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[[Category:New Reviews|Politics and Society]] __NOTOC__ <!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Sarah BakewellAlastair Humphreys|title= At The Existentialist Café: FreedomLocal|rating=5|genre=Travel |summary= Alastair Humphreys has walked and cycled all over the world. And then written about it. For this book he walked and cycled very close to home and then wrote about it. As he says in his introduction, the book is an attempt ''to share what I have learnt about some big issues from a year exploring a small map. Nature loss, pollution, land use and access, agriculture, the food system, rewilding…'' 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', Being that every upside is likely to have a downside for somebody and Apricot Cocktailsthat there are some hard choices ahead.|isbn=1785633678}}{{Frontpage|author=Edel Rodriguez|title=Worm: A Cuban American Odyssey

|genre= Politics Graphic Novels|summary=We're in childhood, and we're in Cuba. The revolution has happened, and Castro, first thought of as a saviour of the country, has proven himself a Communist, and not done nearly enough to create a level playing field for all. Well, those hours-long speeches of his were kind of taking his time away. Our narrator's family weren't in the happiest of places here, an uncle refusing to be the good soldier the country demanded (especially as he would 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 frowned upon. 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 SocietyPrecious Life: the path back to connection in a fractured world|rating=3.5|genre= Lifestyle|summary= You know My favourite Mary Oliver line is the one in which she asks ''What is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?'' I get to love that old saying about judging books by their cover? line so much because my answer is ''This! Precisely this.'' Ignore it! I have found that by judging a book by its cover 'm lucky enough to be living my one wild and getting it completely wrong is a great precious life the way I want to find yourself committed . 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 reading a book 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'd never have picked in a million years and yetre doing, somehowshe thinks you (we, being amazingly glad you didI) could be doing more…And she's effing furious about the fact that we are not.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099554887</amazonuk>1785633848

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Tony Benn and Ruth Winstone (editor)1785633457|title=The Benn DiariesCharging Around: The Definitive CollectionExploring the Edges of England by Electric Car|author=Clive Wilkinson

|genre=BiographyTravel|summary=Tony Benn must be one Clive Wilkinson has a history of travelling by unconventional means with a preference for slow travel. As he neared his eightieth birthday the most famous diarists idea of exploring the modern ageedges of England in an electric car was not totally outrageous. He kept a diary from his schooldays in the nineteen forties until he made his last entry in 2009In fact, five years before his death. Benn was also it should be a particularly charismatic politician: since my teens I've found myself listening to him believing that I disagreed with what he was saying and then realising that perhaps we weren't so far apart after all. Whatever he spoke about always gave food pleasant holiday for thought. Of course the ideal way to enjoy the diaries would be to read the individual volumes, beginning with {{amazonurl|isbn=0099497719|title=Years Of Hope: Diaries,Letters Clive and Papers 1940-1962}}his wife, but that's a lengthy undertaking and ''The Benn Diaries: The Definitive Collection'' edited by Ruth Winstone gives you the opportunity to sample the best of the diaries in a mere seven hundred or so pages. Be warned though: there has been a previous {{amazonurl|isbn=0099634112|title=composite volume}}Joan, also called shouldn''The Benn Diaries'' and published in 1996. The current volume goes to 2009.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1786330768</amazonuk>t it?

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Henning Mankell1529153050|title= QuicksandBritain's Best Political Cartoons 2022|author=Tim Benson|rating= 54|genre= AutobiographyHumour|summary= How do you judge a book? Not by its coverSeeking some light relief from the current political turmoil which is coming to seem more and more like an adrenaline sport, weI was nudged towards ''Britain're told. In my case, often by the number s Best Political Cartoons of turned down corners or post-it-note-marked pages by the time I2022've finished reading it. Sometimes, by whether I worry about leaving its characters to fend for themselves while I take a break…or by how much of it stays with me afterwards or for how long. In this case, it doesn't matter. However, I judge ''Quicksand'Sharp eyes will have noted that we' re not yet through the judgement comes up year: the same. This collection of vignettes cartoons run from an ageing, possibly dying, writer looking back on his own life is as powerful as it is simple, as easy 4 September 2021 to read as it is impossible to forget.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784701564</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Anne Glyn-Jones|title= Morse Code Wrens of Station X|rating= 4.5|genre= History|summary= Bletchley Park is probably now the least secret of all the secret ops that went on during World War II31 August 2022. I for one am pleased about that: technology has moved on so far that Who can imagine what there can't will be anything that happened back then on the communications front that is worth continuing to shroud come in mystery. With most of the participants either departed or at least in the departure lounge, the more recollections we can still gather the better. What remained secret far longer however, is the work of the telegraphers that served Station X: those posted to the Y-stations. There are few of them left to tell their tales, so I applaud those who finally saw fit (a) to release them from their life-long bonds of secrecy and (b) encourage them to write it down, tell us what it was really like.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845409086</amazonuk>2023 edition?

