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Newest Politics and Society Reviews (view source)
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[[Category:New Reviews|Politics and Society]]==Politics and society==__NOTOC__ <!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Laurence Manley (editor)Ariel Saramandi|title=The Cambridge Companion to the Literature Portrait of Londonan Island on Fire|rating=34.5
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=The history In this powerful collection of London is a long and storied oneessays, and it's unsurprising that so many people have written about Saramandi seeks to intradermally dissect the capital. I've always loved sociopolitical fabric of Mauritius, tunneling deep into the city, its history and novels wounds left by colonialism and plays set within London, so was really keen slavery to get my hands on this new volume in expose how these legacies still shape modern life. Saramandi describes the Cambridge Companion series.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0521722314</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Jolyon Fenwick and Marcus Husselby|title=It Could Have Been Yours: The enlightened personcountry at one stage as ''rotting's guide to the year's most desirable things|rating=4|genre=Trivia|summary=In a world of diamond-encrusted skulls, gold-leafed iPhones and luxury yachts ten a penny, of blingy shit (or should that be shitty bling?) it's a relief to know people are still spending money on unique one-offs that are more worthwhile. The records blunt yet apt metaphor for costliest photo, artwork, musical instrument and manuscript have all been broken in the twenty four months leading up to this book's release. Our collators have scoured systemic decay brought about by the press for those and othermalignant forces of racism, similarly noteworthy auctionspatriarchy, environmental degradation and found what other people paid for what you didn't know you would have wanted given the moneygovernmental dysfunction.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846684900</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=John L Locke|title=Duels and Duets: Why Men and Women Talk So Differently|rating=4|genre=Popular Science|summary=Locke's subtitle ''Why Men and Women Talk So Differently'' might lead you to think that Each essay in this is just another self-help ''Men are from Marscollection serves as a kind of diagnostic, Women are from Venus'' tome. It's not. Rather than focussing upon what we all know from experience – that men and women do not communicate very well because of some fundamental difference in their respective approach to verbal expression – charting the various diseases afflicting the New York City University Professor of Linguistics sets out to explain WHY that might beisland state.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0521887135</amazonuk>1804271616
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Frank FurediGregor Hens and Jen Calleja (translator)|title=On Tolerance: The Life Style Wars: A Defence of Moral IndependenceCity and the World
|rating=4
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=Furedi is a Professor of Sociology at a UK university so heIn ''The City and the World''ll know his subject matter inside out, Gregor Hens reveals how cities are as much imagined spaces as they are physical ones. The short preface tells us With a deep affection for the urban landscapes that 'tolerance has been emptied have shaped his life, Hens reflects on places like Cologne, Berlin, and Goch on the Lower Rhine with a blend of its moral personal memory and intellectual meaningthoughtful observation.' This publication's aim is His writing, at times abstract, captures not just architectural features but the emotional and mental geographies tied to argue the case each location, for tolerance in societyexample, his perspectives as a child as opposed to as an adult. How its meaning has changed over the centuries until today's rather fuzzy From Belgium and watered-down meaning. Professor Furedi was spurred on Germany to writing this book because he firmly believes that tolerance has been lost somehowBerkeley and Columbus, Hens traces a map of experiences, to be almost invisible in some areas turning cities into reflections of public identity and private lifebelonging.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1441120106</amazonuk>1804271691
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Chris MullinPaul B Preciado|title=A Walk-on Part: Diaries 1994 - 1999Dysphoria Mundi
|rating=4.5
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=We tend to remember where we were and how we heard about the deaths of people like John F Kennedy, Elvis Presley and Princess Diana, but I'd add another person to the list: John Smith. I remember sitting in my office and a colleague coming in to tell me. She added 'I suppose we'll have that dreary Gordon Brown as leader now'. We'd many angst-ridden miles It is never too late to go before that came about but Smith's death is embrace the opening entry in this, the third volume (but first chronologically) revolutionary optimism of Chris Mullin's Diaries. This book covers the first period of 'New Labour', from Smithchildhood's death until Mullin's assumption into government in July 1999.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846685230</amazonuk>}}
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Lydia Ola TaiwoJacqueline Feldman|title=A Broken Childhood: A True Story of AbusePrecarious Lease
|rating=3.5
