For Book Reviews
If you would like to write a book review, please send your request with the following information to the editors: houstonreviewofbooks@gmail.com
- Your name, email, postal address, and phone number (often a requirement from publishers).
- A short biography.
- Book(s) that you would like to review. We recommend books that are drawn from our list of recent books of review (below) but we are willing to consider older books if the reviewer provides a fresh perspective or analysis. Please include publication details if possible.
Guidelines for Reviewers
- The review should provide an account of the book as a whole, not just of one part or aspect. It should include a brief overall characterization of the book so that readers can tell quickly if they are interested in reading the entire review.
- The review should situate the book in contemporary debates, discussions, or fields so that uninitiated readers can find their way about.
- It should give an evaluation of at least some key aspects of the book and not merely provide a summary. Make sure to give reasons for evaluations, particularly negative ones.
- The review should be between 1,500-2,000 words.
- Finally, we expect reviewers to utilize the Chicago manual of style (see above).
List of Recommended Books for Review
Shahidul Alam
The Tide Will Turn
Steidl, 2020
Tariq Ali
Street Fighting Years: An Autobiography of the Sixties
Verso, 2018
Tariq Ali
Uprising in Pakistan: How to Bring Down a Dictatorship
Verso, 2018
Pouya Alimagham
Contesting the Iranian Revolution: The Green Uprisings
Cambridge University Press, 2020
Cinzia Arruzza, Tithi Bhattacharya, & Nancy Fraser
Feminism for the 99%: A Manifesto
Verso, 2019
Alain Badiou & Peter Engelmann
For a Politics of the Common Good
Polity Press, 2019
Alain Badiou
Can Politics be Thought?
Duke University Press, 2019
Alain Badiou
Happiness
Bloomsbury Academic, 2019
Alain Badiou
Lacan: Anti-Philosophy 3
Columbia University Press, 2018
Alain Badiou
Malebranche
Columbia University Press, 2019
Greg Beckett
There is No More Haiti: Between Life and Death in Port-au-Prince
University of California Press, 2020
John Bellamy Foster
The Return of Nature: Socialism and Ecology
Monthly Review Press, 2020
John Bellamy Foster
The Robbery of Nature: Capitalism and the Ecological Rift
Monthly Review Press, 2019
Vincent Bevins
The Jakarta Method: Washington’s Anticommunist Crusade and the Mass Murder Program that Shaped Our World
Public Affairs, 2020
Tithi Bhattacharya
Social Reproduction Theory: Remapping Class, Recentring Oppression
Pluto Press, 2018
Max Blumenthal
The Management of Savagery: How America’s National Security State Fueled the Rise of Al Qaeda, ISIS, and Donald Trump
Verso, 2019
Kasper Brasken, Nigel Kopsey, & David J. Featherstone (Editors)
Anti-Fascism in a Global Perspective: Transnational Networks, Exile Communities, and Radical Internationalism
Routledge, 2020
Nicholas Brown
Autonomy: The Social Ontology of Art under Capitalism
Duke University Press, 2019
Shujaat Bukhari
The Dirty War in Kashmir: Frontline Reports
LeftWord Press, 2018
Douglas Burnham & Peter Lamb
The First Marx: A Philosophical Introduction
Bloomsbury Academic, 2018
Jean Casimir
The Haitians: A Decolonial History
Duke University Press, 2020
Antonia Castaneda & Clara Lomas
Writing/Righting History: Twenty-Five Years of Recovering the US Hispanic Literary Heritage
Arte Publico Press, 2019
George Ciccariello-Maher
We Created Chavez: A People’s History of the Venezuelan Revolution
Duke University Press, 2013
George Ciccariello-Maher
Building the Commune: Radical Democracy in Venezuela
Verso, 2016
George Ciccariello-Maher
Decolonizing Dialectics
Duke University Press, 2017
George Ciccariello-Maher
A World Without Police: How Strong Communities Can Make Cops Obsolete
Verso, 2021
Carlos Cisneros
The Paper Lawyer
Arte Publico Press, 2019
Paul Cockshott
