Book Category: Essential
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The Hospital: Life, Death, and Dollars in a Small American Town by Brian Alexander
This reminded me a lot of Dopesick and Evicted, in that it dissects a whole lot about America through a seemingly simple lens.
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The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York by Robert Caro
The Power Broker is a masterpiece. Essential reading
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My Fourth Time, We Drowned: Seeking Refuge on the World’s Deadliest Migration Route by Sally Hayden
I’ll never forget this book. It’s eye-opening and upsetting, and absolutely critical to understanding the world we live in.
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Sellout: The Major-Label Feeding Frenzy That Swept Punk, Emo, and Hardcore by Dan Ozzi
Dan Ozzi’s profile of the late 90’s-early 2000’s punk scene is like catnip. I saw a lot of these bands live (some before they were cool!).
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The Stranger Beside Me: Ted Bundy: The Shocking Inside Story by Ann Rule
This is the OG true crime novel. Rule gets contracted to write a book about a serial killer, and it turns out that the killer is a friend and former coworker.
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White Teeth by Zadie Smith
This was impossible to put down. The characters leap off the page, the writing is filled with energy and charm. Loved it.
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When McKinsey Comes to Town by Walt Bogdanich
If you don’t know McKinsey or the world in which they operate, much of this will be eye-opening and enraging. At this point in America’s history though, it all feels depressingly unsurprising, part-and-parcel of How America Does Business.
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Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke
Clarke’s writing is so readable, funny and clever that I couldn’t put it down.
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The Age of Surveillance Capitalism by Shoshana Zuboff
This changed the way I think about tech and the lenses that I interpret the world with. There’s a reason that most tech criticism written after this book, references this book.
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Middlemarch by George Eliot
It’s a project, but a worthy one!