A searching and timely exploration of indigeneity and its many interpretations.
A Wampanoag journalist looks at what it means to be Native American.
Over the course of U.S.–Native American relations, too few people have remembered that the East Coast once abounded with Indigenous settlements. In the case of the Wampanoag, famed for their generous role in the first Thanksgiving, writes Lee, “we, the Aquinnah Wampanoag people, only own a small piece of the smallest town on…what is now Martha’s Vineyard—one of the most expensive and exclusive vacation destinations in the country.” Owning land, Lee observes, is one of the principal ways that one can claim sovereignty over a place, and it is just for that reason that, centuries ago as now, white newcomers to Martha’s Vineyard have labored to displace Native people, whether by violence or by property taxes too high for them to afford, “victims of a rigged capitalist system no one bothered to explain.” As Lee, of mixed Asian, European, and Wampanoag descent, explores the issue of sovereignty, he necessarily opens the door to the question of who qualifies to be Native American: Some nations have a “blood quantum,” by which Black people whose ancestors were formerly enslaved by the Cherokee were long denied membership in that tribe, and which, Lee writes provocatively, can be a species of “creepy race science.” More inclusive tribal identity, he suggests, “is best rooted in community and events like the Native market, not tribal government and council policies.” Given that tribal membership is often a criterion for the distribution of federal grants, revenues from casinos and natural resources, and the like, the question is fraught. Lee travels widely across the U.S. and visits with Indigenous peoples from Oceania and South America to look at how such matters are addressed, concluding that “there are different ways of being Wampanoag and what works or is meaningful for someone might be different from the way I approach things.”
A searching and timely exploration of indigeneity and its many interpretations.Pub Date: July 15, 2025
ISBN: 9781668087251
Page Count: 256
Publisher: One Signal/Atria
Review Posted Online: June 13, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2025
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.
A noted actor turns to verse: “Poems are a Saturday in the middle of the week.”
McConaughey, author of the gracefully written memoir Greenlights, has been writing poems since his teens, closing with one “written in an Australian bathtub” that reads just as a poem by an 18-year-old (Rimbaud excepted) should read: “Ignorant minds of the fortunate man / Blind of the fate shaping every land.” McConaughey is fearless in his commitment to the rhyme, no matter how slight the result (“Oops, took a quick peek at the sky before I got my glasses, / now I can’t see shit, sure hope this passes”). And, sad to say, the slight is what is most on display throughout, punctuated by some odd koanlike aperçus: “Eating all we can / at the all-we-can-eat buffet, / gives us a 3.8 education / and a 4.2 GPA.” “Never give up your right to do the next right thing. This is how we find our way home.” “Memory never forgets. Even though we do.” The prayer portion of the program is deeply felt, but it’s just as sentimental; only when he writes of life-changing events—a court appearance to file a restraining order against a stalker, his decision to quit smoking weed—do we catch a glimpse of the effortlessly fluent, effortlessly charming McConaughey as exemplified by the David Wooderson (“alright, alright, alright”) of Dazed and Confused. The rest is mostly a soufflé in verse. McConaughey’s heart is very clearly in the right place, but on the whole the book suggests an old saw: Don’t give up your day job.
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9781984862105
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.
A former New York City dancer reflects on her zesty heyday in the 1970s.
Discovered on a Manhattan street in 2020 and introduced on Stanton’s Humans of New York Instagram page, Johnson, then 76, shares her dynamic history as a “fiercely independent” Black burlesque dancer who used the stage name Tanqueray and became a celebrated fixture in midtown adult theaters. “I was the only black girl making white girl money,” she boasts, telling a vibrant story about sex and struggle in a bygone era. Frank and unapologetic, Johnson vividly captures aspects of her former life as a stage seductress shimmying to blues tracks during 18-minute sets or sewing lingerie for plus-sized dancers. Though her work was far from the Broadway shows she dreamed about, it eventually became all about the nightly hustle to simply survive. Her anecdotes are humorous, heartfelt, and supremely captivating, recounted with the passion of a true survivor and the acerbic wit of a weathered, street-wise New Yorker. She shares stories of growing up in an abusive household in Albany in the 1940s, a teenage pregnancy, and prison time for robbery as nonchalantly as she recalls selling rhinestone G-strings to prostitutes to make them sparkle in the headlights of passing cars. Complemented by an array of revealing personal photographs, the narrative alternates between heartfelt nostalgia about the seedier side of Manhattan’s go-go scene and funny quips about her unconventional stage performances. Encounters with a variety of hardworking dancers, drag queens, and pimps, plus an account of the complexities of a first love with a drug-addled hustler, fill out the memoir with personality and candor. With a narrative assist from Stanton, the result is a consistently titillating and often moving story of human struggle as well as an insider glimpse into the days when Times Square was considered the Big Apple’s gloriously unpolished underbelly. The book also includes Yee’s lush watercolor illustrations.
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.Pub Date: July 12, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-27827-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2022
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
