This Week’s Reviews

The Torture Machine
Flint Taylor | Haymarket Books | 9781608468959 | March 2019
“A meticulously detailed and authentic, truly appalling story of shame and disgrace.”—National Lawyers Guild

Facing the Climate Emergency: How to Transform Yourself with Climate Truth
Margaret Klein Salamon | New Society Publishers | 9780865719415 | April 2020
“One of several notable climate books due this year. Ms. Klein Salamon encourages us to feel the fright of the climate peril, so that we can effectively rise to meet the threat. She urges us to live in emergency mode.”—Common Dreams

The Ethical Meat Handbook
Meredith Leigh | New Society Publishers | 9780865719231 | February 2020
“The book is based on the belief that on a warming planet, divided by injustice and doubt and starvation on many levels, every eater has a way to conjure hope and empowerment, not tomorrow, but now.”—PR Newswire

A Little More Red Sun on the Human
Gillian Conoley | Nightboat Books | 9781643620114 | October 2019
“Through Conoley’s poems, we are reminded that, while we may often feel like the rulers of our universe, there will be days when we do not, and we must embrace the playfulness that arises when we aren’t so busy keeping track of time. The poet’s duality between frolic and wit shows us that we stifle ourselves when we constantly try to control what we feel, perceive, and expect in life. Through their inventive retrospection, Conoleys’ poems create new universals for our secular world.”—ZYZZYVA

Doomstead Days
Brian Teare | Nightboat Books | 9781643620022 | April 2019
Given the havoc of climate crisis around the world, Doomstead Days is an all too timely book. While its title may invoke a sense of doom, Teare’s poems accurately report what he finds on his walks, and yet at the same time inspire us to act with tenderness.”—Rain Taxi

Seven Samurai Swept Away in a River
Jung Young Moon, trans. Yewon Jung | Deep Vellum Publishing | 9781941920855 | December 2019

“There are many novels by Western authors sojourning in Asia. Stories that go the other way around are as rare as hens’ teeth… Seven Samurai Swept Away in a River opens a window into a non-traditional narrative prose style.”—Asian Review of Books

The Committee
Sterling Watson | Akashic Books | 9781617757686 | January 2020
“Sharply-crafted . . . The Committee is the kind of story that makes you hope it can’t happen here—but reminds you that it already has.”—Tampa Bay Times

Temporary
Hilary Leichter | Coffee House Press | 9781566895668 | March 2020

“As if Alice in Wonderland and The Odyssey hooked up at a party and conceived a child who, out of shame, tried their hardest to become a functioning member of society…I loved this book that manages to create fantastical lore out of the banality of office work, that idealizes the working class experience without being condescending, that offers whimsy to failure.”— Entropy Magazine

It’s Just a Plant: A Children’s Story about Marijuana
Ricardo Cortés | Akashic Books/Black Sheep | 9781617758003 | April 2020

“The fact is, kids who have parents who talk to them openly and respectfully about tough subjects are better able to navigate the chaos of the teen and young adult years. And for that reason, I am so here for this book.”—Momtastic

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