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Donald NaismithB0B7289HKQ|title=Conversations Across America: A Bradford ApprenticeshipFather and Son, Alzheimer's, and 300 Conversations Along the TransAmerica Bike Trail that Capture the Soul of America|author=Kari Loya

|genre=Politics and SocietyTravel|summary=Kari (that rhymes with all schools removed from their control ‘sorry’, by the way) wanted to spend some time with his father and established as freestanding and self-governing academiesthe period between two jobs seemed like a good time to do it. In effect this would (and possibly will) mean that what The decision was once a national servicemade to ride the Trans America Bike Trail from Yorktown, locally administered will become a local serviceVirginia to Astoria, nationally administered. Donald Naismith is perhaps best known as the former Chief Education Officer Oregon - all 4250 miles of Richmond-uponit -Thames, Croydon and then Wandsworth but his education and formative working years took place in his adopted home city of Bradford2015. In ''A Bradford Apprenticeship'' he gives us an affectionate tribute They had 73 days to do it - slightly less than the city recommended time - but there were factors which made him what he is and his thoughts pointed this up as more of a challenge that it would be for most people who considered taking it on the education system. Bradford Merv Loya was once one of the country75 years old and he was suffering from early-stage Alzheimer's leading education authorities and he values the opportunities it gave him to fine tune his thinking.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1524636118</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Siri Hustvedt1739593901|title= A Woman Looking at Men Looking at Women: Essays on Art, Sex 22 Ideas About The Future|author=Benjamin Greenaway and the MindStephen Oram (Editors)|rating= 45|genre= Politics and Society Science Fiction|summary= I must confess that ''A Woman LookingOur 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.'' spoke  I've got a couple of confessions to me make. I'm not keen on short stories as I find it easy to read a profound, intimate levelfew stories and then forget to return to the book. This is in part due 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 apparent similarities between me and Siri Hustvedt world- we are both feminists building. It's human beings who love art fascinate me: the technology and also love science in a the world which emphasises that these two passions scape are mutually exclusivepurely incidental. What Hustvedt suggests in ''A Woman Looking'' is that it is the similarities between these So, what did I think of a book of twenty-two areas we should emphasise and that a cohesivescience fiction short stories? Well, inclusive approach towards art and science could help fill the gaps in both disciplinesI loved it. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473638895</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=T J ColesJane Goodall and Douglas Abrams |title=The Great Brexit Swindle: Why the Mega-Rich and Free Market Fanatics Conspired to Force Britain from the European UnionBook of Hope |rating=3.5|genre=Business Politics and FinanceSociety |summary=''Have The done thing is to read a book all the way through before you been mis-sold Brexit by posh men in sharp suits promising you free healthcare? If so, you might be entitled sit down to compensation...'' There wasn't much could make me laugh on the morning after the EU referendum but this spoof advert on Twitter managed review it. OnlyI’m making an exception here, it seems that it wasn't completely a joke - well apart from the bit about compensation. In ''The Great Brexit Scandal'' T J Coles looks at the substantial core because I don’t want to lose any of free marketeers in the Conservative party who were determined to rid the UK experience of the Brussels red tape which was putting a brake on their activities. You might also know these views as ''neoliberalism''reading this amazing book, an ideology which looks I want to deregulate markets and maximise profitscapture it as it hits me. And it is hitting me. On the surface that doesn't sound bad, until you realise that the benefit will go to the people who are already This beautiful book has me in the group which Coles refers to as the ''mega-rich'' and the losers will be working peopletears.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1905570813</amazonuk>024147857X

