rosepoints's reviews
129 reviews

overall, it’s an impactful and moving story about two colombian migrants, mauro and elena, and their three children and how they are separated between the united states and colombia. there were certain chapters that really left me reeling and the prose is just how i like it: simple yet lyrical, clear and precise. i also loved the inclusion of colombian mythology and the father’s indigenous heritage being incorporated into the story.

however, i think that there were a couple things that brought down my rating. first, i think that the author does third person narration best and i found the shifts to first person in some chapters to be jarring. it’s probably to highlight the differences in how the two children in the US define and tell their own narrative vs the story unfolding in colombia, but i found the writing in those chapters to be less compelling. i also thought that the story was imbalanced between mauro, elena, and their children, with talia, the youngest, being highlighted far more than her siblings. i would almost have preferred it if the story centered on mauro and elena OR if there was a little more of an equal distribution between the children. having one or two chapters from the two children in the US felt more like an afterthought than a real addition to the book. altogether, still a book that i’d recommend reading but not a book that i found myself fully enjoying. 

it pains me to rate this book so low because i really had high hopes for it and i think that the book does several things well. i also believe that the intent behind writing the book and the issues that the book highlights are incredibly important and pertinent to our daily lives. however, the things it does poorly loomed over everything else for me during my reading experience.

first, it reads well for a book targeted at a general audience, and i think it does a decent job explaining things like social determinants of health and structural violence in layman's terms. i can see a lot of people being able to read this and enjoy it, which is a good thing in the nonfiction genre. the author directly addresses classism and racism as the major roots of many healthcare problems and ties it to her main theory of weathering, which she describes as the physiological effects of living in marginalized communities. i also think that one of the last chapters in the book, focusing on public health sciences and practices, was a strong chapter, which makes sense given the author's background as a public health professor at the university of michigan.

yet, this book struggles greatly from an organizational problem. i found that the book often jumped back and forth between certain topics without ever resolving one or the other, and the chapters felt disjointed. a lot of the chapters could have been condensed and reorganized into a more cohesive book. for example, in part 2 when the author discusses solutions to address weathering, she brings up having more doulas at birth. then, she moves on to discuss situational cues, counternarratives, and media representation before discussing what she terms as "the fourth trimester of pregnancy" (essentially supporting mothers after childbirth). why wasn't this discussed with the doulas? why leave out one aspect of maternal health 30 pages after you initially bring it up in the solutions section and then sandwich it with unrelated topics?

she does something similar in the social policy chapter, where she includes a section on the vilification of teen mothers. why was this information not included in the chapter, one hundred pages back, on teen mothers, maternal health and black families? i would've forgiven this had the author specifically dissected the social policies and legislation that contributed to these weathering effects, but instead, the social policy chapter ended up being disparate descriptions and anecdotes that could've been better served elsewhere in the book.

if anything, the social policy chapter could've been funneled into the second half, which is titled "the way forward." this is where we could've analyzed the previous chapters through the lens of social policy and figure out what worked vs what didn't work. instead, i also found part 2 to be disorganized and honestly frustrating at some points. some of the things the author advocates for seem like individual solutions to a systemic problem. for example, she recommends removing gendered and racialized posters from classrooms, doing affirmations, and hosting intergroup exchanges. the amount of text dedicated to these individual solutions pales in comparison to the later sections on legislation and government, which would actually address these problems at an institutional level. 

she also coins this term called "jedi public health" (yes, the jedis from star wars), abbreviates it to JPH, and then uses the abbreviation for the rest of the section in part 2. coining this term felt utterly unnecessary; why not just call it "collaborative public health" since that's what it essentially means? coming up with new terms and abbreviating them is typical for academia, but given that this is a book targeted towards the general audience, i felt like this obscured the meaning and the main point. 

because of this, i truly cannot rate this book higher than 2 stars and i'm left feeling disappointed at the end of it all.

something that always strikes me about darwish’s poetry is the lyrical imagery in them and the vivid detail afforded to nature and its landscapes. through his words alone, i feel as though i am transported to the palestine of darwish’s memories, dotted with olive trees and scented with the aroma of oranges and figs. it is beautifully tragic when juxtaposed with the theme of exile that runs through his poetry. 

something in particular that i enjoyed about this collection of poems was the attention to mythology. darwish includes homages to canaanite gods and mesopotamian legends alongside references to the abrahamic religions: cain and abel, ishmael and his lute, and the hoopoe that carried messages between king solomon and the queen of sheba in the qu’ran. for readers who may not be familiar with these kinds of references, i found the glossary in the back to be incredibly helpful.

i’m left a little torn at the end of the book, oscillating between three and four stars. 

by far, i considered the second half of the book to be stronger than the first half, with the second half expanding more on the science being discovered. something that i look for when it comes to popular science books is how well they can appeal to the average reader and how they can explain science in layman’s terms, and ireland does fantastically in the second half. 