How the World Works: The Story of Human Labor from Prehistory to the Modern Day
Monthly Review Press, 2019
Mike Davis
Old Gods, New Enigmas: Marx’s Lost Theory
Verso, 2018
Mike Davis and John Wiener
Set the Night on Fire
Verso, 2020
Jodi Dean
Comrade: An Essay on Political Belonging
Verso, 2019
Ariel Dorfman
How to Read Donald Duck: Imperialist Ideology in the Disney Comic
Pluto Press, 2020
Susana Draper
1968 Mexico: Constellations of Freedom and Democracy
Duke University Press, 2018
Kevin Duong
The Virtues of Violence: Democracy Against Disintegration in Modern France
Oxford University Press, 2020
Max Elbaum
Revolution in the Air: Sixties Radicals Turn to Lenin, Mao and Che
Verso, 2018 (Originally published in 2002)
Rachel Elfenbein
Engendering Revolution: Women, Unpaid Labor, and Maternalism in Bolivarian Venezuela
University of Texas Press, 2019
Noura Erakat
Justice for Some: Law and the Question of Palestine
Stanford University Press, 2019
Michael R. Fischbach
Black Power and Palestine: Transnational Countries of Color
Stanford University Press, 2018
Elisabeth Jay Friedman
Seeking Rights from the Left: Gender, Sexuality and the Latin American Pink Tide
Duke University Press, 2019
Veronica Gago
Neoliberalism from Below: Popular Pragmatics and Baroque Economies
Duke University Press, 2017
Yolanda Gallardo
The Glass Eye
Arte Publico Press, 2019
Subhash Gatade
Modinama: Issues That Did Not Matter
LeftWord Press, 2019
Tom Gatehouse (Ed.)
Voices of Latin America: Social Movements and the New Activism
Monthly Review Press, 2019
Norah A.L. Gharala
Taxing Blackness: Free Afromexican Tribute in Bourbon New Spain
University of Alabama Press, 2019
Kristen R. Ghodsee
Red Hangover: Legacies of Twentieth-Century Communism
Duke University Press, 2017
Chris Gilbert and Cira Pascual Marquina
Venezuela, the Present as Struggle: Voices from the Bolivarian Revolution
Monthly Review Press, 2021
Alexey Golubev
The Things of Life: Materiality in Late Soviet Russia
Cornell University Press, 2020
Mark Goodale
A Revolution in Fragments: Traversing Scales of Justice Ideology, and Practice in Bolivia
Duke University Press, 2019
Victor Grossman
A Socialist Defector: From Harvard to Karl-Marx-Allee
Monthly Review Press, 2019
Laure Guirguis
The Arab Lefts: Histories and Legacies, 1950s-1970s
Edinburgh University Press, 2020
Max Haiven
Revenge Capitalism: The Ghosts of Empire, the Demons of Capital, and the Settling of Unpayable Debts
Pluto Press, 2020
Marta Harnecker & Jose Bartolome (Editors)
Planning from Below: A Decentralized Participatory Planning Proposal
Monthly Review Press, 2019
Michael Heinrich
Karl Marx and the Birth of Modern Society: The Life of Marx and the Development of His Work (Volume I: 1818-1841)
Monthly Review Press, 2019
Gerald Horne
Facing the Rising Sun: African Americans, Japan, and the Rise of Afro-Asian Solidarity
NYU Press, 2018
Gerald Horne
The Apocalypse of Settler Colonialism: The Roots of Slavery, White Supremacy, and Capitalism in 17th Century North America and the Caribbean
Monthly Review Press, 2018
Gerald Horne
Jazz and Justice: Racism and the Political Economy of the Music
Monthly Review Press, 2019
Gerald Horne
White Supremacy Confronted: U.S. Imperialism and Anti-Communism vs. the Liberation of Southern Africa from Rhodes to Mandela
International Publishers, 2019
Fredric Jameson
The Benjamin Files
Verso, 2020
Fredric Jameson
Allegory and Ideology
Verso, 2019
Mark Jay & Philip Conklin
A People′s History of Detroit
Duke University Press, 2020
Ola Johansson & Johanna Wallin (Editors)
The Freedom Theatre: Performing Cultural Resistance in Palestine
LeftWord Press, 2018
Michael Joseph Roberto
The Coming of the American Behemoth: The Origins of Fascism in the United States, 1920–1940
Monthly Review Press, 2018
Manu Karuka
Empire’s Tracks: Indigenous Nations, Chinese Workers, and the Transcontinental Railroad
University of California Press, 2019
Manu Karuka & Jordan T. Camp (Ed.)