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Erin Moore1788360737|title= That's Not EnglishArtivism: The Battle for Museums in the Era of Postmodernism|author=Alexander Adams|rating= 52|genre=Politics and Society|summary=It's Can art ever be apolitical? All art is political because art is not clear who first coined the expression ''divided by made in a common language'' about Brits and Americans, but as this highly entertaining book demonstrates, it isn't our language that divides usvacuum. On the contrary the language simply reflects the divisions that existIt is made by people. We tend to watch a lot of TV at home, but rarely find anything Antonio Gramsci stated that totally engrosses us. As a result we tend ‘’Every man… contributes to talk over a lot of TVmodifying the social environment in which he develops’’. We play games with some of what we watchTherefore, all art must be political, even implicitly. One Alexander Adams in his new book ‘Artivism: The Battle for Museum in the Era of those games Postmodernism’ is spotting anachronisms. Another adamant that art is "would she ever have got the job" – particularly fun with crime programmes that think freer when it's ok is art for lab techs art’s sake. The recent trend of so-called artivism has caused artists to become more overtly political (read: left wing). Their seemingly grass roots movements have long freebeen astroturfed by large “left-flowing locks when doing evidence analysis or have Detective Sergeants who frankly wouldn't have passed their CV submission. A long-running one involves spotting the spread of British English in American TV shows. Erin Moore explains why. Not directly, indeed I'm not sure she even makes the connection – but the fact that there are wing” donors and media elites hoping to create a lot more Brits in the higher echelons of US TV-making might just explain why CSI, NCIS, Law globalist and Order and a whole host of other shows will slip in words like wallet, handbag, boot (of a car), pavement…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784701912</amazonuk>progressive regime. Or at least that’s what Alexander Adams believes.

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Chris McIvor1398508632|title=The World is ElsewhereWilderness Cure|author=Mo Wilde

|genre=AutobiographyLifestyle|summary=As a Country Director, Chris McIvor has worked It had been on the cards for a number while but it was the week-long consumer binge which pushed Mo Wilde into beginning her year of years at Save the Childreneating only wild food. ' The World is Elsewhere' covers his end of November, particularly in Central Scotland was perhaps not the best time there to start, in a world where the normal sores had been exacerbated by climate change, Brexit and, his journeys across a number of countriespandemic. It is Wilde had a beautiful mix of autobiography and travel. It also captures his philosophical thoughts on international aid. He reflects on both few advantages: the good and the bad area around her was a known habitat with a very easy, conversational writing style that makes the book truly captivatingvariety of terrains. I read from cover She had electricity which allowed her to cover in run a single sittingfridge, unusual for freezer and dehydrator. She had a reviewercar - and fuel. Such Most importantly, she had shelter: this was the draw as he laid himself barenot a plan to ''live'' wild just to live off its produce. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1910124346</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Anna Bikont1529149800|title= The Crime Things You Can Do: How to Fight Climate Change and Reduce Waste|author=Eduardo Garcia and the SilenceSara Boccaccini Meadows|rating= 4|genre= HistoryHome and Family|summary= Where was your father? Where was your brother, your mother, your uncle? These are the questions Anna Bikont struggles to ask during her investigation into We begin with a shocking act of violence committed against telling story. All the Jewish community in Jedwabne during birds and animals fled when the summer forest fire took hold and most of 1941. The Crime them stood and the Silence weaves together journalswatched, interviews and pictures unable to share the story think of a community torn apart by hatred and intoleranceanything they could do. It is also a moving testament The tiny hummingbird flew to the dedication river and began taking tiny amounts of Bikont, who documents her struggle water and flying back to find drop them into the truth with grace and dignity in fire. The animals laughed: what good was that doing. ''I'm doing the face of silencebest I can'', rationalisationsaid the hummingbird. And that, and even angerreally, from members of is the Polish community who would rather not stir up only way that we will solve the crimes problem of climate change – by each of the pastus doing what we can, however small that might be.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099592525</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Kate Harrad1638485216|title=Purple ProseBlack, White, and Gray All Over: Bisexuality A Black Man's Odyssey in BritainLife and Law Enforcement|author=Frederick Reynolds