|genre=AutobiographyBiography|summary=Mojisola – known to everyone as Ola – was born The title of this novel refers to a Nigerian couple French legal term (''bail précaire'') associated with squatters in London in 1964 France, affording them temporary suspension from eviction charges and spent the first five years processes, but few scant property rights. Among mentions of her life other squats dotted around Paris like Le Carrosse and La Miroiterie, Feldman takes particular interest in a foster home in Brighton. Here she was lovedone squat of massive proportions which adopted an almost mythical status for its inhabitants, looked after admirers and lived her life in detractors alike: Le Bloc. Something like a genuinely good family. This wasnhaven for artists and marginal members of society (as one character, Le Général, repeats throughout, ''t an unusual arrangement as it allowed I live on the margins of the biological parents to earn money without worrying about childcare – and Ola was happy. It was all margins of the more cruel when her biological father arrived to take her margins'home' for ), Le Bloc was subject to the weekend – a weekend which would stretch into seven years continual threat of abuse eviction and neglectthe pressures from above which oppressed its inhabitants' lives. We follow Le Bloc from its opening in 2012 until its eventual dissolution, framed as a tragedy in this book.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846245907</amazonuk>1804271403
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Max PembertonClaire Dederer|title=The Doctor Will See You NowMonsters: What Do We Do with Great Art by Bad People?|rating=3.5
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=The NHS is one Dederer sets out to unveil what she calls a ''biography of those things that everyone seems to have an opinion aboutthe audience'' in a deconstructed, thoroughly nitpicked, and this exploration of course includes those the old aphorism of us who work for said organisation (separating the art from the artist in the worldcontext of contemporary ''cancel culture's 3rd largest employer, don'tcha know). Max Pemberton Dederer's work is one of those people: a doctor, though despite what you might assume original and expressive. The reader gets the impression that the thoughts simply sprang and leapt from her brilliant mind and onto the titlepage. In particular, not the prologue packs a GP but a hospital medicpunch: she simultaneously condemns and exalts the director Roman Polanski, an artist she personally admires for his art, and yet despises for his actions. This model of ''monstrous men'' as she calls them, is his third book on consistent for the subject of life (and death) within first few chapters, interrogating the walls likes of a hospitalWoody Allen, plus the odd excursion to rather misnamed Care HomesMichael Jackson and Pablo Picasso. Her critical voice is acutely present throughout, never slipping into anonymity and maintaining her own subjectivity, as she holds it's not so dearly, and a bad readpersonal, rather than collective voice. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0340919949</amazonuk>1399715070
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Shirin EbadiVirginie Despentes|title=The Golden Cage: Three Brothers, Three Choices, One DestinyKing Kong Theory
|rating=4
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=''King Kong Theory'' is a hard-hitting memoir and feminist manifesto, which can be seen as a call to arms for women in a phallocentric society broken at its core. Originally written in French, the book is a collection of essays in which Virginie Despentes explores her experiences as a woman through the complex prism of her varied life: from rape to sex work and pornography. Though these discussions are intertwined, their placement within the book can feel somewhat disjointed, a reflection of their original form as independent essays.
|isbn=191309734X
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=1009473085
|title=The Conservative Effect 2010 - 2024
|author=Anthony Seldon and Tom Egerton (Editors)
|rating=5
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=Dr Ebadi is currently living in exile, fearing for her safety, should she return Sometimes it's simpler to Iran in the foreseeable future. Her Prologue describes explain a violent book by describing what it ''isn't'' and bloody reaction that applies to ''The Conservative Effect: 2010-2024 - 14 Wasted Years?''. If you're looking for an easy read which will deliver the inside story about what was a peaceful situation involving wives''really'' happened on certain occasions, mothers and sistersthen this isn't the book for you. Boulders and large stones were thrown If that's what you're looking for, I don't think Anthony Seldon's book, {{amazonurl|isbn=B0BH7SKG2S|title=Johnson at elderly10}}, defenseless women without can be bettered for those tumultuous years. It's a momentcompelling read and should be compulsory for anyone who thinks Johnson should return to politics. ''The Conservative Effect'' is an entirely different beast. It's hesitationthe seventh book in a series which looks at the impact a government has made and co-editor Sir Anthony Seldon regards this as the most important. A taste This book follows the well-established format: a series of experts from various fields review the state of things to come?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0979845645</amazonuk>the nation when the coalition took over in 2010, the changes that occurred and the situation in 2024.
