Book Review |

Book convincing on the need for peace, but not on the promise of Biden

Recovery: Peace prospects in the Biden era (2020) Author: Douglas Roche Publisher: Khalid Yaqub Reviewed by Ed Lehman Douglas Roche’s latest book contains a lot of valuable information and could be an important stimulus to [...]

An exploration of Maoism and its continuing allure

Maoism: A Global History 2019 Author: Julia Lovell Publisher: Penguin Random House Reviewed by Brian W. Major Julia Lovell’s book is a detailed study of the history, impact, appeal and legacy of Mao Zedong and Maoism globally. [...]

“A confession from the profession”

Presstitutes: Embedded in the Pay of the CIA Author: Udo Ulfkotte Publisher: Progressive Press, 2019 Review by Tim Pelzer It is well documented that the CIA uses the media to spread disinformation. After 1945, in what is known as [...]

Trauma and damage placed alongside hope and resistance

Until We are Free: Reflections on Black Lives Matter in Canada 2019 Edited by Rodney Diverlus, Sandy Hudson and Syrus Marcus Ware University of Regina Press Review by Helen Kennedy White supremacy and colonialism aim to erase the [...]

Sweeping history of the Métis Nation

The North-West Is Our Mother 2019 Jean Teillet Harper Collins Review by Kimball Cariou The development of nations often takes millennia, or at least centuries, a complicated process of forging a common language, culture, history and [...]

A labour of love from a lover of labour

A Worker’s Friend Peter Marcus 2019 Granville Island Publishing “Poetry is a reflection of the society in which we live and its past and its political future,” writes Peter Marcus in the introduction to his book of poetry, A Worker’s [...]

From smallpox to COVID-19 – epidemics and Indigenous peoples

Clearing the Plains: Disease, Politics of Starvation and the Loss of Aboriginal Life (2013) Author: James Daschuk Publisher: University of Regina Press Review by Kimball Cariou What economic system extends its reach across entire [...]

Breaking down anti-Communist caricatures, book reveals a man who grasped the nature of world-wide class struggle

Norman Bethune in Spain: Commitment, Crisis and Conspiracy (2013) Author: David Lethbridge Publisher: Sussex Academic Press Few figures in Canadian history remain as popular as Norman Bethune. This despite a plethora of books, films and [...]

A passionate and entertaining account of GDR socialism

A Socialist Defector: from Harvard to Karl-Marx-Allee Author: Victor Grossman Publisher: Monthly Review Press, 2019 Thirty one years ago the Berlin Wall came down and the working class in the German Democratic Republic (GDR), or East [...]

Michael Palin: From Monty Python to Pyongyang

North Korea Journal (2019) Michael Palin Many readers might know Michael Palin as part of the Monty Python comedy troupe. His comedic antics were hilarious, and his work has been shown around the world. In later years he also became a [...]