|summary=Before reading Kate HarradIt's thought provoking insight into bisexuality in Britain I have easy to confess to being as guilty of forget at times that The Naked Don't Fear the misconceptions surrounding the subject as everyone else. It is only when you read this collection of essays and anecdotesWater isn't actually fiction, you realise the prejudice they face on because it reads very much like a daily basiswell-paced thriller at times. The very nature of bisexuality This is widely misunderstood not by the heterosexual and gay communities alike. As any means a result bisexuals find themselves marginalisedcriticism, or, in the worst-case scenario, completely ostracisedbut 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 at times painful journey. Far from having, ''the best There are tense moments and gripping accounts of both worlds'', they are considered to be sitting border crossings which had me on edge the fence, unable to come to terms with their true sexualitywhole way through. But it''Purple Prose'' tackles these myths s written with a haunting and ill-informed ideas head on, and in almost lyrical quality that allows the process shows a community that does have many issues, just not reader to perfectly envisage the ones that are being laid at their doorenvironments and people described. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0996460160</amazonuk>B09N9157T6

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Wade Graham1785633074|title=Dream Cities: Seven Urban Ideas That Shape the WorldStaggering Hubris|author=Josh Berry

|genre= HistoryHumour|summary=Between 1950 Members of Parliament like us to believe that the country is run by politicians, headed by the Prime minister - the ''primus inter pares'' (that's for those of you who are Eton and 2014 Oxbridge educated) but the worldreality is that the ''s urban population increased from 746 million to 3prime'' movers are the special advisers - the SPADS - who are the driving force behind the government.9 billion. The urbanising trend is set We are in the privileged position of having access to continue with the United Nations predicting that memoirs of Rafe Hubris, the man who was behind the skilful control of the Covid crisis which was completely contained by the middle end of 2020. You might not know the century 66% of us name now but he will certainly be city dwellers, a massive six billion people. How have city planners and architects tried to cope with the recent surge? How can they avoid repeating mistakes from the past? Both of those questions are considered in Dream Cities – Seven Urban Ideas That Shape The World, Wade Graham's excellent field guide man to the modern worldwatch. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1445659735</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1846276772|title=The End of Bias: How We Change Our Minds|author=T J ColesJessica Nordell|titlerating=4.5|genre=Politics and Society|summary=BritainAnyone who is not an able, white man understands bias in that they may no longer even recognise the extent to which they suffer from it: it's simply a part of everyday life. White men will always come first. The able will come before the disabled. Jobs, promotions, higher salaries are the preserve of the white man. Even when those who wouldn't pass the medical become a part of an organisation it's rare that their views are heard, that their concerns are acknowledged. It's Secret Warspersonally appalling and degrading for the individuals on the receiving end of the bias but it's not just the individuals who are negatively impacted.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1529148251|title=Misfits: A Personal Manifesto|author=Michaela Coel

|summary= Britain's Secret Wars is a chilling and disturbing book 'How am I able to read. With all four corners of the globe hell-bent be so transparent on conflictpaper about rape, oppression malpractice and injustice, our sanitised media portrays Britainpoverty, yet still compartmentalise? It's as though I were telling the truth whilst simultaneously running away from it.'' Before you start reading ''Misfits'' you need to be in a nation, responding certain frame of mind. You're not going to harrowing global eventsread a book of essays or a self-help book. What is chilling, in T J Coles book, is that You're going to read writing which was inspired by Michaela Coel's 2018 MacTaggart Lecture to professionals within the political establishment, through television industry at the military and intelligence community appear to Edinburgh TV Festival. You might be complicit in instigating many of them. What is disturbing is that ''reading'' the majority of information he has used book but you need to ''listen'' to form his analysis and conclusion is freely available and the words as though you're in the public domainlecture theatre. The disjointedness will fade away and you'll be carried on a cloud of exquisite writing. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905570783</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Angela Lightburn0008350388|title=An Annoyance of Neighbours: Life is Never Dull When You Have Neighbours!We Need to Talk About Money|author=Otegha Uwagba|rating=4.5

