Category: Non-Fiction Book Reviews

“Being Seen” Review

Posted on by Jen

“Being Seen: One Deafblind Woman’s Fight to End Ableism” by Elsa Sjunneson

A Deafblind writer and professor explores how the misrepresentation of disability in books, movies, and TV harms both the disabled community and everyone else.

As a Deafblind woman with partial vision in one eye and bilateral hearing aids, Elsa Sjunneson lives at the crossroads of blindness and sight, hearing and deafness—much to the confusion of the world around her. While she cannot see well enough to operate without a guide dog or cane, she can see enough to know when someone is reacting to the visible signs of her blindness and can hear when they’re whispering behind her back. And she certainly knows how wrong our one-size-fits-all definitions of disability can be.

As a media studies professor, she’s also seen the full range of blind and deaf portrayals on film, and here she deconstructs their impact, following common tropes through horror, romance, and everything in between. Part memoir, part cultural criticism, part history of the Deafblind experience, Being Seen explores how our cultural concept of disability is more myth than fact, and the damage it does to us all.

Review

I really enjoyed this book and the way Elsa mixes personal stories with Deafblind history and criticisms of portrayals of disability in various mediums. The criticisms are all relevant to her life because the lives of disabled people are often shaped by what others assume to be true. Like all of us who are disabled Elsa has had to fight the ableist assumptions people have made in order have a life that she wants. She has a whole chapter on Hellen Keller and how Hellen’s story is often changed to suite ableist ideas of who she was. There’s also a lot to be said for the damage caused by people “not seeing disability” – because when that happens it results in a lot of internalized ableism to unpack while also needing to learn how to actually work with your disabilities instead of ignoring them to pass as non-disabled. There’s also a chapter about disability in science fiction and how we’re often erased.

Book Details

Being Seen book cover - black background with the authors name and the title and subtitle on the book: Elsa Sjunneson Being Seen One DeafBlind Women's Fight to End Ableism. The text is pale gray with a light shining through the I in the word Being in the title - the light is shining to the right of the cover hitting some of the letters in the rest of the title.

Author’s Website
Elsa Sjunneson
Publisher / Date
S&S/Simon Element, October 26, 2021
Genre / Topics
Memoir, Disability
Page Count
288
Completion Date
September 2, 2024

“Safe and Sound” Review

Posted on by Jen

“Safe and Sound: A Renter-Friendly Guide to Home Repair” by Mercury Stardust

For too many people, the simple act of contacting a plumber or repair person can feel like a game of chance. As a transwoman and a professional maintenance technician, Mercury Stardust has discovered (the hard way) that we live in a world with much to fear. If you’ve ever felt panicked about opening your home to strangers in order to fix a maintenance issue, this book is for you.

Renting a home can be a complex process—from finding a safe and affordable space, to hiring help for moving and out, and of course, managing any repairs that come up during your stay.

You deserve to feel empowered to take matters into your own hands—and it’s not as hard as you might think. In this book, Mercury will show you how to tackle the projects that need improvement in your home—from how to properly fix a clog in your bathroom sink and safely hang things on your walls to patching small and medium drywall holes.

Review

This is a great book for anyone who’s renting and needs some tips for everything from finding an apartment to making repairs and more. There’s a lot of great information in the book with very detailed explanations for what tools to use and how to complete the repairs. There’s also a section at the end of the book with a lot of great information about the various laws and various resources for tenants in the United States that may prove useful to many.

Book Details

The cover has a drawing of a woman with blue/green hair in a pink plaid shirt and blue overalls standing in front of a workbench with several tools on it and a peg board behind them. Woman is holding up a drill with her other hand on her hip. The title is in box above the woman's head and the title is above that.

