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3.9 AVERAGE
3.9 AVERAGE
informative
medium-paced
I really enjoyed this book. As someone who doesn’t read a lot of non-fiction, I thought this was digestible and kept my interest throughout. I knew almost all of the brands and groups that Montell covered, but this was an interesting dive into the language that surrounds them. I think part of what makes this book work is that it doesn’t go too deep into each example, but readers get the gist of what Montell is talking about and that’s the commercial aspect of it. It kept me interested throughout, I thought it was really well-done.
informative
reflective
medium-paced
adventurous
informative
fast-paced
Genuine "it was okay" rating (perhaps 2.5 stars). To me, this book felt like the idiom - "50 feet wide but 2 feet deep".
I was hoping for a book that dove deeper into the genuine linguistics behind cults, and how they entice and operate. It covered these ideas loosely, but the book was far more filled with first hand accounts from interviewees (who spent time in cults) or anecdotes from the author.
Unfortunately, it felt like the majority of the content was just... obvious? I'm not even a "cult fanatic", I haven't read other books, I don't watch the documentaries, and I don't even listen to podcasts - but even for me, a lot of the content felt so surface level. Do I really need a general description of the Jonestown massacre, or how a Soulcycle class operates? Isn't this just baseline common knowledge?
The book was well written, and if the previous topics are something you're interested in I think you'll probably enjoy it -- I just felt like it was advertised as one thing, and delivered another.
I was hoping for a book that dove deeper into the genuine linguistics behind cults, and how they entice and operate. It covered these ideas loosely, but the book was far more filled with first hand accounts from interviewees (who spent time in cults) or anecdotes from the author.
Unfortunately, it felt like the majority of the content was just... obvious? I'm not even a "cult fanatic", I haven't read other books, I don't watch the documentaries, and I don't even listen to podcasts - but even for me, a lot of the content felt so surface level. Do I really need a general description of the Jonestown massacre, or how a Soulcycle class operates? Isn't this just baseline common knowledge?
The book was well written, and if the previous topics are something you're interested in I think you'll probably enjoy it -- I just felt like it was advertised as one thing, and delivered another.
funny
informative
dark
informative
reflective
adventurous
informative
reflective
medium-paced
informative
reflective
medium-paced
This book was fine, because I’ve taken some linguistics and sociology classes (and the concept of social media and cults isn’t that new to me), this book wasn’t mind blowing. I did think it was interesting to hear about the standard cults because I didn’t know about them before.
informative
fast-paced
informative
reflective
fast-paced
Less of a history of cults themselves and more of a primer on identifying cults and high control groups through the medium of language.
The text could have been a little less repetitive and there were a couple of points I felt needed further elaboration, but the lesson this book teaches is still extremely important. I had always been bothered by thought-terminating cliches but had never known there was a term for them!
The text could have been a little less repetitive and there were a couple of points I felt needed further elaboration, but the lesson this book teaches is still extremely important. I had always been bothered by thought-terminating cliches but had never known there was a term for them!