|summary=You can choose your friends. You can't choose your relatives'To be a dark-skinned Black woman is to be seen as less desirable, but you can - usually - put some physical distance between you and themless hireable, but you can't choose your neighbours less intelligent and once youultimately less valuable than my light-skinned counterparts...'re ' 'there'We Need to Talk About Money' it can be very expensive or even impossible to break the link. Now, I can't give you any advice on this thorny subject as itby Otegha Uwagba 's more than thirty years since I've been 0.7% of English Literature GCSE students in England study a book by a writer of colour while only 7% study a position to have anything to complain about, but Angela Lightburn knows all there is to knowbook by a woman. '' She's spent 'The Bookseller'' 29 June 2021 Otegha Uwagba came to the UK from Kenya when she was five years collating all the different problems which people have old. Her sisters were seven and nine. It was her mother who came first, with her father joining them later. The family was hard-working, principled and determined that their neighbours and ways children would have the best education possible. There was always a painful awareness of money although this did not translate into a shortage of improving anything: it was simply carefully harvested. When Otegha was ten the situation which don't involve family acquired a car. For Otegha, education meant a scholarship to a private school in London and then a lengthy prison sentenceplace at New College, Oxford.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1785892029</amazonuk>

The central aim of this discourse is to highlight our current position, and the fact that there is a choice to be made. The authors date 1990 as the dawn of a new, and our present, Renaissance. As with the last, this time warrants in a whole host of risks, but it also offers the opportunity to reap the benefits of the changes occurring across the globe.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>147293637X</amazonuk>}}{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Xinran, Esther Tyldesley and David DobsonRichard Brook|title= Buy Me The Sky|rating= 3.5|genre= Politics and Society|summary=''These single-sprout children are more precious than gold'', says a Chinese woman to the author. Buy Me The Sky asks what it's like to grow up as ''gold'' through Xinran's conversations with ten adults from the first generation of China's only children. In the highly informative introduction, she tells the story of a 22 year old male student who, in 2010, ran over a female migrant worker in his car, and then was so fearful of the consequences that he brutally murdered her. He was tried and executed in a hugely divisive case with some seeing him as an evil perpetrator and others, a victim. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846044731</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Tom Bower|title=Broken VowsUnderstanding Human Nature: Tony Blair The Tragedy of Power|rating=4|genre=Biography|summary=In May 1997 we went to vote gleefully, sure that there was going to be a change from the tired, sleaze-ridden Conservative government we'd been suffering. The Blairs' entry into Downing Street the following day - through crowds of well-wishers - was like a breath of fresh air and (perhaps fortunately) it would be years before I discovered that the 'well wishers' had been bussed in for the event. Looking back now it seems that our hopes for what the 'New Labour' government could achieve were unreasonably high and thereA User's a special place in hell reserved for those who disappoint us in this way. I've often wondered quite how history will see Blair: Afghanistan and Iraq as well as his failure to deal with Gordon Brown would always sour his premiership for me, but Guide to what extent could his achievements such as the Good Friday Agreement, the minimum wage and higher welfare payments be balanced against his failures?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571314201</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Peter Popham |title=The Lady and the Generals: Aung San Suu Kyi and Burma's Struggle for FreedomLife

|genre=BiographyLifestyle|summary=On 13 November 2010I am a firm believer that sometimes we choose books, and sometimes books choose us. In my case, Aung San Suu Kyi was released from house arrest after spending 15 this is one of the previous 21 years as a prisoner of Burma's military juntalatter. Political reforms soon followedNot so very long ago, culminating with Suu (as she prefers to be known) being elected to parliament. The West rejoiced; leadersif I had come across this book I'd have skimmed it, business menfound some of it interesting, and tourists poured but it would not have 'hit home' in; and Suu entered the pantheon of modern-day political heroesway that it does now. Burma I believe it came to me not just because I was likely to give it a burgeoning democracyfavourable review [ ''full disclosure The Bookbag's u.s.p. is that people chose their own books rather than getting them randomly, and Suu was so there is a saint. In realitypredisposition towards expecting to like the book, as Peter Popham argues in even if it doesn't always turn out that way'The Lady and the Generals'] – but also because it is a book I needed to read, the situation was far more complexright now.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846043719</amazonuk>1800461682