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Nigel HamiltonAlastair Humphreys|title=American Caesars: Lives of the US Presidents, from Franklin D Roosevelt to George W BushLocal
|rating=5
|genre=HistoryTravel |summary=The Premise is simple: take twelve men (Alastair Humphreys has walked and unfortunately they are cycled all men, but that's not over the author's fault) who have achieved high office world. And then written about it. For this book he walked and cycled very close to home and look at each of themthen wrote about it. FirstlyAs he says in his introduction, take a look at the road book is an attempt ''to the high office, then how they performed once they reached their goal and finally share what I have learnt about some big issues from a year exploring a look at their private lifesmall map. Suetonius did it first when he wrote ''The Twelve Caesars'' Nature loss, pollution, land use and now Nigel Hamilton has taken access, agriculture, the same journey with food system, rewilding…''American Caesars One of the joys of the book for me was that the biggest thing he learned about all of these things was that there are no easy answers, no single 'right or wrong', that every upside is likely to have a remarkably in-depth look at twelve consecutive American presidents from the twentieth downside for somebody and early twenty-first centuries, starting with Franklin D Roosevelt and finishing with George W Bushthat there are some hard choices ahead.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099520419</amazonuk>1785633678
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Bob Marshall-AndrewsEdel Rodriguez|title=Off MessageWorm: The Complete Antidote to Political HumbugA Cuban American Odyssey
|rating=4
|genre=AutobiographyGraphic Novels|summary=Bob Marshall-Andrews entered Parliament We're in 1997childhood, rather too late to be and we're in Cuba. The revolution has happened, and Castro, first thought of as a saviour of the country, has proven himself a career politician (he was already an established QC) Communist, and with not done nearly enough to create a profound distrust level playing field for all. Well, those hours-long speeches of his were kind of authoritytaking his time away. He had no aspirations towards officeOur narrator's family weren't in the happiest of places here, which was perhaps as well for all concerned an uncle refusing to be the good soldier the country demanded (especially as he would become best known probably be shipped off to some minor pro-Communism skirmish, such as Angola) and the father being watched and watched, and not liked for his successful photography business, success being a dissidentfrowned upon. I occasionally enquired as The mother gets the couple jobs with the party to ease some of the heat, but in this sultry island country, it remains the kind of heat forcing you out of the kitchen…|isbn=1474616720}}{{Frontpage|author=Sarah Wilson|title=This One Wild and Precious Life: the path back to connection in a fractured world|rating=3.5|genre= Lifestyle|summary= My favourite Mary Oliver line is the one in which party held his allegiance she asks ''What is it you plan to do with your one wild and eventually concluded precious life?'' I get to love that he went with his conscienceline so much because my answer is ''This! Precisely this. '' The last three Labour administrations have spawned more political memoirs than any other – and I did wonder if this would 'm lucky enough to be just living my one more wild and precious life the way I want to add . Sarah Wilson is equally lucky. In her book that takes Oliver's words as her title (though I can't see that she acknowledges the source) she pushes us to think about whether we really ''are'' living the life we want – the best life that we could be living. Her answer is an unequivocal ''no, we are not''. Don't care what you're doing, she thinks you (we, I) could be doing more…And she's effing furious about the pilefact that we are not.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846684412</amazonuk>1785633848
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Karen Blixen1785633457|title=Out Of AfricaCharging Around: Exploring the Edges of England by Electric Car|author=Clive Wilkinson
|rating=5
|genre=AutobiographyTravel|summary=It's more than Clive Wilkinson has a quarter history of travelling by unconventional means with a century since I first saw the film ''Out of Africa'' and it's one of the few that have stayed with me over the intervening yearspreference for slow travel. It wasn't just As he neared his eightieth birthday the story, but the personality idea of Karen Blixen and exploring the wonderful landscape edges of the Ngong Hills, south of Nairobi, England in Kenya's Rift Valleyan electric car was not totally outrageous. I remember looking In fact, it should be a pleasant holiday for this book at the timeClive and his wife, but being unable to find itJoan, so the opportunity to read shouldn't it now was too good to miss.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241951437</amazonuk>?
