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A review by margaret45678
Trust the Plan: The Rise of QAnon and the Conspiracy That Unhinged America by Will Sommer
dark
informative
sad
medium-paced
Pretty well-written and a good overview of QAnon, from 2017 to about mid-2021. The most recent QAnon-related events are touched on only briefly, if at all, but obviously writing a book takes time and (in my not at all expert opinion) I think Sommer's analysis and summation of the movement(s) still apply to events he doesn't explicitly discuss.
I think the book is a bit weak in a few areas, though. It refers in passing to a few of the most visible representatives of QAnon (like Michael Flynn, Jacob Chansley and Isaac Kappy) but doesn't go into much depth about them, presumably because other sources like the QAnon Anonymous podcast and Jon Ronson's "Things Fall Apart" radio program have already covered them. I also found the coverage of Jim and Ron Watkins to be a bit brief, again presumably because the HBO documentary focused so heavily on them. In other words, I think you would have to be somewhat familiar with reporting on QAnon already to get the most out of this book.
On the other hand, these weaknesses are sort of compensated by Sommer's accounts of lesser-known (by normal people, at least) Q-influencers like Austin Steinbart. Moreover, Sommer's overall analysis and arguments are convincing and coherent, although I wish he had incorporated his social and political critique more explicitly into the book as a whole, instead of leaving it for the last few pages.
I think the book is a bit weak in a few areas, though. It refers in passing to a few of the most visible representatives of QAnon (like Michael Flynn, Jacob Chansley and Isaac Kappy) but doesn't go into much depth about them, presumably because other sources like the QAnon Anonymous podcast and Jon Ronson's "Things Fall Apart" radio program have already covered them. I also found the coverage of Jim and Ron Watkins to be a bit brief, again presumably because the HBO documentary focused so heavily on them. In other words, I think you would have to be somewhat familiar with reporting on QAnon already to get the most out of this book.
On the other hand, these weaknesses are sort of compensated by Sommer's accounts of lesser-known (by normal people, at least) Q-influencers like Austin Steinbart. Moreover, Sommer's overall analysis and arguments are convincing and coherent, although I wish he had incorporated his social and political critique more explicitly into the book as a whole, instead of leaving it for the last few pages.