A straightforward and useful guide to better living.
Haley offers a short handbook for more ecologically sensible living.
“Continuing on with unlimited growth and overconsumption, while ignoring Earth’s biophysical constraints, makes no sense,” writes the author at the beginning of this concise book. In order to survive and thrive as a species, Haley contends, humans must do a better job of dealing with the many dangerous factors increasing in number and tempo in the modern world—not only economic, political, and social upheavals, but also looming ecological crises. The author economically outlines practical and philosophical measures ordinary people can take to make small differences in their own lives. He gives detailed, pragmatic guidance on a wide range of topics, from efficient water use to improved gardening techniques, all of which consistently involves the careful re-use of existing household materials. Take an empty plastic one-gallon milk jug, for instance; cut it in half and use the top part as a “mini-greenhouse” and the bottom as a planting pot. His advice on gardening is extensive, with tips like grinding up eggshells (for their calcium) as fertilizer or using coffee grounds for similar nutrients (he also suggests burying a whole banana or a whole egg about 10 inches into the soil six to eight months before germination). While dispensing all of these pointers, Haley employs prose that is brisk and authoritative, effectively supported by his deeper sociological beliefs. In a real sense, he contends, the current system makes its inhabitants slaves—to debt and to the rat race. And who benefits? “Overwhelmingly, it’s the Super-Rich, the Upper Crust, the new aristocrats,” he writes. “Bottom line: stop drinking the Propaganda Kool Aid.” His insistence on the vital importance of food, water, clean air, and good soil will strike many over-stressed readers as a clear-eyed and bracing reminder of the basics.
A straightforward and useful guide to better living.Pub Date: March 5, 2024
ISBN: 9798883819192
Page Count: 101
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: May 21, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
For those satisfied with blame-the-victim tidbits of received wisdom.
The noted conservative economist delivers arguments both fiscal and political against social justice initiatives such as welfare and a federal minimum wage.
A Black scholar who has lived through many civil rights struggles, Sowell is also a follower of Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman, who insisted that free market solutions are available for every social problem. This short book begins with what amounts to an impatient declaration that life isn’t fair. Some nations are wealthy because of geographical advantages, and some people are wealthy because they’re smarter than others. “Some social justice advocates may implicitly assume that various groups have similar developed capabilities, so that different outcomes appear puzzling,” he writes. In doing so, he argues, they fail to distinguish between equal opportunity and equal capability. Sowell is dismissive of claims that Black Americans and other minorities are systematically denied a level playing field: Put non-white kids in charter schools, he urges, and presto, their math scores will zoom northward as compared to those in public schools. “These are huge disparities within the same groups, so that neither race nor racism can account for these huge differences,” he writes, clearly at pains to distance himself from the faintest suggestion that race has anything to do with success or failure in America. At the same time, he isn’t exactly comfortable with the idea that economic inequalities exist, and he tries to finesse definitions to suit his convictions: “The terms ‘rich’ and ‘poor’ are misleading in another and more fundamental sense. These terms apply to people’s stock of wealth, not their flows of income.” As for crime? Give criminals more rights, he asserts, as with Miranda v. Arizona, and crime rates go up—an assertion that overlooks numerous other variables but fits Sowell’s ideological slant.
For those satisfied with blame-the-victim tidbits of received wisdom.Pub Date: Sept. 19, 2023
ISBN: 9781541603929
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Basic Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 13, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An ebullient nature lover’s paean to birds.
A charming bird journey with the bestselling author.
In his introduction to Tan’s “nature journal,” David Allen Sibley, the acclaimed ornithologist, nails the spirit of this book: a “collection of delightfully quirky, thoughtful, and personal observations of birds in sketches and words.” For years, Tan has looked out on her California backyard “paradise”—oaks, periwinkle vines, birch, Japanese maple, fuchsia shrubs—observing more than 60 species of birds, and she fashions her findings into delightful and approachable journal excerpts, accompanied by her gorgeous color sketches. As the entries—“a record of my life”—move along, the author becomes more adept at identifying and capturing them with words and pencils. Her first entry is September 16, 2017: Shortly after putting up hummingbird feeders, one of the tiny, delicate creatures landed on her hand and fed. “We have a relationship,” she writes. “I am in love.” By August 2018, her backyard “has become a menagerie of fledglings…all learning to fly.” Day by day, she has continued to learn more about the birds, their activities, and how she should relate to them; she also admits mistakes when they occur. In December 2018, she was excited to observe a Townsend’s Warbler—“Omigod! It’s looking at me. Displeased expression.” Battling pesky squirrels, Tan deployed Hot Pepper Suet to keep them away, and she deterred crows by hanging a fake one upside down. The author also declared war on outdoor cats when she learned they kill more than 1 billion birds per year. In May 2019, she notes that she spends $250 per month on beetle larvae. In June 2019, she confesses “spending more hours a day staring at birds than writing. How can I not?” Her last entry, on December 15, 2022, celebrates when an eating bird pauses, “looks and acknowledges I am there.”
An ebullient nature lover’s paean to birds.Pub Date: April 23, 2024
ISBN: 9780593536131
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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