reibureibu's reviews
75 reviews

Daddy Issues: Love and Hate in the Time of Patriarchy by Katherine Angel

emotional reflective fast-paced

3.5

yeah

Anarchy by Errico Malatesta, Vernon Richards

hopeful informative inspiring reflective fast-paced

3.5

Malatesta's account of anarchism seems greatly like marxism (I'm a fan) without governmental structure (I'm unsure), which surely is the point. I can't really say I believe any sort of anarchism would work in the 21st-century, but that's no fault of a text written right before the 20th and if this is what anarchist literature is like then I'm certainly keen on reading more from them. 

In the Swarm: Digital Prospects by Byung-Chul Han

informative reflective fast-paced

3.0

The slow heat death of collectivity.

The Faggots and Their Friends Between Revolutions by Larry Mitchell

emotional hopeful lighthearted sad fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

To be a faggot means to take care of your brothers and sisters. I hope when I'm gone that's how I'm remembered.

Post-Cinema: Theorizing 21st-Century Film by Julia Leyda, Shane Denson

challenging informative reflective medium-paced

5.0

Where it all started
my gateway into theory

Hyperion by Dan Simmons

adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Wonderfully flawed, messy and porose and delightful in its dauntless foray into genre/s and how each story registers the ethics of the storyteller. I hope for the same.

Climate Change as Class War: Building Socialism on a Warming Planet by Matthew T. Huber

challenging informative inspiring reflective medium-paced

4.5

The most instructive singular work I've ever encountered (and likely ever will encounter) on the climate crisis and what to do about it. Amassing class consciousness and implementing global socialism is admittedly a big task, but Huber makes convincing argument on why working within the system proves a glacial pace of change slower than the actual glaciers melt. Cannot recommend enough.

All We Can Save: Truth, Courage, and Solutions for the Climate Crisis by Ayana Elizabeth Johnson, Katharine K. Wilkinson

emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective fast-paced

3.5

When read in conjunction certain essays strike it out purely in being memorable; the largest offense here is simply that so many essays converge on a single point, that point being one of incredible importance of course but nonetheless by midway through there's longing to go past retreaded ground. Yet, given how urgent the issue of climate crisis is I fault this far less than other anthologies for its missive of rousing global activism. Plus, the highlights really are that good.

The Right To Be Lazy and Other Writings by Paul Lafargue, Len Bracken

funny lighthearted slow-paced

2.5

Unfortunately interminably inane, and that's not a criticism I levy lightly nor happily. It's hard to not feel as if Lafargue's rhetoric is all a second-hand regurgitation of his father-in-law's that doesn't quite understand the greater synthesis of its ideas and so doesn't quite reach any real culmination. But nothing if not an admirable writing experiment, and it's worth noting that his other essays in the NYRB edition of this text are, imho, much better.

Paper Tiger: A Mythic Narrative by Jason Kephas, Jasun Horsley

dark mysterious reflective sad fast-paced

2.5

A brotherly confession vulnerable to a fault. Which makes it so much more human, and so much more wanted.