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Stephen Sedley1529153050|title=Ashes and Sparks: Essays On Law and JusticeBritain's Best Political Cartoons 2022|author=Tim Benson|rating=4.5|genre=Politics and SocietyHumour|summary=Some books are hard Seeking some light relief from the current political turmoil which is coming to readseem more and more like an adrenaline sport, and even harder I was nudged towards ''Britain's Best Political Cartoons of 2022''. Sharp eyes will have noted that we're not yet through the year: the cartoons run from 4 September 2021 to review31 August 2022. This is particularly true of Who can imagine what are essentially academic or "professional" books and you there will be to come to them as a lay reader. This then is my starting position on Ashes and Sparks.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0521170907</amazonuk>in the 2023 edition?
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Gary Armstrong and Tim GrayB0B7289HKQ|title=The Authentic TawneyConversations Across America: A New Interpretation of Father and Son, Alzheimer's, and 300 Conversations Along the TransAmerica Bike Trail that Capture the Political Thought Soul of R. H. Tawney America|author=Kari Loya
|rating=4
|genre=Politics and SocietyTravel|summary=The Authentic Tawney takes a fresh look at the political writing of R H TawneyKari (that rhymes with ‘sorry’, a left wing academic whose works were a big influence on the huge program of postwar reform engineered by the Labour Party, particularly way) wanted to spend some time with his father and the provision of universal secondary educationperiod between two jobs seemed like a good time to do it. The authors assert that Tawney's ideas changed markedly through decision was made to ride the course Trans America Bike Trail from Yorktown, Virginia to Astoria, Oregon - all 4250 miles of his life and that they lack the consistency that other interpreters have erroneously attributed to themit - in 2015. They reject had 73 days to do it - slightly less than the notion recommended time - but there were factors which pointed this up as more of a challenge that his writings have an essential unity, which is philosophically interesting it would be for most people who considered taking it on. Merv Loya was 75 years old and he was suffering from early- don't we tend to assume that an intellectual's lifestage Alzheimer's work will contain a central 'core' of ideas? Discussion of an important pioneer in democratic socialism also seems relevant at a time when Labour has 'lost its way' and evolved into a watered down version of the Conservatives.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845402243</amazonuk>
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=1739593901
|title=22 Ideas About The Future
|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)
|rating=5
|genre=Science Fiction
|summary=''Our future will be more complex than we expected. Instead of flying cars, we got night-vision killer drones and automated elderly care with geolocation surveillance bracelets to track grandma.''
I've got a couple of confessions to make. I'm not keen on short stories as I find it easy to read a few stories and then forget to return to the book. There's got to be a very compelling hook to keep me engaged. Then there's science fiction: far too often it's the technology which takes centre stage along with the world-building. It's human beings who fascinate me: the technology and the world scape are purely incidental. So, what did I think of a book of twenty-two science fiction short stories? Well, I loved it. }}{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Nick HewlettJane Goodall and Douglas Abrams |title=The Sarkozy PhenomenonBook of Hope |rating=45|genre=Politics and Society|summary=The old saying done thing is that 'cometh the hour, cometh the man' and whether or not it's the electorate's ability to pick the man or whether he was only seen as the right man in retrospect is read a moot point. There are, though, some surprising people at book all the head of European countries at the moment – with Silvio Berlusconi and Nicholas Sarkozy at the head of my personal listway through before you sit down to review it. My [[Nicolas Sarkozy and Carla Bruni: The True Story by Valerie Benaim and Yves Azeroual|last attempt]] to find out more about Sarkozy proved to be too light-weight for my tastesI’m making an exception here, but this time because I've gone don’t want to lose any of the opposite end experience of the scale with a reading this amazing book from Nick Hewlett, Professor of French Studies at the University of Warwick and published by Imprint Academic. I mention those points because there is no attempt want to present this capture it as populist writing: it's scholarly from beginning to endhits me. And it is hitting me. This beautiful book has me in tears.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1845402391</amazonuk>024147857X
