Pompous and self-lauding: a book for true believers only.
A collection of thoughts from the self-styled champion of free expression.
Clinton or Trump? Says Assange, holed up in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London at the time, “Well, you’re asking me, do I prefer cholera or gonorrhea?” It’s a characteristically inapt comparison. The reason Assange took refuge in the Ecuadorian Embassy in the first place was to escape extradition to Sweden to face charges of rape (later dropped), which makes his musings on “the ideal man” a touch suspect: “It’s someone who has the courage of their convictions, who doesn’t bow to pressure, who doesn’t exploit people who are weaker than they are, who acts in an honourable way.” Volume editor Sharpe lauds Assange for his courage in performing such acts as dumping documents via WikiLeaks concerning the Clinton campaign just before the 2016 election. (To be sure, many readers will ask, why not the Trump campaign?) Risibly, Sharpe also likens Assange to British poet Wilfred Owen, who died in World War I after having decried “the old lie” that it is sweet and noble to die for one’s country. If hiding behind closed curtains is comparable, she may have a point; otherwise, not. Assange’s defense of WikiLeaks, which specializes in publishing government and corporate documents, as the “rebel library of Alexandria” seems off, too, unless Alexandria has been transported to Moscow. (Why no data dumps of Russian secrets? Curious minds want to know.) “Truth, ultimately, is all we have,” Assange pronounces, seemingly not pausing to consider whether his truth is not a partial thing. But then, even as he prides himself on being a courageous journalist, he lauds partiality in another strange comparison: “To be completely impartial is to be an idiot. This would mean that we would have to treat the dust in the street the same as the lives of people who have been killed.”
Pompous and self-lauding: a book for true believers only.Pub Date: Oct. 12, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-68219-263-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: OR Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
A powerful melding of image and text inspired by Instagram yet original in its execution.
Smith returns with a photo-heavy book of days, celebrating births, deaths, and the quotidian, all anchored by her distinctive style.
In 2018, the musician and National Book Award–winning author began posting on Instagram, and the account quickly took off. Inspired by the captioned photo format, this book provides an image for every day of the year and descriptions that are by turns intimate, humorous, and insightful, and each bit of text adds human depth to the image. Smith, who writes and takes pictures every day, is clearly comfortable with the social media platform—which “has served as a way to share old and new discoveries, celebrate birthdays, remember the departed, and salute our youth”—and the material translates well to the page. The book, which is both visually impactful and lyrically moving, uses Instagram as a point of departure, but it goes well beyond to plumb Smith’s extensive archives. The deeply personal collection of photos includes old Polaroid images, recent cellphone snapshots, and much-thumbed film prints, spanning across decades to bring readers from the counterculture movement of the 1960s to the present. Many pages are taken up with the graves and birthdays of writers and artists, many of whom the author knew personally. We also meet her cat, “Cairo, my Abyssinian. A sweet little thing the color of the pyramids, with a loyal and peaceful disposition.” Part calendar, part memoir, and part cultural record, the book serves as a rich exploration of the author’s fascinating mind. “Offered in gratitude, as a place to be heartened, even in the basest of times,” it reminds us that “each day is precious, for we are yet breathing, moved by the way light falls on a high branch, or a morning worktable, or the sculpted headstone of a beloved poet.”
A powerful melding of image and text inspired by Instagram yet original in its execution.Pub Date: Nov. 15, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-593-44854-0
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 5, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2022
A raw but uneven narrative capturing Gen Z anxiety, though sometimes undermined by its attention-seeking impulses.
Young actor’s path from troubled youth to ascending Hollywood success.
In his provocative debut memoir, the emerging star behind memorable turns in The White Lotus and Euphoria delivers an engaging if somewhat disjointed portrait of coming-of-age trauma and Hollywood ambition. Gage vividly recounts his chaotic San Diego childhood—divorced parents, substance abuse, and a harrowing stint at a brutal rehab facility—with the kind of unflinching detail that will resonate powerfully with young adult readers navigating similar struggles. His voice feels most authentic when excavating family dysfunction and internal turmoil, capturing the emotional extremes and disconnection that define so much of adolescent experience. The memoir’s second half, chronicling his move to Los Angeles and emergence as an actor while grappling with his expanding sexual awareness and subsequent romantic relationships, feels less focused. Here, Gage’s self-aware attention-seeking—the book’s driving conceit—tips toward performative navel-gazing. His eventual borderline personality disorder diagnosis provides some clarity: “After my BPD diagnosis, I thought I’d discovered some profound epiphany about who I was and why I did the things that I did….I could finally see the patterns I’d been blind to before. Every relationship, the same cycle. Too fast, too deep, too reckless.” While Gage succeeds in chronicling the messy realities of mental health, addiction, and queer identity with refreshing honesty, his tendency toward calculated vulnerability can feel manufactured. The memoir works best as a snapshot of a particular generational moment—one in which therapy, social media, and celebrity culture collide in ways both illuminating and exhausting. Despite its inconsistent execution, Gage proves himself an effective and often entertaining storyteller, offering genuine insight into the psychological mechanics of family connection, fame seeking, and self-destruction that will resonate particularly with younger readers seeking meaning amid the noise.
A raw but uneven narrative capturing Gen Z anxiety, though sometimes undermined by its attention-seeking impulses.Pub Date: Oct. 14, 2025
ISBN: 9781668080078
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: July 16, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2025
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