques of hermeneutics and interpretation, then you will have a hard time with this book. And that's okay. The world needs people of that wiring as well.

Lastly, as one source of critique, I've got to say: this book REALLY needed a more aggressive editing process. Individual lines, stories, and conclusions are repeated at different times in the book, as if Bauman had forgotten she had already mentioned these things. People who she's been quoting throughout the book suddenly get a fuller introduction to who they are halfway through, as if they are being introduced for the first time. It felt like the original draft of this book had the chapters in a different order, maybe. The pacing and the flow of the book can be inconsistent, and the clarity with which she makes her point could have been tighter. This is only a little distracting, and does not take away from the overall force in beauty of the book, though.

However, I will say that the audiobook version has a wonderful narrator and listening to it as opposed to reading it might more effectively smooth out some of the rough edges of the pros.