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Charles Emmerson1788360737|title=Artivism: The Future History Battle for Museums in the Era of the Arctic: How climate, resources and geopolitics are reshaping the north, and why it matters to the worldPostmodernism|author=Alexander Adams|rating=42|genre=HistoryPolitics and Society|summary=Charles Emmerson examines Can art ever be apolitical? All art is political because art is not made in a vacuum. It is made by people. Antonio Gramsci stated that ‘’Every man… contributes to modifying the past history of Arctic explorationsocial environment in which he develops’’. Therefore, economic exploitation and development and the policies of governments of countries which include Arctic territory (and others)all art must be political, with the aim of understanding the present and predicting the future bettereven implicitly. He explains the apparently contradictory title Alexander Adams in some detail his new book ‘Artivism: The Battle for Museum in the Introduction. While history Era of Postmodernism’ is adamant that art is freer when it is about the past, 'ideas about the future have changed over time'art for art’s sake. Also, the future The recent trend of the Arctic will be shaped so-called artivism has caused artists to become more overtly political (read: left wing). Their seemingly grass roots movements have been astroturfed by its historylarge “left-wing” donors and media elites hoping to create a more globalist and progressive regime. Or at least that’s what Alexander Adams believes.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099523531</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Yangzom Brauen and Katy Darbyshire1398508632|title=Across Many Mountains: Three Daughters of TibetThe Wilderness Cure|author=Mo Wilde|rating=45|genre=BiographyLifestyle|summary=Fleeing your home can never be easy It had been on the cards for a while but when you are six, your only shoes are roughly hand-sewn and stuffed with hay, and your route is over the world's highest mountain range then it must be particularly challenging. This was the journey that Yangzom Brauen's mother took with week-long consumer binge which pushed Mo Wilde into beginning her parents when they fled Tibet after the Chinese invasion year of 1959eating only wild food. They were leaving behind all that they knew and travelling to India The end of November, particularly in Central Scotland was perhaps not the hope that they could find sanctuary best time to start, in a world where the country where normal sores had been exacerbated by climate change, Brexit and a pandemic. Wilde had a few advantages: the Dalai Lama area around her was in exilea known habitat with a variety of terrains. She had electricity which allowed her to run a fridge, freezer and dehydrator. She had a car - and fuel. Most importantly, she had shelter: this was not a plan to ''live'Across Many Mountains' is their storywild just to live off its produce.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184655344X</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Dambisa Moyo1529149800|title=Things You Can Do: How the West was Lost: Fifty Years of Economic Folly And the Stark Choices Aheadto Fight Climate Change and Reduce Waste|author=Eduardo Garcia and Sara Boccaccini Meadows
|rating=4
|genre=Politics Home and SocietyFamily|summary=Moyo's first book, ''Dead Aid'' was We begin with a well regarded telling story. All the birds and oft discussed title animals fled when I worked in Developmentthe forest fire took hold and most of them stood and watched, unable to think of anything they could do. In a country where it was hard The tiny hummingbird flew to find any book at all, somehow every ex-pat household seemed to have at least one copy the river and began taking tiny amounts of this, water and flying back to drop them into the fire. The animals laughed: what good was that doing. ''I followed 'm doing the sheep and had a readbest I can'', said the hummingbird. It was a great And that, really, insightful book is the only way that we could all identify withwill solve the problem of climate change – by each of us doing what we can, and I was eager to read her second, if somewhat unrelated workhowever small that might be.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846142350</amazonuk>
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=1638485216
|title=Black, White, and Gray All Over: A Black Man's Odyssey in Life and Law Enforcement
|author=Frederick Reynolds
|rating=5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=''Corruption is not department, gender or race specific. It has everything to do with character. Period.''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Anna PolitkovskayaMatthieu Aikins|title=Nothing but The Naked Don't Fear the Truth: Selected Dispatches Water
|rating=4.5
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=Anna Politkovskaya worked for It's easy to forget at times that The Naked Don't Fear the Russian newspaper Novaya gazetaWater isn't actually fiction, becoming particularly famous for her critical reports on the wars in Chechnyabecause it reads very much like a well-paced thriller at times. This is not by any means a criticism, on Putin, on state corruption but rather a testament to how well Matthieu Aikins – a Canadian citizen who decided to accompany his friend as a refugee from Afghanistan through Europe – recounts a vast and on life in Russia under his regimeat times painful journey. She never avoided controversy There are tense moments and received a number gripping accounts of death threats before she was murdered in October 2006border crossings which had me on edge the whole way through. She had reason to know these were no idle threats – one of her articles here entitled But it'Is Journalism Worth s written with a haunting and almost lyrical quality that allows the Loss of a Life?' reports reader to perfectly envisage the attempted murder of one of her colleaguesenvironments and people described.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099526689</amazonuk>B09N9157T6
