...That I didn't have time to post individual reviews for. Hold on, folks, this is gonna be a long one.
First up is Sharon Hays'
Flat Broke with Children, which I read for a research paper on the 1996 PRWORA legislation, commonly known as "welfare reform" in the US (yes, all of my papers were on similarly cheerful subjects). Overall, I really enjoyed it-- as much as you can enjoy a book about poor single mothers getting screwed over by judgmental, affluent male politicians and their supporters. Hays combines reviews of scholarly literature and her own long-term observations of a cohort of TANF clients in a few cities in her illuminating account of the true motives of the legislation and the effects it has had on AFDC/TANF participants.
Now, whenever I recommend books on poverty in America, I always mention this one along with Barbara Ehrenreich's
Nickel and Dimed: On not Getting By in America. Together, I think they paint a fairly accurate picture of why upward mobility in the US is so difficult.
5 out of 5 stars.
More reviews behind the jump:
War is Boring by David Axe,
The Card-Turner by Louis Sachar,
Shine by Lauren Myracle,
Bumped by Megan McCafferty,
When You are Engulfed in Flames by David Sedaris, and
The Psychopath Test by Jon Ronson.
