BOOK: Twelve Years a Slave (Solomon Northup, 1853)

In his memoir Twelve Years a Slave, African-American Solomon Northup described how, having been born free in 1808, he was kidnapped and sold into slavery in 1841. So began twelve years of immense suffering as he worked upon plantations in Louisiana, until a chance meeting with abolitionist Samuel Bass ultimately led to his freedom in 1853.

• An altogether harrowing prose that provides a striking insight into the abhorrent institution of slavery and the atrocities afflicted upon enslaved people, as well as the lows that people have historically stooped too for financial gain (exemplified by how Solomon Northup ended up becoming enslaved), but it is also a hopeful narrative as we see Northup’s remarkable resilience and the strength to endure that his faith in God gave him.
• Solomon Northup was incredibly open and vulnerable with the prose, as he described what his experiences taught him about himself and about the things that humans are capable of, and he also detailed some of his regrets and horrors regarding the things that he thought when most angry or upset.
• Detailed descriptions of the work that the slaves undertook on plantations, as well as the treatment that some particularly brutal owners and/or overseers subjected them to provides a remarkable insight into the complexity and hard manual labour of their daily toil (and for readers today an insight into what farming looked like without modern-day equipment) as well as harrowing and gut-wrenching descriptions of the suffering inflicted upon them by bigots who simply enjoyed abusing their power, although none more so than the horrific acts that Edwin Epps inflicted upon slave Patsey.
• The detailing of the perils of the Louisiana bayou and of the variety of responses that white people would make to the sight of a black person unaccompanied by a white provides a clear understanding of why most slaves in that State did not attempt to escape, as we see that to do so would have been if anything more dangerous than staying on the plantation.
• It would have been totally understandable for Solomon Northup to unrelentingly condemn the family of his longest-serving and most vicious master, Edwin Epps, but instead he considered their humanity, praising Mrs. Epps for the times that she showed him kindness and described how the bigotry of Epps’s children (like that of their father) was a result of the environment in which they had spent their entire lives and the ideologies ingrained within them since infancy – in doing so, Northup provided a unique contribution to the Nature vs. Nurture debate.
• Solomon Northup’s recounting of his early life in New York could have featured a more detailed consideration of the social status of African-Americans, particularly as the emancipation process in that state was not completed until 1827.

VERDICT: MUST

BOOK: Black Klansman (Ron Stallworth, 2014)

In Black Klansman, Ron Stallworth, who was the first ever black Police officer in Colorado Springs, details how in the late-1970s he launched an undercover investigation into the local chapter of the Ku Klux Klan, in order to gain intelligence on and prevent their activity. Owing to a rookie error at the offset, he ended up having regular phone conversations with local leaders and even the national director, David Duke, whilst his (white) colleague Jim attended Klan meetings using Stallworth’s name.

• As a whole this book provides a compelling insight into a remarkable undercover operation that gives shocking revelations about some highly powerful men who (unbeknownst to their bosses) were Klansmen. Yet it is also bemusing that this operation would have looked so different had Ron Stallworth not made the ultimate rookie error, and fair play to him for his honesty and humility concerning his various mistakes and naiveties during the operation.
• With much of the prose being in narrative form, Ron Stallworth provides fascinating insights into how his operation played out, and we find ourselves utterly horrified by the Klan activity and awful bigotry therein. Yet equally, we cannot help but find ourselves stunned by how easily Stallworth managed to dupe Klan leaders.
• As he recounts his operation, Ron Stallworth gives fascinating insights into undercover policing – namely the techniques and considerations, particularly as there are so many ways in which the officers involved can easily encroach into illegal territory without even meaning to, and describes how they were applied to his operation.
• A really interesting thought from Ron Stallworth that challenges the reader’s perception of a successful Police operation, as he describes how success is not necessarily measured by the number of arrests, but can be determined by what crimes were prevented.
• Although they are fortunately on very minor points/details, Ron Stallworth did make a few typos here and there, a couple of which result in illogical descriptions. In fairness to Stallworth though, even the most experienced authors make typos, but I am surprised that the editor never picked up on them when proofreading.

VERDICT: MUST

BOOK: Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption (Bryan Stevenson, 2014)

In Just Mercy, Bryan Stevenson (founder of the Equal Justice Initiative) documents his career defending disadvantaged clients. The main focus is upon his work getting Alabama death row inmate Walter McMillian exonerated of a murder that he had been framed for, due to the local Sheriff’s hatred over the fact that McMillian (an African-American) had had an affair with a white woman. Stevenson recounts the case and also refers to others that he worked on in the same era, and considers their place in the history of the American justice system and what they demonstrated to him about the flaws within said system that leave those from ethnic minority backgrounds, the poor and the mentally ill most at risk.

