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A review by alisonw
Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People About Race by Reni Eddo-Lodge
challenging
informative
inspiring
sad
medium-paced
4.5
Like a lot of people, this book has been on my TBR pile since early 2020, and I’m so glad I finally got around to reading it.
The beginning of the book was a very important brief filling in of the history of race in Britain, as an outsider who moved here recently it was very informative.
The rest of the book is hard to summarise anymore than maybe a series of essays discussing race and issues around it, with context from examples and studies. Even if your understanding and views align with the author already, they are insightful and the concrete examples are useful for remembering when talking to someone who does not believe certain issues to be as big as they actually are.
Ending this review with a quote from the end of the book;
“[…]I know how much it can paralyse. How the feeling of hopelessness works to utterly crush creativity, and passion, and drive. But those are the three things we will definitely need if we’re ever going to fight this injustice.
We have to fight despondency. We have to hang on to hope.”
I genuinely think this is one of those books that is making the world a better place for all that live in it, which keeps me hopeful.
A note on the audiobook: I think I would have preferred this as a physical book, just because it would have been easier to pause and process. In future I’ll know now to stick to physical for essay type non fiction. However, the reading was very well done so if you’d prefer it in audio I do recommend it. I did listen at 1.3x because the pace was sliiightly slower than I prefer, but she has a great voice for reading.
The beginning of the book was a very important brief filling in of the history of race in Britain, as an outsider who moved here recently it was very informative.
The rest of the book is hard to summarise anymore than maybe a series of essays discussing race and issues around it, with context from examples and studies. Even if your understanding and views align with the author already, they are insightful and the concrete examples are useful for remembering when talking to someone who does not believe certain issues to be as big as they actually are.
Ending this review with a quote from the end of the book;
“[…]I know how much it can paralyse. How the feeling of hopelessness works to utterly crush creativity, and passion, and drive. But those are the three things we will definitely need if we’re ever going to fight this injustice.
We have to fight despondency. We have to hang on to hope.”
I genuinely think this is one of those books that is making the world a better place for all that live in it, which keeps me hopeful.
A note on the audiobook: I think I would have preferred this as a physical book, just because it would have been easier to pause and process. In future I’ll know now to stick to physical for essay type non fiction. However, the reading was very well done so if you’d prefer it in audio I do recommend it. I did listen at 1.3x because the pace was sliiightly slower than I prefer, but she has a great voice for reading.