The Undertow: Scenes from a Slow Civil War by Jeff Sharlet

4.1 AVERAGE

rchltnnswd's review

4.5
challenging dark emotional informative sad slow-paced
A good read, but seriously depressing. I didn’t know upon picking this book that there would be so much tr*mp talk. It’s a very worrying read and I had my audiobook version on 2x speed at the end just to get through all of it as quickly as possible

kathleenitpdx's review against another edition

3.75
challenging informative reflective medium-paced

kirstennelson8's review

4.5
informative reflective tense medium-paced

cshedron's review

4.0
informative reflective
mineral9's profile picture

mineral9's review

4.75
challenging dark emotional reflective medium-paced

emceeawkward's review

5.0
dark emotional medium-paced
I always think it’s worth fighting for, but I always worry if a better world is actually possible. Books like this reaffirm my determination to fight while also convincing me it’s not possible.

jrboudreau's review

5.0
challenging dark emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced
I wept and I feared and I hoped
bxtskr's profile picture

bxtskr's review

5.0
challenging dark emotional hopeful informative medium-paced
this is the best book that I’ve read in 2023. 
alizamiriam's profile picture

alizamiriam's review

4.25
challenging dark informative reflective sad slow-paced
Don’t take this the wrong way — this felt like a beach when I picked it back up after the first week of the war here. (This book is not a beach read.)

Sharp thinking and clear writing on an ever-changing and evolving topic. Read it for the content and keep reading for the prose. Sharlet is a creative journalist who tells stories through people and seems  put their thoughts in conversation with his own, beyond their verbal conversations. History that works because it knows it is a slice in time. Loved the nod to Death Trip (I am also a former student of Michael Lesy.) 

mingerific's review

2.0
This was not what I expected based on the descriptions. It is technically true that he talks to nominally religious people about their ideas of a coming civil war, but I'm not sure that he does a good job making it a through-line. The essays seemed pretty disconnected, it was especially jarring at the beginning. Some interesting things, but nothing you can't get elsewhere