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jonny Steinberg1785633074|title=Little Liberia: An African Odyssey in New York CityStaggering Hubris|author=Josh Berry|rating=4.5|genre=BiographyHumour|summary=South African Steinberg has won awards with previous nonMembers of Parliament like us to believe that the country is run by politicians, headed by the Prime minister -fiction books and after reading the praise from various sources ''primus inter pares'' (New York Times, J M Coetzeethat's for those of you who are Eton and Oxbridge educated) I came to but the conclusion reality is that I was in for a serious and thoughtthe ''prime'' movers are the special advisers -provoking read. The preface tells us that the two Liberian men SPADS - Rufus and who are the driving force behind the younger Jacob left Liberian soil in vastly different circumstances and for different reasonsgovernment. But as they meet up years later and thousands We are in the privileged position of having access to the memoirs of miles away from their homelandRafe Hubris, their ''Little Liberia'' in New York City has a tall order: the man who was behind the skilful control of the Covid crisis which was completely contained by the end of 2020. You might not know the name now but he will certainly be the man to contain and accommodate their big personalities and to a certain extent, their big egoswatch. Can it cope?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224085662</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Tracy Kidder1846276772|title=Mountains Beyond MountainsThe End of Bias: How We Change Our Minds|author=Jessica Nordell
|rating=4.5
|genre=BiographyPolitics and Society|summary=Dr Paul Farmer has dedicated his life to helping Anyone who is not an able, white man understands bias in that they may no longer even recognise the poorest and neediest in society. He works tirelessly extent to help people less fortunate than him. which they suffer from it: it''Dedicated his s simply a part of everyday life'' and ''works tirelessly'' - phrases we've heard many times about many wonderful people. White men will always come first. The able will come before the disabled. Jobs, promotions, but higher salaries are the preserve of the white man. Even when reading ''Mountains Beyond Mountainsthose who wouldn't pass the medical become a part of an organisation it's rare that their views are heard, you'll realise therethat their concerns are acknowledged. It's not a shred of hyperbole about these claims. Farmer began working with tuberculosis and AIDS patients in Haiti, and then worked with them, personally appalling and worked degrading for them, and worked with them, and worked for them, and worked with them. In an area where treating the disease is just one part individuals on the receiving end of the problem, where poverty is rife, he has transformed an area, saved countless lives, and made an incredible difference to many people. [http://www.pih.org/ Partners In Health], bias but it's not just the healthcare organisation he set up with his colleagues, takes this work worldwideindividuals who are negatively impacted. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846684315</amazonuk>
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=1529148251
|title=Misfits: A Personal Manifesto
|author=Michaela Coel
|rating=5
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=''How am I able to be so transparent on paper about rape, malpractice and poverty, yet still compartmentalise? It's as though I were telling the truth whilst simultaneously running away from it.''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Valerie Benaim and Yves Azeroual0008350388|title=Nicolas Sarkozy and Carla Bruni: The True Story|rating=3.5|genre=Biography|summary=In November 2007 the French President, Nicolas Sarkozy was newly divorced from his second wife and, despite his position and busy life, feeling rather lonely. He accepted an invitation We Need to a dinner party from a friend and met supermodel and recording artist, Carla Bruni. The attraction between them was instant – she had already said that she wanted a man with nuclear power and he was smitten by the attentions of a beautiful, famous and intelligent woman. Within months they were married.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0907633145</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewTalk About Money|author=Beate Teresa Hanika|title=Learning to ScreamOtegha Uwagba
|rating=5
|genre=TeensPolitics and Society|summary=Malvina is thirteen years old, the youngest of three children in ''To be a dysfunctional family. Her father dark-skinned Black woman is a very grumpy teacher, with little understanding of children, whilst her mother seems to suffer permanently from migraine. She has a good friendbe seen as less desirable, Lizzyless hireable, less intelligent and they play together as much as they can, united in their dislike of the ultimately less valuable than my light-skinned counterparts...'boys from the estate'. Her grandmother died last year, leaving her granddad on his own and it's Malvina's job We Need to go and visit him and take him his meals. The family think this is a great arrangement because they know how much Granddad loves Malvina and looks forward to her visits. ThereTalk About Money's a problem though. Malvina doesn't like going, particularly on her own. Granddad kisses her on the mouth.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849390606</amazonuk>}}by Otegha Uwagba
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Andrew RawnsleyRichard Brook|title=The End of the PartyUnderstanding Human Nature: The Rise and Fall of New LabourA User's Guide to Life
|rating=4.5
|genre=Lifestyle
|summary= I am a firm believer that sometimes we choose books, and sometimes books choose us. In my case, this is one of the latter. Not so very long ago, if I had come across this book I'd have skimmed it, found some of it interesting, but it would not have 'hit home' in the way that it does now. I believe it came to me not just because I was likely to give it a favourable review [ ''full disclosure The Bookbag's u.s.p. is that people chose their own books rather than getting them randomly, so there is a predisposition towards expecting to like the book, even if it doesn't always turn out that way'' ] – but also because it is a book I needed to read, right now.