• Bryan Stevenson’s prose as he recounts the McMillian case in narrative form is masterful, as his writing style is detailed-yet-concise, and as he details the uncovering of originally-concealed evidence of Walter McMillian’s innocence, we become increasingly shocked by the injustice of it all, yet also find ourselves on tenderhooks, as the clear picture about the type of people whom Stevenson was up against makes us wonder how and when he would eventually get his client exonerated.
• In detailing such a broad range of cases – those that he worked on, those that he was aware of from other pro-bono law firms, those that were historic cases that he learnt of in law school – from a multitude of States, Bryan Stevenson paints a harrowing picture of how disadvantaged thousands of people have been, even when it has been all too obvious that they are being framed, demonstrating that the McMillian case was far from an exception to the norm.
• Through referring to many cases of innocent people who were sent to Death Row, Bryan Stevenson presents an argument against capital punishment that nobody could reasonably argue with.
• A harrowing book that is utterly powerful in its raw humanity, as Bryan Stevenson shockingly reveals the range of horrific abuses that vulnerable prisoners have been subjected to and the psychological toll. He also expresses immense sympathy for the families of murder victims who are forced to relive the tragedies when it becomes clear that their loved one’s supposed killer was innocent all along.
• Bryan Stevenson is vulnerable as he discusses the emotional toll that his work has had upon him, and is completely transparent about himself and the flaws that he came to recognise through his work running the Equal Justice Initiative – he is honest about his naiveties that his cases exposed, the times he said the wrong things, and the times that he struggled to keep his temper and/or composure.
• Towards the end, Bryan Stevenson describes work that he undertook almost 20 years after the McMillian case that ultimately resulted in Supreme Court decisions, but this done too briefly when they really deserve to be the topic of an entire book.

VERDICT: MUST

BOOK: She Said (Jodi Kantor/Megan Twohey, 2019)

In She Said, journalists Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey of The New York Times detail how they came to write, research and publish an investigative piece on film producer Harvey Weinstein’s history of sexually harassing and abusing women who worked for/with his companies over a span of decades. What they did not foresee and which they also document is how their report ultimately led to the revival of the Me Too movement, with countless women of a multitude of professions globally opening up about their own experiences in the aftermath of the piece’s publication.

• A compelling, blow-by-blow account of the investigative work for what became one of the most significant news reports of the century, which provides gut-wrenching and often harrowing descriptions of the abuse of power at the heart of sexual harassment and the devastating impact it can have upon victims, particularly when people working for the perpetrator found ways to keep the truth from getting out.
• As they recount their work (even including email, text and conversation transcripts from the time), Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey’s writing oozes compassion as they discuss why Harvey Weinstein’s victims had not come forward before, and sometimes consider this in relation to similar cases that testified to the psychological toll that such perpetrators’ actions can have. Yet also they testify, through the findings of this and other reports that they worked on, that so often a victim of sexual harassment can find solidarity with others subjected to it by the same perpetrator, and that by coming together they can expose a behavioural pattern and it will not be a case of “her word against his”.
• Throughout the recounting of their investigative work and subsequent write-up, Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey refer to journalistic principles and the requirements regarding the standard of their reporting, thereby demonstrating how complex a job it can be, how they went about writing something watertight for which (if sued) no judge could rightly rule against them, and testifying to the nitty-gritty work of investigative journalism and its subsequent rewards.
• An objective approach is implemented in the consideration of the subsequent revival of Me Too, as the authors make it clear that, regardless of one’s feelings towards the movement, it is impossible to deny that it highlighted how ill-equipped so many companies were to handling allegations of sexual harassment, as well as the difficulties people find in talking about that issue.
• Although featuring a good account of the case made against Brett Kavanaugh in 2018, given that case’s significance, more pages could have been dedicated to it to flesh out more of its nuances.

VERDICT: MUST

BOOK: Boy (Roald Dahl, 1984)

Boy is the first of two autobiographies by British author Roald Dahl and, as the title suggests, concerns his childhood. He describes growing up in Britain during the 1920s and 1930s, with considerable focus on his time at boarding school, and how his experiences there later informed his writing, as well as his familial life, particularly his relationship with his mother.

