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3.77 AVERAGE
3.77 AVERAGE
challenging
hopeful
informative
sad
fast-paced
⭐️ Rating: 2/5
The book should come with a trigger warning due to its explicit discussion of sexual abuse. I was certainly not expecting this. Although the book is short, it took me a while to finish it because of that.
The book should come with a trigger warning due to its explicit discussion of sexual abuse. I was certainly not expecting this. Although the book is short, it took me a while to finish it because of that.
challenging
dark
informative
medium-paced
hopeful
inspiring
slow-paced
I think some of these essays probably hit harder in 2014, which is obviously a good thing overall but it meant that I didn't find this collection particularly mind-blowing. I enjoyed the second half more than the first half, so I might pick up one of Rebecca Solnit's other books in the future.
reflective
fast-paced
informative
medium-paced
If I had read this when it was first published, I probably would have found it ground breaking. I still like some of the essays, but to echo what other critics have said-- its a very white-centric view point. While the subject matter is still relevant as hell, its like a text book that is almost obsolete once its printed.
challenging
emotional
hopeful
reflective
fast-paced
took the words right out of my mouth. It's a little feminism 101 and doesn't address a lot of her points from a POC perspective. It reads a little outdated, but I'm reading this in 2025, im a little late to this party. It also jumps around quite a bit, probably because these essays weren't written with a full book in mind that you can read in the span of a few hours back to back.
Overall: good.
Overall: good.
The essay on Virginia Woolf is wonderful! Some of the other essays are too simplistic, or possibly just too out of date for how much progress we’ve made on many fronts.
Solnit writes in a beautiful, metaphorical way, but the constant “not all men” removes strength from the overall piece, and gender as the sole line of analysis, disregarding race (even tho she speaks immensely about India, for example) is quite off putting. I am also not a big fan of ending every article with some sort of cliche, hopeful sentence but I guess thats because these essays were written individually and not thought from scratch for a book format. Feels very feminism 1-0-1. Yes, men should stop killing us (BUT SOME ARE GOOD) is kind of the takeaway.
2,5 / 3.
2,5 / 3.
challenging
dark
funny
informative
reflective
fast-paced