Briskly written but scattershot.
A British journalist's account of Americans who have fled the mainstream to pursue marginal lifestyles.
Rosen initially defines off-gridders as people who are not connected to public utilities, estimating that there are now some 500,000 off-the-grid houses in the United States. He then expands his definition to include anyone fleeing “the system” as a whole, quite apart from their connections to local power grids and water supplies, and even includes individuals without online or cell-phone access. The author's wishy-washy debut celebrates the unusual lifestyles of a bewildering variety of individuals, including middle-class environmentalists, right-wing survivalists, victims of foreclosure, long-term marijuana growers, people living in cars and vans and business executives with their own islands. In a cross-country trip, Rosen visited dozens of off-gridders, including a couple in Springfield, Mass., who light their mortgaged home with candles, grow their own fruits and vegetables, sell honey and home-school their children; an 80-year-old New Mexico pothead who owns a cabin, a solar panel and an outhouse; an award-winning former PBS cameraman who works part-time in a thrift store and leads a contemplative life; and residents of solar-powered communities like No Name Key, Fla., and Earthaven ecovillage outside of Asheville, N.C. The author provides vignettes on such well-known individualists as impoverished Maine author Carolyn Chute and outdoorsman Eustace Conway, subject of Elizabeth Gilbert's The Last American Man (2002). Tracing the popularity of simple living to the 1970s back-to-the-land-movement, Rosen says off-gridders share “a fierce resistance to convention and a pioneering spirit.” They are generally motivated by one or more concerns: distrust of government and bankers; fear of an impending economic collapse; desire to flee the rat race; and anger over pollution, consumerism and traffic. The author writes that people living off the power grid can now generate electricity cheaply and safely with the help of new technologies and low-energy appliances.
Briskly written but scattershot.Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-14-311738-4
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Penguin
Review Posted Online: June 3, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2010
A powerful voice on behalf of young people who should not be stigmatized but need support from schools and communities to...
An unvarnished account of one woman's painful “journey from victim to survivor,” as she came to understand the “dynamics of commercial sexual exploitation, especially child sex trafficking.”
In this debut, Smith, a public advocate for trafficking victims, begins in 1992 with her own experience. At the age of 14, she was briefly a prostitute before being rescued by the police. Since she was manipulated rather than subjected to violence, she was shamed by the false belief that she had chosen to be a prostitute. Only in 2009, three years after her marriage, did she feel able to reveal her story and give testimony before Congress. She blames the media for objectifying sexuality and creating an environment in which an estimated 100,000 in the U.S. are victimized annually. Smith describes how one afternoon, she was walking through the mall when a young man approached her. They flirted briefly, and he slipped her his phone number, asking her to get in touch. She describes her vulnerability to his approach. She was socially insecure. Both of her parents were alcoholics, and before the age of 10, she had been repeatedly abused sexually by a cousin. In her eagerness to have a boyfriend, she responded to his come-on and agreed to a meeting. As it turned out, he was profiling her for a pimp, and it was the pimp who met her—accompanied by a prostitute, there to show her the ropes. Their approach was nonthreatening, and they suggested that, in the future, she might have a career in modeling. Many unhappy children, writes the author, “are lured into trusting their traffickers” due to their lack of self-esteem. In the aftermath of the experience, although she finished college and had a successful career, Smith struggled with depression and substance abuse.
A powerful voice on behalf of young people who should not be stigmatized but need support from schools and communities to protect them from predators.Pub Date: March 18, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-137-27873-9
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2014
A cosmic straw man is vanquished in the fight against dangerous ideals such as social justice and equality. This is not the place to look for original ideas or honest analysis. Presumably, Sowell’s (Migrations and Cultures, 1996, etc.) goal is to entertain those who share his convictions rather than convince open-minded readers, and this audience will be pleased. “Cosmic justice” is presented as a fundamental departure from the “traditional” conception of justice, which Sowell claims has the “characteristic of a process,” rather than of a particular outcome. He conveniently forgets to mention that this “tradition” dates back only to the emergence of liberal-democratic states and that contrasting notions of procedural vs. substantive justice remain the subject of lively debate. Admitting legitimate disagreement over even something as slippery as justice would soften the blows he aims at those who think inequality and any associated oppression raises concerns a just society should address, and Sowell is not one to temper a political argument simply to maintain intellectual integrity. He is not straightforwardly defending inequality, of course, but rather is pursuing the familiar strategy of attacking measures that could alleviate it. Sowell, a fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford, boldly asserts that those who believe equality should be pursued through public policy “assume that politicizing inequality is free of costs and dangers.” No names are mentioned, and it is indeed hard to imagine that anyone would believe there are no costs or dangers. By stating the issue in terms of extremes, however, he ducks the real issue—the challenge of weighing costs and benefits—and avoids the need for incorporating any subtlety into his discussion. Confronted with such disingenuous blather, readers may find Sowell’s criticism of others applies well to Sowell himself: “To explain the levels of dogmatism and resistance to facts found in too many writings . . . it is necessary to explore what purposes are served by these visions.”
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-684-86462-2
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Free Press
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1999
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