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jason Burke1787332098|title=The New Threat From Islamic MilitancyHow to Love Animals in a Human-Shaped World|author=Henry Mance|rating=45

|summary=Barely a day passes without Islamic militancy making headlines ''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 wild animals stay out there, ''somewhere in ,'' hopefully on the worldnext David Attenborough series.'' I was going to argue. I mean, cows are for cheese (I couldn't consider eating red meat...) and yet I much prefer my elephants in the wild but then I realised that I was quibbling for the sake of it can be a hard subject . Essentially that quote sums up my attitude to graspanimals - and I consider myself an animal lover. The sudden rise If I had to choose between the company of Islamic State humans and their campaign the company of shocking violence both in animals, I would probably choose the Middle East and further afield has left many confused and fearful, and has provoked a sometimes extreme political responseanimals. I insisted that I read this book: no one was trying to stop me but I was initially reluctant. In "The New Threat From Islamic Militancy" I eat cheese, Jason Burkeeggs, a journalist with two decades of experience reporting on the Islamic world, attempts chicken and fish and I needed to correct either do so without guilt or change my choices. I suspected that making the many misconceptions about Islamic extremism to give a true understanding of the threat we now facedecision would not be comfortable.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784701475</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Benedict Rogers1523092734|title= Burma: A Nation at the CrossroadsWomen's Guide to Claiming Space|author=Eliza Van Cort|rating= 3.5|genre= HistoryPolitics and Society|summary= Benedict Rogers is ''She brings a human rights activist hug-kick-thunderclap that every woman needs in her life. Again and again and journalist with an expert insight into Burmaagain.'' (Alma Derricks, former CMO, gathered first-hand on journeys Cirque du Soleil RSD) ''To claim space is to regions off live the beaten tracklife of choosing unapologetically and bravely. Burma It is to live the life you've always wanted.'' Sometimes the reviewing gods are generous: at a country under time when violence against women is much in the iron rule of news, ''A Women's Guide to Claiming Space'' by Eliza Van Cort dropped onto my desk. Now - to be clear - this book is not a succession of military regimes'how to disable your attacker with two simple jabs' manual: it's something far more effective, but discussion at the moment seems to be about how women can be ''protected''. I've always thought that women need to rise above this, to be people who don't need protection, struggling with over half a century of sufferingpeople who claim their own space. If all women did this, much unknown those few men who are violent to women would realise that we are not just an easy target to be used to the wider international audienceprove that they are big men.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846044464</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Roger ScrutonPolly Barton|title= Fools, Frauds and Firebrands: Thinkers of the New LeftFifty Sounds|rating= 3.5|genre= Politics and Society|summary=''Thinkers of the New Left'' first came out in 1985, under Thatcher's government. British left-wing intellectuals gave it savage reviews. The publisher was threatened with a boycott and the book was withdrawn from bookshops. Roger Scruton feels this caused his university career to decline. In the introduction, he says he is ''reluctant to return to the scene of such a disaster.'' However, this is a subject he is clearly passionate about, having worked with underground networks in communist Europe and seen the destructive reality behind the fashionable ''leftist ways of thinking.''|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408187337</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Malala Yousafzai|title= I Am Malala|rating= 5|genre= Autobiography|summary= ''She's a phenomenon'' is my OH's response to any mention of Malala. I can't disagree on some level, but what this book proves is that on another she is just a girl. One voice among many. It's just that she decided to speak louder than most. We know about Malala because she got lucky. She got lucky because when she got shot by the Taliban there were people nearby, doctors who got her to a hospital, and then luckier still because when her condition worsened, nearby there were western doctors with access to western facilities and she was flown to the UK for treatment.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1780622163</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Allan Metcalf|title=From Skedaddle to Selfie: Words of the Generation|rating=3.5|genre=Trivia|summary=I have to go a roundabout way to introducing this book, so bear with me. It stems partly from dictionaries and the etymology of the language we use, but more so if anything from a different couple of books, and their ideas of generations. The authors of those posited the idea that all those archetypical generations – the Baby Boomers, the Millennials, and those before, in between and since – have their own cyclical pattern, and the history of humanity has been and will be formed by the interplay of just four different kinds, running (with only one exception) in regular order. I don't really hold much store by that, and I certainly didn't know we'd started one since the Millennials – who the heck decides such things, for one? ''Somebody must have put out an order'', as someone here says of something else. But in the same way as generations get defined by collective persons unknown, so do words – and those words are certainly a clue to what was important, predominant and of course spoken in each decade.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>019992712X</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Danny Rogers|title=Campaigns that Shook the World: The Evolution of Public Relations|rating= 5|genre= Business and Finance |summary= I dithered about how to begin this review. On one hand I thought I should probably start by saying that I have a work related interest in marketing and communications. On the other hand, Danny Rogers has written a book which appealed to me on several levels. Campaigns are about psychology and storytelling – which of course leads us into branding but also feature critical issues around concept delivery. In short, I was looking forward to reading this for many reasons – and it didn’t disappoint.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0749475099</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=Jill Leovy|title=Ghettoside|rating=34.5