• A writing style that is accessible for younger readers, as there are not any complex or pretentious words, terminology from the 1920s/1930s that would not be in a modern child’s vocabulary is defined, and the contexts provided are detailed without being verbose.
• There is an excellent balance between comedy and drama within the narrative – the former in some of the shenanigans that Roald Dahl got up to as a youngster, the latter in the emotional nature of his relationships and the tragedies that the Dahl family experienced.
• Adult readers particularly will appreciate the reflective tone of much of Roald Dahl’s writing, as he details how much of his perspective and understanding of events have changed with hindsight and a more nuanced understanding of people and the world alike.
• Whilst there are aspects of them which feel embellished, like he is writing about them as though the way they seemed to him as a child is the way they actually were, Roald Dahl’s descriptions of his interactions with adults provide a fascinating insight into what informed the way that he wrote adult characters within his children’s books.
• Even as a child, it always bugged me that Roald Dahl never even provided the names of five of his siblings. Whilst (as an adult) I now appreciate that they may have requested that he not name them, if they did then some reference should have been made to that. Additionally, there is scarcely any consideration or detailing of Dahl’s relationships with his siblings.

VERDICT: MUST

BOOK: Living Mission (Miriam Swaffield/Rich Wilson, 2013)

For most of the 2010s, authors Miriam Swaffield and Rich Wilson were the faces of Fusion, a Christian charity that supports student ministry, in particular providing help and resources, and they wrote Living Mission as a tool to help Christian freshers live as disciples on campus.

• Having done prayer walks and outreach discussions with Miriam Swaffield in 2014 (my final year at the University of Portsmouth), I can honestly say that her passion for student ministry and outreach comes through in the sections of prose that she writes.
• The book clearly conveys the importance for Christian students to live what they preach and in doing so provides a striking challenge, and also provides a striking reminder that (statistically) all Christian students will have multiple peers who had never met a Christian before.
• The prose does include multiple testimonies to the fruit of student ministry, rightly emphasising that such ministry can have fruit and has a proven record of changing people’s lives.
• Approximately half the book is taken up by testimonies and, as much as they are encouraging, they do not include any much, if any, clear practical advice that could be beneficial to Christian students, particularly those fairly new to the faith.
• There is a lack of focus on Scripture, in no small part due to the previous point, and for Christians at any stage in their faith it would be beneficial for Scripture to be dissected and applied to the types of situations that students are likely to encounter at university.

VERDICT: MEH

BOOK: The Reckoning: Our Nation’s Trauma and Finding a Way to Heal (Mary L. Trump, 2021)

In The Reckoning, former-President Trump’s niece, Mary L. Trump, looks at his Administration’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic and his reaction to losing the 2020 Presidential Election. She considers the culturally-traumatic impact of this dark time upon the American nation, as well as how it fits into a wider national narrative that benefits the white privileged, and what precedents Trump set for future politicians in the process.

From hereon, to differentiate between the two Trumps, the following will be used: DJT for Donald J. Trump, MLT for Mary L. Trump.

• By drawing upon her own knowledge and experience of DJT, MLT explains why he responded in the ways that he did the COVID-19 and the 2020 Election results, giving us a better understanding of why he did so and how they fit into a wider history of behavioural patterns.
• This book is not so much a book about DJT as it is a book about the turbulent history of American race relations to precede his Presidency, and it is a very rushed history that frequently lacks nuance or detail and makes very sweeping statements.
• Both the historical aspects and the sociological writings on contemporary America feature generalisations and half-truths that are not backed up by documented examples or statistics. MLT’s bibliography is huge, and one cannot help but feel that she cherry-picked elements of facts to support her writings but deliberately left out the majority of the detail.
• Despite acknowledging that there are many reasons why people may have voted Republican (in 2016 and/or 2020), MLT makes very generalising condemnations of Republican voters, as though all of them support the far-right ideologies that became increasingly apparent during that era.
• Towards the end of the book, MLT makes very generalising statements about what it means to be a black person in contemporary America – something that a white person should never do unless they are quoting African-Americans verbatim.

SUMMARY: When writing on and applying psychology, Mary L. Trump’s expertise in that field comes through, but most of this book is an exercise in history and sociology – neither of which is a subject-area that she is suited to or an expert in, which most of the prose makes very apparent.

VERDICT: MISS

BOOK: Risk is Right (John Piper, 2013)

In the little Christian book Risk is Right, John Piper explores what it means to take a risk for the Gospel, and looks to the historical example of the Apostle Paul and the risks to his safety and wellbeing that he took in order to write a large percentage of the New Testament. As suggested by the book’s tagline “Better to Lose Your Life Than to Waste It”, Piper looks at why suffering and even dying for the Gospel is a worthwhile endeavour for Christians.

