What We Are Reading Today: The Light that Failed

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Updated 13 March 2022
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What We Are Reading Today: The Light that Failed

Authors: Ivan Krastev and Stephen Holmes

In the early 1990s, hopes for the eastward spread of liberal democracy were high. And yet the transformation of Eastern European countries gave rise to a bitter repudiation of liberalism itself, not only there but also back in the heartland of the West.

In this work of political psychology, Ivan Krastev and Stephen Holmes argue that the supposed end of history turned out to be only the beginning of an Age of Imitation.

Reckoning with the history of the last thirty years, they show that the most powerful force behind the wave of populist xenophobia that began in Eastern Europe stems from resentment at the post-1989 imperative to become Westernized. according to a review on goodreads.com.

Through this prism, the Trump revolution represents an ironic fulfilment of the promise that the nations exiting from communist rule would come to resemble the US.


What We Are Reading Today: ‘Dark Matter’

Updated 24 August 2025
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What We Are Reading Today: ‘Dark Matter’

Authors: David J.E. Marsh, David Ellis, and Viraf M. Mehta

This book provides an incisive, self-contained introduction to one of the most intriguing subjects in modern physics, presenting the evidence we have from astrophysics for the existence of dark matter, the theories for what it could be, and the cutting-edge experimental and observational methods for testing them.

It begins with a survey of the astrophysical phenomena, from rotation curves to lensing and cosmological structure formation.

The book explains the constraints on each theory, such as direct detection and indirect astrophysical limits.


What We Are Reading Today: Birds of Belize

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Updated 23 August 2025
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What We Are Reading Today: Birds of Belize

  • It covers all regularly occurring bird species found in the region and features facing-page plates and text that make field identification easy

Authors: STEVE N. G. HOWELL AND DALE DYER 

Belize is one of the world’s premier birding destinations, home to a marvelous array of tropical birds and beautiful habitats ranging from verdant rain forests and extensive wetlands to rolling pine savannas and the country’s famed barrier reef.

“Birds of Belize” is the essential illustrated pocket guide to this birder’s paradise.

It covers all regularly occurring bird species found in the region and features facing-page plates and text that make field identification easy. 

 


What We Are Reading Today: Feeding Gotham

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Updated 23 August 2025
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What We Are Reading Today: Feeding Gotham

  • A masterful blend of economic, social, and geographic history, “Feeding Gotham” traces how a highly fragmented geography of food access became a defining and enduring feature of the American city

Author: Gergely Baics

New York City witnessed unparalleled growth in the first half of the 19th century, its population rising from thirty thousand to nearly a million in a matter of decades.

“Feeding Gotham” looks at how America’s first metropolis grappled with the challenge of provisioning its inhabitants. It tells the story of how access to food, once a public good, became a private matter left to free and unregulated markets—and of the profound consequences this had for American living standards and urban development. 

Taking readers from the early republic to the Civil War, Gergely Baics explores the changing dynamics of urban government, market forces, and the built environment that defined New Yorkers’ experiences of supplying their households.

A masterful blend of economic, social, and geographic history, “Feeding Gotham” traces how a highly fragmented geography of food access became a defining and enduring feature of the American city.

 


What We Are Reading Today: Horses by Ludovic Orlando

Updated 21 August 2025
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What We Are Reading Today: Horses by Ludovic Orlando


What We Are Reading Today: Three Revolutions by Simon Hall

Updated 20 August 2025
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What We Are Reading Today: Three Revolutions by Simon Hall

Simon Hall’s “Three Revolutions” tells together for the first time Lenin’s 1917 return to Russia, Mao’s ‘Long March’ of 1934-35 and Fidel Castro’s return to Cuba in 1956.

Told in tandem with these are the corresponding journeys of three  journalists - John Reed, Edgar Snow and Herbert L. Matthews - whose electric testimonies from the frontlines would make a decisive contribution to how these revolutions were understood in the wider world.