Author’s Website
Mercury Stardust
Publisher / Date
Alpha, August 2023
Genre
Guide Book
Page Count
224
Completion Date
April 3, 2024

“This Arab Is Queer” Review

Posted on by Jen

“This Arab Is Queer: An Anthology by LGBTQ+ Arab Writers” edited by Elias Jahshan

This ground-breaking anthology features the compelling and courageous memoirs of eighteen queer Arab writers — some international bestselling, others using pseudonyms. Here, we find heart-warming connections and moments of celebration alongside essays exploring the challenges of being LGBTQ+ and Arab.

From a military base in the Gulf to loving whispers caught between bedsheets; and from touring overseas as a drag queen to a concern in Cairo where the rainbow flag was raised to a crowd of thousands, this collection celebrates the true colours of a vibrant Arab queer experience.

Review

This was a great collection of stories. Each one felt important to read and understand as the individuals told their stories. As the introduction explains being Arab and Queer can be difficult for a number of reasons and each person has had to deal with a lot because of where they come from. There are also other issues they have to deal with as well. There was a range of different queer topics that were good and informative. Some stories were harder to read than others – with different issues happening to the individuals. I’m glad I read this book and I’ve already looked up the authors to learn more about them.

Book Details

The cover has a white background with the title in the center in outlined letters "This Arab is Queer" and the subtitle is in solid black with the editors name below it. Around the top and bottom are shapes in rainbow colors - red at the top ending with purple at the bottom

Editor’s Website
Elias Jahshan
Publisher / Date
Saqi Books, January 2022

Genre / Topics
Essays, LGBTQIA+, Race
Page Count
216
Completion Date
March 23,2024

“The Climate Book” Review

Posted on by Jen

“The Climate Book” edited by Greta Thunberg

We still have time to change the world. From Greta Thunberg, the world’s leading climate activist, comes the essential handbook for making it happen.

You might think it’s an impossible task: secure a safe future for life on Earth, at a scale and speed never seen, against all the odds. There is hope – but only if we listen to the science before it’s too late.

In The Climate Book, Greta Thunberg has gathered the wisdom of over one hundred experts – geophysicists, oceanographers and meteorologists; engineers, economists and mathematicians; historians, philosophers and indigenous leaders – to equip us all with the knowledge we need to combat climate disaster. Alongside them, she shares her own stories of demonstrating and uncovering greenwashing around the world, revealing how much we have been kept in the dark. This is one of our biggest challenges, she shows, but also our greatest source of hope. Once we are given the full picture, how can we not act? And if a schoolchild’s strike could ignite a global protest, what could we do collectively if we tried?

We are alive at the most decisive time in the history of humanity. Together, we can do the seemingly impossible. But it has to be us, and it has to be now.

Review

There is a lot of information in this book and I probably need to re-read some of it at some point. Each chapter of the book is by a different person with their one bit of information about Climate Change. Everyone needs to understand and accept how serious the issues are and that something has to be done. But as we learned with COVID it’s very hard to get people to change their habits if they feel like changes are impacting their way of life or freedoms. But we do need to change. We need to understand how much damage has already been done to the Earth and that if we’re to survive much longer we need to make changes.

Book Details

The cover of the book has vertical stripes of blue, white and red in various shades that represent the average temperature in a given year. The stripes on the right are blue and the ones on the left are red. The title and editors name are written on the cover one word for each line from top to bottom.

Editor / Book Website
Greta Thunberg
Publisher / Date
Penguin Press, February 2023
Genre
Essays
Page Count
464
Completion Date
January 25, 2024

“Against Technoableism” Review

Posted on by Jen

“Against Technoableism: Rethinking Who Needs Improvement” by Ashley Shew

When bioethicist and professor Ashley Shew became a self-described “hard-of-hearing chemobrained amputee with Crohn’s disease and tinnitus,” there was no returning to “normal.” Suddenly well-meaning people called her an “inspiration” while grocery shopping or viewed her as a needy recipient of technological wizardry. Most disabled people don’t want what the abled assume they want—nor are they generally asked. Almost everyone will experience disability at some point in their lives, yet the abled persistently frame disability as an individual’s problem rather than a social one.