|summary=There are enough LA rappers around to attest that living as Where do I start? I could start with where Barton herself starts, with the question ''Why Japan?'' Japan has been on my radar for a black man in South Central is no easy taskwhile and if the world hadn't gone into melt-down I would have visited by now. Dismiss these urban lyricists at your peril, as crude they I may beget there later this year, but I am not hopeful. And like Barton, I don't know the answer to the question ''Ghettosidewhy Japan?'' will soon inform She explains her feelings in respect of the question in the disbeliever that life first essay, which is on the streets of LA is hard. With a 40 times higher chance of sound ''giro' '' – which she describes as being murdered than a white person in America, what made among other things, the LA sound of the 80s through ''every party where you have to the late 2000s such a dangerous place to live for young black men?introduce yourself''.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1784700762</amazonuk>1913097501

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Ben CoatesStephen Fabes|title= Why the Dutch are Different: A Journey into the Hidden Heart Signs of the Netherlands Life|rating= 45|genre= Travel|summary= I know Holland in the way everyone doeswas brought up on maps and first-person narratives of tales of far away places. Pancakes I was birth-righted wanderlust and windmills and Potcuriosity. Unfortunately, oh myI didn't inherit what Dr. But Stephen Fabes clearly had which was the guts to simply go out and do it. I also didn's one t inherit the kind of steady nerve, ability to talk to strangers and basic practicality that would have meant that I would have survived if I had been gifted with the few European countries requisite 'bottle'. In order words I've never lived in for any period m not the sort of time, person who will get on a bike outside a London hospital and so I was intrigued to know morenot come home for six years. Fabes did precisely that.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>185788633X</amazonuk>1788161211

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Emma Marriott1504321383|title= I Used to Know That: History|rating= 4|genre= Politics and Society|summary= I've picked up a few things over the yearsSingle, most notably from English language text books while TEFLing abroad (there's nothing like an exciting lesson on Guy Fawkes to have a classroom of Mexicans wondering why we so love to celebrate a terrorist attack that didn't happen). But I have gapsAgain, of this I am sureand Again, and I thought to get a basic understanding of, well, the basics that we all should know, a quick read of this book wouldn't hurt.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1782434488</amazonuk>}}{{newreviewAgain|author= Emma Marriott|title= I Should Know That - Great BritainLouisa Pateman|rating= 4.5|genre= Politics and SocietyAutobiography|summary= I am ''You can't be happy and fulfilled on your own. You are not complete until you find a dreadful Britman''. I This was what Louisa Pateman was brought up to believe. It wasn'm better at t unkind: it was simply the geography of Colombia than adults in her life advising her as to what they thought would be best for her. It was reinforced by all those fairy tales where the UK girl (true story, I had she's usually fairly young) is rescued by the handsome prince who then marries her so that they can live happily ever after. Few girls are lucky enough to google where Essex was be brought up ''without'' the other day)expectation that they will marry and have children. Despite 17 It was a belief and it would be many years of full time education in the UK, I probably wouldnbefore Louisa would conclude that ''t pass a simple citizenship test. Which belief is a little embarrassing, really. So when this book came up for review I thought Ichoice''d have it, both for interest and as a subtle way to brush up on my Britain. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1782434313</amazonuk>