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Black Spartacus: The Epic Life of Toussaint Louverture

David A Bell The Guardian
A gripping biography of the leader of the slave revolt that led to Haiti’s independence, described as ‘the first black superhero of the modern age, the work under review promises to be the definitive study of the epocal revolutionary figure.

True Crimes

Ron Elving NPR
Reviewer Elving describes this book as "a condensation of the best evidence against the presidency and character of Donald Trump, a summation offered up much as a prosecutor would do in seeking to sway a jury."

Can We Unlearn Imperialism?

Stephen Sheehi Hyperallergic
This book uses the history of photography and the history of imperialism to shed light on both the work of images and on the work of colonial and imperial domination.

Walking the Tightrope: Latin America’s Pink Tide

Frederick B. Mills New Politics
The lessons of the Pink Tide of leftist and leftish governments in Latin America that marked much of the period following 1998 but were undone by rightist movements, US meddling, world economic crisis and internal weaknesses are aptly told....

Why Caste? And Why Now?

Zillah Eisenstein Portside
Wilkerson, in this new book, asks us to rethink our current discourse on race. Reviewer Eisenstein is skeptical, and finds the book's argument unconvincing.

An Interview with Karl Marx

John Swinton People's World
Labor journalist John Swinton visited the Marx family on vacation in Southern England and wrote this dispatch showing Marx in his last years - no less astute, productive and committed to the class struggle than at any time in his adult life.

A Darker View of the Renaissance

John T. Scott Los Angeles Review of Books
A reviewer's respectful, if somewhat critical, look at a new book on the Italian Renaissance that seeks to contextualize that movement within the broader sweep of history and within the social conflicts of its time.

Red Legacies

Michael Terry Brooklyn Rail
This book, first published in 2011, remains useful in this time of renewed popularity for socialist ideas. As reviewer Terry pointed out when the book was first published, it is an informative treatment of its topic, despite its weaknesses.

How to Save the World from Financialization

Gregory N. Heires Portside
Long before the 2008 financial collapse rocketing, debt and financial wizardry masked the deep underlying fragility of finance-led growth, with wages and productivity stagnating, inequality exploding and ecological systems teetering.