REVIEWS

“The book is a beautiful exercise in consciousness; in bringing both intelligence and experience to bear on a subject that has implications for the way one behaves in the world.” [Link]

 

“Whether pointing out the self-serving hypocrisy of modern institutional agendas or rewriting Joan Didion’s famous “Goodbye to All That,” Biss’s steady gaze is invaluable to the contemporary essay…. Reading this book will force you to take a long, hard look at what’s going on in a no man’s land near you.” [Link]

 

“Expository writing should always be this compelling, provocative, and intelligent. Biss explores race in America through multiple lenses, examining common issues through uncommon situations and events. She flawlessly weaves present-day experiences with historical research to create 13 essays that combine narrative appeal with fascinating facts.” [Link]

 

“Although plenty critical examinations of race already exist, Biss’s approach to the subject is fueled by a quest for intellectual clarity so intense that it takes on a spiritual tone. These essays are also confessions, the revelations of a disappointed and sensitive thinker. She welcomes disillusionment again and again, a process both painful and transcendent.” [Link]

“Biss calls our attention to things so intrinsic to our lives they have become invisible, such as telephone poles and our assumptions about race…. With nods to Didion and Baldwin, her sinuous essays dart off and zigzag, and we hold on tight. Biss compares the lesson plans for freed slaves in Reconstruction-era public schools with what is taught to today’s African American students, and chronicles her experiences as a minority in black worlds, including her stint as a reporter for an African American community newspaper in San Diego. Matters of race, sense of self, and belonging involve everyone, and Biss’ crossing-the-line perspective will provoke fresh analysis of our fears and expectations.”

 

“An intense, sensitive author and journalist with a restless spirit and a whip-crack wit, Biss (The Balloonists) presents a collection of short essays on race in America that spans an impressive range, beginning with a gripping narrative connecting the history of the telephone pole with the history of lynching. As her stories progress, Biss extrapolates a great deal about America's complicated racial attitudes from her own experience—teaching in Harlem, living in a diverse Chicago neighborhood, watching the long, sad saga of Hurricane Katrina from Iowa. The result is a personal, opinionated and accessible collection; Americans of any background, while they may disagree with her point of view, will see a country they recognize in settings as diverse as deepest Brooklyn or a Mexican border retreat.” [Link]

 

“The concluding essay in the collection is called ‘All Apologies.’ It’s a series of apologies (and non-apologies) issued throughout history…. At the end of the essay, Biss writes, ‘I apologize for slavery.’ It’s less an admission of wrongdoing than a classic apologia—a formal defense, and implicit examination, of her own conduct, which is what underpins this entire book. The reader is once again reminded of those telephone poles at the turn of the twentieth century, which served as both gallows and technological thruway. That nexus implicates all of us, and Biss puts it in plain view: for a moment, at least, we see even what is unseen.” [Link]

 

“Biss’s examination of America’s complicated racial heritage offers penetrating insight. In ‘Back to Buxton,’ she contrasts the supposedly progressive university in Iowa City, where white and black students rarely cross paths, with the early-20th-century hamlet of Buxton, a small, Jim Crow–era town that functioned, briefly, as a desegregated utopia…. 'Is this Kansas?,' in particular, raises some troubling questions about the way the young are trained to view tragedies like Katrina—often through the harsh lens of racial stereotypes. Telephone poles may be on their way out, but at moments like these, Biss still encourages us to reach out and connect.” [Link]