In a warm, feisty voice and vibrant prose, Shew shows how we can create better narratives and more accessible futures by drawing from the insights of the cross-disability community. To forge a more equitable world, Shew argues that we must eliminate “technoableism”—the harmful belief that technology is a “solution” for disability; that the disabled simply await being “fixed” by technological wizardry; that making society more accessible and equitable is somehow a lesser priority.

This badly needed introduction to disability expertise considers mobility devices, medical infrastructure, neurodivergence, and the crucial relationship between disability and race. The future, Shew points out, is surely disabled—whether through changing climate, new diseases, or even through space travel. It’s time we looked closely at how we all think about disability technologies and learn to envision disabilities not as liabilities, but as skill sets enabling all of us to navigate a challenging world.

Review

This was a really good book – though it’s really meant for non-disabled people who don’t already know about the various issues discussed in the book. Most of the information in the book is stuff I’m already aware of as a disabled person. I wear a hearing aid and I know all too well that technology doesn’t fix everything. I’m still deaf if I don’t have them on or if the battery is running out or any number of situations. They also don’t work well in all situations because they amplify all sounds not just speech. So I’m always going to have difficulty in loud crowded situations. The book talks a lot about these kinds of situations where people assume everything can be fix with technology and that people won’t be disabled anymore. That’s not going to happen. Technology can do a lot of good things but there is a huge issue of people acting like technology can fix everything so there are no more problems for disabled people. Which results in people getting angry when people don’t use the technology.

Book Details

The book cover is green and yellow with images of various assistive technology displayed all over the over. There are wheelchairs, hearing aids, canes, crutches, wheelchair vans, medication, glasses and more. The title is written near the top left and subtitle near the bottom right with the authors name to the left.

Author’s Website
Ashley Shew
Publisher / Date
W.W. Norton, September 2023
Genre / Topics
Essays, Disability, Accessibility
Page Count
158
Completion Date
January 13, 2024

“Making It So: A Memoir” Review

Posted on by Jen

“Making It So: A Memoir” Patrick Stewart

The long-awaited memoir from iconic, beloved actor and living legend Sir Patrick Stewart!

From his acclaimed stage triumphs to his legendary onscreen work in the Star Trek and X-Men franchises, Sir Patrick Stewart has captivated audiences around the world and across multiple generations with his indelible command of stage and screen. Now, he presents his long-awaited memoir, Making It So, a revealing portrait of an artist whose astonishing life—from his humble beginnings in Yorkshire, England, to the heights of Hollywood and worldwide acclaim—proves a story as exuberant, definitive, and enduring as the author himself.

Review

This was quite an interesting read. “Star Trek: The Next Generation” has always been my favorite show since I was very young and Captain Picard my favorite of the captains.

Sir Patrick Stewart is certainly a story teller – given his background in theater it’s not really a surprise. The memoir is very detailed and heavy with a lot of information about his childhood and background. I think some might be a little frustrated that it takes most of the book to get to his Star Trek days, but it was clear he had a lot he wanted to say about his childhood and early days working in the various theaters.

Theater got him out of his situation and gave him a future so naturally that is what he wanted to talk about most. It’s also what he returned too every time in between his other work. It was also important to get through all of that to really understand how he ended up getting into Star Trek. He’d never even watched the original series, but his children had so they had to tell him what it was all about! He also talked about working on the film “Dune” and the “X-Men” movies and other films and shows.

Sir Patrick was also very honest about his childhood with his violent father who abused his mother and how that impacted him growing up, and about his own mistakes in his first and second marriages. He had a lot to get through and deal with to be who he is today.

Book Details

A head shot of Sir Patrick Stewart takes up most of the cover with his chin resting on his clasped hands. He's wearing a black suit jacket with a green shirt under it.

Author’s Website
Patrick Stewart (Instagram)
Publisher / Date
Gallery Books, October 2023
Genre
Memoir
Page Count
479
Completion
October 7, 2023