|isbn=1800461682
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=1787332098
|title=How to Love Animals in a Human-Shaped World
|author=Henry Mance
|rating=5
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=After decades ''When we do think about animals, we break them down into species and groups: cows, dogs, foxes, elephants and so on. And we assign them places in society: cows go on plates, dogs on sofas, foxes in rubbish bins, elephants in zoos, and millions of watching politics more or less assiduously wild animals stay out there, ''somewhere,'' hopefully on the next David Attenborough series.'' I was surprised by the New Labour administrationgoing to argue. Never before had so I mean, cows are for cheese (I couldn't consider eating red meat...) and I much been put – or so it seemed – prefer my elephants in the public domain, wild but never before had then I realised that I had quite such a feeling of really not understanding what was going on, quibbling for the sake of being party it. Essentially that quote sums up my attitude to only half a storyanimals - and I consider myself an animal lover. The age If I had to choose between the company of humans and the company of spin told us little that we really wanted to knowanimals, but left unsaid all I would probably choose the important thingsanimals. Early in 2010 I was disappointed insisted that I'd missed Andrew Rawnsley's 'The End of the Party' read this book: no one was trying to stop me but now I'm rather glad was initially reluctant. I eat cheese, eggs, chicken and fish and I needed to either do so without guilt or change my choices. I suspected that I did as it's been republished in paperback with two additional chapters which include making the extraordinary events surrounding the 2010 General Electiondecision would not be comfortable.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141046147</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Andrew Penman1523092734|title=School Daze: Searching for a Decent State EducationA Women's Guide to Claiming Space|author=Eliza Van Cort|rating=3.5
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=As ''She brings a teacher myself, I'm naturally well aware of most of the aspects of education hug-kick-thunderclap that Andrew Penman discusses here every woman needs in her life. Again and some of the stories he repeats are well-known to me but may be of news to some readersagain and again. Yes'' (Alma Derricks, people will really do just about anything to try and get their children into the school of their choice – even commit fraud! But how well does this book work as an insight into the type of measures some people will go to for those readers unaware of the desperation thatcan set in at this time in a child’s life? It’s a good question…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906132976</amazonuk>}}former CMO, Cirque du Soleil RSD)
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Mark OatenPolly Barton|title=Screwing UpFifty Sounds
|rating=4.5
|genre=AutobiographyPolitics and Society|summary=Like John Profumo and othersWhere do I start? I could start with where Barton herself starts, Mark Oaten will probably be remembered for with the wrong reasons. It was the episode which made him question ''Why Japan?'' Japan has been on my radar for a while and if the countryworld hadn's Not gone into melt-down I would have visited by now. I may get there later this year, but I am not hopeful. 1 paparazzi targetAnd like Barton, I don't know the answer to the question ''why Japan?'' She explains her feelings in respect of the question in the first essay, and which is on the sound ''giro' '' – which she describes as he recounts in his Prologuebeing, among other things, when his the sound of ''every party where you have to introduce yourself''world .|isbn=1913097501}}{{Frontpage|author=Stephen Fabes|title=Signs of Life|rating=5|genre=Travel|summary= I was brought up on maps and first-person narratives of tales of far away places. I was crashing downbirth-righted wanderlust and curiosity. Unfortunately, I didn' t inherit what Dr. Stephen Fabes clearly had which was the guts to simply go out and do it hardly needs recounting in detail. Yet when all is said and doneI also didn't inherit the kind of steady nerve, this is a very lively, readable, sometimes quite poignant memoir from one of the men whose career at Westminster began ability to talk to strangers and ended basic practicality that would have meant that I would have survived if I had been gifted with the Blair requisite 'bottle'. In order words I'm not the sort of person who will get on a bike outside a London hospital and Brown not come home for six years. Throughout there is an admirable absence of self-pityFabes did precisely that.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1849540071</amazonuk>1788161211
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