Futures Held Hostage: Confronting US Hybrid Wars and Sanctions in Venezuela
Pluto Press, 2020
Raosaheb Kasbe
Decoding the RSS: Its Tradition and Politics
LeftWord Press, 2019
Margaret Kimberly
Prejudential: Black America and the Presidents
Truth to Power Press, 2020
Naomi Klein
On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal
Simon & Schuster, 2019
Naomi Klein
The Battle For Paradise
Haymarket Books, 2018
Alexandra Kollantai
The Soviet Woman: Selected Essays
LeftWord Press, 2017
Miroslav Krleža & Željko Cipriš
Harbors Rich with Ships: The Selected Revolutionary Writings of Miroslav Krleža, Radical Luminary of Modern World Literature
Monthly Review Press, 2017
Costas Lapavitsas
Marxist Monetary Theory: Collected Papers
Haymarket Books, 2018
Marc James Leger
Vanguardia: Socially Engaged Art and Theory
Manchester University Press, 2019
Tatiana Linkhoeva
Revolution Goes East: Imperial Japan and Soviet Communism
Cornell University Press, 2020
Loren D. Lybarger
Palestinian Chicago: Identity in Exile
University of California Press, 2020
Fred Magdoff & Chris Williams
Creating an Ecological Society: Toward a Revolutionary Transformation
Monthly Review Press, 2017
Usama Makdisi
Age of Coexistence: The Ecumenical Frame and the Making of the Modern Arab World
University of California Press, 2019
Carlos Martinez
The End of the Beginning: Lessons of the Soviet Collapse
LeftWord Press, 2018
David McNally
Blood and Money: War, Slavery, and the State
Haymarket Books, 2020
René Zavaleta Mercado
Towards a History of the National-Popular in Bolivia
Seagull Books, 2018
Natalia Milanesio
Destape: Sex, Democracy, and Freedom in Postdictatorial Argentina
University of Pittsburgh Press, 2019
Charles W. Mills
Black Rights/White Wrongs: The Critique of Racial Liberalism
Oxford University Press, 2017
Massimo Modonesi
The Antagonistic Principle: Marxism and Political Action
Haymarket Press, 2019
Elaine Mokhtefi
Algiers, Third World Capital: Freedom Fighters, Revolutionaries, Black Panthers
Verso, 2018
Jean Moufawad-Paul & Benjanun Sriduangkaew
Methods Devour Themselves: A Conversation
Zero Books, 2018
A.G. Noorani
The RSS: A Menace to India
LeftWord Press, 2019
Utsa Patnaik and Prabhat Patnaik
Capital and Imperialism: Theory, History and the Present
Monthly Review Press, 2021
Vijay Prashad (Editor)
Strongmen: Trump-Modi-Erdogan-Duterte
LeftWord Press, 2018
Nicola Pratt
Embodying Geopolitics: Generations of Women’s Activism in Egypt, Jordan, and Lebanon
University of California Press, 2020
Nicos Poulantzas
Fascism and Dictatorship: The Third International and the Problem of Fascism
Verso, 2018 (Originally published in 1970)
Nayrouz Qarmout
The Sea Cloak & Other Stories
Comma Press, 2019
Uzma Quraishi
Redefining the Immigrant South: Indian and Pakistani Immigration to Houston during the Cold War
University of North Carolina Press, 2020
David Rainbow
Ideologies of Race: Imperial Russia and the Soviet Union in Global Context
McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2019
Anjuli Raza Kolb
Epidemic Empire: Colonialism, Contagion, and Terror 1817-2020
University of Chicago Press, 2021
Ben Reynolds
The Coming Revolution: Capitalism in the 21st Century
Zero books, 2018
Thea Riofrancos
Resource Radicals: From Petro-Nationalism to Post-Extractivism in Ecuador
Duke University Press, 2020
Walter Rodney
1917: The Russian Revolution
Verso, 2018
Walter Rodney
