I was between books, catching up on a long article in the current New Yorker about Trump’s unpardonable abuse of pardoning power for his criminal friends and supporters when my wife arrived with this book from the William’s Court lending library. It is written by by Trump’s estranged niece who provides this already outdated, and deeply troubling warning documentary.
As she reviews the sordid history of slavery, the Jim Crow era atrocities, the unprecedented theft of Native’s lands and the political responses to these crimes, no one, not even Barack Obama, escapes from her scorn when they condone or pardon those responsible. But in a latter chapter she does describe Obama as the best president since Lincoln.
The history of white supremacy from the establishment of the republic to the present day is abundantly documented with many laws, customs, and individuals implicated in maintaining it, some overt and some covert.
The COVID-19 epidemic and the bungled Trump administration to it plays an important part in this discussion, as the book ends about April, 2021, at a time of continuing uncertainty.
I found the last couple of chapters where she continues to rant about the past of American culture but offers little concrete suggestion for how to move forward other than advocating for reparations to Black Americans, to be a bit vague.
This book is clearly outdated by the 2024 reelection of Donald Trump, something that the author seems to never have seriously considered, but must deeply regret. And it is very U.S- centric with barely any other country even mentioned.
3.5/5
The Passionate Reader 