• Piper reminds us of just how much the Apostle Paul suffered for the Gospel’s advancement without wavering at all in his faith, and in doing so challenges the Christian who reads this book to think about how much they would be willing to risk and/or give up for the sake of Gospel ministry.
• A personal book as Piper has clearly been challenged by Paul’s example, plus he also draws upon his own extensive experience in Gospel ministry to discuss the do’s and don’ts of taking a risk for the Gospel.
• Looking to the historical example of Paul, Piper passionately describes how taking a risk for the Gospel can and will benefit others, in doing so encouraging the reader.
• At only 51 pages, this (admittedly challenging and encouraging) book is too concise and short, and one cannot read it without being convicted that a theologian of Piper’s calibre could easily have fleshed out the themes and contents into a great book of at least four times longer.

VERDICT: MUST

BOOK: Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man (Mary L. Trump, 2020)

Too Much and Never Enough is a tell-all biography of Donald Trump, 45th President of the United States, by his niece Mary L. Trump. Mary L. Trump looks at the history of her family and describes how her grandfather Fred’s preferential treatment for her uncle Donald, during his formative years and continuing into his 50s, ultimately moulded the man who went on to win the 2016 Presidential Election and resulted in both his developing a character and temperament that were unsuited to politics, and his taking an approach to the Presidency that beggared belief.

Due to the sheer number of Trumps that this book concerns, here is a key for this review…

1. MLT – author Mary L. Trump.
2. DJT – subject Donald J. Trump.
3. FCT – the subject’s father, Fred C. Trump.
4. FTJ – Freddy Trump Jr., father of the author, eldest son of FCT.

• MLT was undeniably brave in penning this as she truly risked losing most of the family whom she was still on good terms with, and regardless of one’s opinion on whether she should have crafted such a detailed expose of the Trump family, it is striking to read this and realise that she has had to come to terms with decades of emotional abuse and gaslighting from her own family.
• MLT’s detailed analysis of how FCT’s approaches to parenting and gender throughout the first 53 years of DJT’s life ultimately moulded the latter’s character and temperament really help us the readers understand the man who has been so prominent in politics and the media since the 2010s -his conduct, attitudes and idiosyncrasies all resultantly make a lot more sense.
• MLT’s chronology of DJT’s business and careers, and analyses of the roles that others played in them (particularly somewhat-puppet-master FCT), informs a better understanding of how DJT made it to The White House and why his character and facades remained consistent, no matter what. In this and the former point, MLT cleverly uses her background in psychology to make more sense of DJT.
• MLT’s position at times feels self-contradictory, as she constantly condemns DJT, whilst also regularly expressing sympathy over how his character became inevitable due to FCT and the subsequent “enablers”, with that occasionally being used to excuse his behaviour.
• The first half is predominantly a biography of MLT’s late father, FTJ, rather than of DJT, and the references to how FCT’s treatment of FTJ made his preference for DJT apparent and helped mould the latter’s character are often fleeting and very surface-level.
• The fact that the book was rushed to publication due to the then-upcoming 2020 Election and did not receive a thorough proofread is apparent in the incorrect maths and lack of clearly-detailed dates that crop up several times, particularly when MLT discusses multiple events to occur in a several-year-period in an alternating, cross-referencing, non-linear manner.

VERDICT: MEH

BOOK: The Presidents: 250 Years of American Political Leadership (Iain Dale, 2021)

The Presidents: 250 Years of American Political Leadership is a collection of contributed chapters, edited by Iain Dale. Each chapter concerns a different President of the United States – from George Washington to Joe Biden. The chapters are essentially mini-biographies, with the primary focus being of their respective subject-matters’ tenures in quite possibly the most powerful political position in the world, as well as their subsequent legacies.

• A brief prologue provides a fascinatingly detailed yet concise explanation for what led to the office of President being established.
• The authors take balanced approaches to their subject-matters, providing overviews of their Presidencies and the achievements (or lack of) therein (including shedding light on lesser known ones). They also consider how history has remembered them, what the general perceptions of them and, rather than outright agreeing or disagreeing, discuss why they are remembered that way and raise possible counter-arguments.
• Each mini-biography is clearly well researched as the authors provide insights into the Presidents’ characters, eccentricities and little ticks (both those that won people over and those that alienated), and each also details the subject-matters’ youth and earlier political career, providing a concise consideration of what led to them getting to the Oval Office; and also briefly discusses their lives after leaving office, providing points on how the role impacted them subsequently.
• Each passionately-written chapter provides a concisely-detailed and very interesting overview of a President, meaning that (regardless of your politics) you come to see why the authors find them fascinating.
• Occasionally it feels like the contributing authors’ are trying too hard to be impartial and objective in their writing, and one cannot help but wish they would be a little more willing to express their subjective opinion in addition to balanced considerations.

VERDICT: MUST