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meagwhalen's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
This book is *incredible.* I have no doubt I will return to it repeatedly.
arimaria97's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
5.0
nanc's review against another edition
emotional
informative
reflective
tense
medium-paced
5.0
This book is a masterpiece of research and documentation. One of my favorite passages is near the end where Wilkerson says if we concentrate on improving the lives of people at the bottom of the caste we improve the outlook for everyone. I believe this is true. While it was hard to hear the facts of our past (I had to stop listening at one point for a break and then put on my big girl pants and started up again) it’s clear that we need to make important systemic changes for the US to live up to the actual words of our constitution.
slenoch's review against another edition
informative
5.0
obsessed with this book! can see why it's on so many lists.
duckduckem's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
informative
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
5.0
akilahrs's review against another edition
5.0
I had to mentally prepare myself whenever I picked up this book to read it. The things that I read made me angry, empowered, ashamed for this country, proud of who I am... the list goes on. I recommend that everyone read this book. It should be required reading, quite frankly.
lomaxs's review against another edition
informative
reflective
slow-paced
4.75
Really informative book that makes the connection between India’s caste system, Nazi Germany, and the U.S. both during and after slavery. It’s clear that she did a lot of in depth research for this!
I do wish that it was in more of a chronological order and talked more evenly about each country since America makes up most of the content.
I do wish that it was in more of a chronological order and talked more evenly about each country since America makes up most of the content.
teokajlibroj's review against another edition
2.0
It's hard to rate this book because it did make some good points about an important issue, but the writing was poor. The analogies in particular were very clunky and dragged on too long to make a basic point.
The structure was also a mess, there was no clear organisation of the chapters and it constantly jumped forward and backwards in time between slavery, Jim Crow and modern times. The author made a lot of sweeping generalisations and relied heavily on anecdotes, frequently assuming racism was the sole cause of events without considering any other factor. This lead to moments of bizarre juxtaposition such as when a rude woman in a restaurant is compared to slaves having their children taken from them.
Also, the blurb implies this is a comparative study of India, Nazi Germany and the USA, but 90% of it is about America.
The structure was also a mess, there was no clear organisation of the chapters and it constantly jumped forward and backwards in time between slavery, Jim Crow and modern times. The author made a lot of sweeping generalisations and relied heavily on anecdotes, frequently assuming racism was the sole cause of events without considering any other factor. This lead to moments of bizarre juxtaposition such as when a rude woman in a restaurant is compared to slaves having their children taken from them.
Also, the blurb implies this is a comparative study of India, Nazi Germany and the USA, but 90% of it is about America.