not so much in the first half, unfortunately.  in some places, especially the section about phage therapy and compassionate-use clauses, he was overly enthusiastic about the therapeutic uses and potentials of bacteriophages without fully explaining why. i also felt like the first half was more disorganized than the second, jumping back and forth between specific figures in history, rather than honing in on a specific storyline. the story meanders a bit before eventually returning to tbilisi, georgia, and i almost wish that there had been some more focus and specificity there. 

i did appreciate the witty quips about scientists’ personal lives, with the sections on watson and delbrück earning a laugh from me. overall, this feels more like a history book with a few touches of science here and there, and although that’s not a bad nonfiction book to read, it’s not what i was expecting based off the jacket cover summary. 

i personally find history books to be dense reads, but this is such an important one to read. it gave me a thorough overview of the history of palestine, focusing on british colonialism and the balfour declaration, the rise of zionism, the nakba, and palestinian resitance in the form of the intifadas and organizations. he also discusses israel's other military ventures such as their conflicts with lebanon and how israel navigates international relations and law with regards to their occupation of palestine. i think it's a solid place to start if you don't know anything about palestine, and although it can be a lengthy read at times, it is critical reading imo. 

something else i really appreciated about the book are the author's personal recollections and ties to palestine. he talks about members of his family who were involved in palestine's history and even includes pictures of them, which i found to be emotionally compelling. he does hone in on the PLO and their failures, but after reading "justice for some" by noura erakat, i feel more sympathetic than he does about the PLO and their attempts at gaining freedom for palestine. 

i've had this book on my TBR list for ages and now that i've finally come to it, i think it's a good primer for those who are interested in learning more about racism in the united states and unlearning their personal biases, which is exactly what the book bills itself as. i wish i read this book earlier in my academic journey rather than right now because i think it would've been more directly helpful then, but i would still recommend this to others who are at the starting point of their personal journey with race. 

i came to this book, wanting to learn more about the history of the disability justice movement, and i got exactly what i asked for. mattlin discusses the history behind certain policies and organizations, changes and transitions in the disability justice movement, and notable figures in the movement such as mia mingus, eli clare, leah piepzna-samarasinha, etc. it's a good starting place if you want to know more about the history and to find specific figures to look into, but the book doesn't delve as much into theory and praxis. definitely a good book to start on if you don't know anything about crip activism, disability pride, etc!

this book could’ve been two chapters long if they just communicated with each other but instead, these two grown adults spend 12 years acting like children…. it’s a no from me

the only reason this gets one more star than “happy place” is because emily henry didn’t pull a fucking pottery twist on me in this book, but i’m damn close to giving this one 1 star as well.

there is something so elegantly haunting in nabokov's prose, despite english not being his native language, and it makes me eager to read more of his work. 

i originally started this book in order to buddy-read with my friend, who is currently taking a course on russian literature. this was assigned at the start of the syllabus, presumably to better understand the author, and i almost skipped over it in favor of starting his novels sooner. however, i really do think that this lends an insight into nabokov's thinking process and how his nostalgia and his life informs his writing. although this is billed as an autobiography, i almost feel like this is a series of dream-like musings and nostalgia veiled in rose-tinted glasses. that's normally a turn-off for me when it comes to memoirs but i think nabokov's prose makes up for it. 

excited to read more of his works!

this is an expansive book that covers various issues with the way we dispose and treat waste, and i honestly felt like i learned so much more than i thought i would. i'm familiar with the usual plights associated with fast fashion and food waste, but i learned about things like sewage (never knew why "rag" was that big of a problem before!) and the finer details of plastics recycling and incineration. i also didn't know that there was a whole industry built on exporting and importing waste, and the story of the "ash ship" in 1986 really shook me. 

unlike similar books i've read in this vein (the first one that comes to mind is "the secret life of groceries" by benjamin lorr), i really enjoyed that oliver franklin-wallis is honest about the shortcomings of the waste industries and the core problems that underlie the waste. for example, he talks about how the majority of waste workers tend to be the most marginalized and earn pittances compared to other members of society in the first chapter. however, unlike other authors who would stop there, he points out how the caste system, islamophobia, and hindu nationalism/prime minister modi's policies influence the population of waste workers in india. another instance of franklin-wallis doing something like this is when he talks about food waste, gleaners and freegans. he directly cites the privileges and resources that some people have vs others and how food banks mask other gaps in the government's social policies. that was genuinely so refreshing to see in a nonfiction book written for a mainstream audience, and it allowed me to see the intersectionality of the waste issue. 

the writing style was also engaging and i feel like a lot of general readers would really enjoy reading this. franklin-wallis doesn't go overboard with any of the stories and i honestly appreciate that he allows us to see both the good and the bad in people working in or alongside the waste industry. an excellent commentary on consumerism, capitalism, and sustainability.