Decolonial Marxism: Essays from the Pan-African Revolution
Verso, 2021
Arundhati Roy
The Ministry of Utmost Happiness
Random House, 2017
Arundhati Roy
My Seditious Heart: Collected Nonfiction
Haymarket Books, 2019
Claudia Rueda
Students of Revolution: Youth, Protest, and Coalition Building in Somoza-Era Nicaragua
University of Texas Press, 2019
Alfredo Saad-Filho
Brazil: Neoliberalism versus Social Democracy
Pluto Press, 2018
Sara Salem
Anticolonial Afterlives in Egypt: The Politics of Hegemony
Cambridge University Press, 2020
Naomi Schiller
Channeling the State: Community Media and Popular Politics in Venezuela
Duke University Press, 2018
Helena Sheehan
Navigating the Zeitgeist: A Story of the Cold War, the New Left, Irish Republicanism, and International Communism
Monthly Review Press, 2019
Helena Sheehan
The Syriza Wave: Surging and Crashing with the Greek Left
Monthly Review Press, 2017
Kyle Shelton
Power Moves: Transportation, Politics, and Development in Houston
University of Texas Press, 2018
Greg Shupak
The Wrong Story: Palestine, Israel and the Media
OR Books, 2021
Luiz Inacio Lula Da Silva
Truth Will Prevail: Why I Have Been Condemned
LeftWord Press, 2018
Steven Stoll
Ramp Hollow: The Ordeal of Appalachia
Hill & Wang, 2017
Darko Suvin
Splendour, Misery, and Possibilities: An X-Ray of Socialist Yugoslavia
Haymarket Books, 2018
Christopher Taylor
Empire of Neglect: The West Indies in the Wake of British Liberalism
Duke University Press, 2018
Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor
Race for Profit: How Banks and the Real Estate Industry Undermined Black Homeownership
University of North Carolina Press, 2019
Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor
How We Get Free: Black Feminism and the Combahee River Collective
Haymarket Books, 2017
Gardner Thompson
Legacy of Empire: Britain, Zionism and the Creation of Israel
Saqi Books, 2019
Stephanie J. Urdang
Mapping My Way Home: Activism, Nostalgia, and the Downfall of Apartheid South Africa
Monthly Review Press, 2017
Yanis Varoufakis
Adults in the Room: My Battle with Europe’s Deep Establishment
Vintage, 2018
Alejandro Velasco
Barrio Rising: Urban Popular Politics and the Making of Modern Venezuela
University of California Press, 2015
Lorella Ventura
Hegel in the Arab World: Modernity, Colonialism, and Freedom
Palgrave Macmillan, 2018
Alex S. Vitale
The End of Policing
Verso, 2018
Laurel Westbrook
Unlivable Lives: Violence and Identity in Transgender Activism
University of California Press, 2020
Fred A. Wilcox
Shamrocks and Oil Slicks: A People’s Uprising Against Shell Oil in County Mayo, Ireland
Monthly Review Press, 2019
Zhun Xu
From Commune to Capitalism: How China’s Peasants Lost Collective Farming and Gained Urban Poverty
Monthly Review Press, 2018
Helen Yaffe
We Are Cuba!: How a Revolutionary People Have Survived in a Post-Soviet World
Yale University Press, 2020
Naoki Yamamoto
Dialectics without Synthesis: Japanese Film Theory and Realism in a Global Frame
University of California Press, 2020
Nadia Yaqub
Palestinian Cinema in the Days of Revolution
University of Texas Press, 2018
Okbazghi Yohannes
The Biofuels Deception: Going Hungry on the Green Carbon Diet
Monthly Review Press, 2018
Kevin Young
Blood of the Earth: Resource Nationalism, Revolution, and Empire in Bolivia
University of Texas Press, 2017
Alenka Zupančič
What is Sex?
MIT Press, 2017
Houston Review Of Books 