The Unwinding
A New York TimesBestseller One of the iTunes Bookstore's "Ten Books You Must Read This Summer" A riveting examination of a nation in crisis, from one of the finest political journalists of our generation American democracy is beset by a sense of crisis. Seismic shifts during a single generation have created a country of winners and losers, allowing unprecedented freedom while rending the social contract, driving the political system to the verge of breakdown, and setting citizens adrift to find new paths forward. In The Unwinding, George Packer, author of The Assassins' Gate: America in Iraq, tells the story of the United States over the past three decades in an utterly original way, with his characteristically sharp eye for detail and gift for weaving together complex narratives. The Unwinding journeys through the lives of several Americans, including Dean Price, the son of tobacco farmers, who becomes an evangelist for a new economy in the rural South; Tammy Thomas, a factory worker in the Rust Belt trying to survive the collapse of her city; Jeff Connaughton, a Washington insider oscillating between political idealism and the lure of organized money; and Peter Thiel, a Silicon Valley billionaire who questions the Internet's significance and arrives at a radical vision of the future.
Stats for nerds
4recommend
7mentions
6people
2013–2019years
71% recommend29% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- Non-Fiction (Science)
Non-Fiction (Social)- *The Selfish Gene* by Richard Dawkins - *The Righteous Mind* by Jonathan Haidt - *Thinking, Fast and Slow* by Daniel Kahneman
Fiction- *The Art of Not Being Governed* by James C. Scott - *The Unwinding* by George Packer - *People's History of the United States* by Howard Zinn
edit: formatting- *East of Eden* by John Steinbeck - *Sometimes a Great Notion* by Ken Kesey - *The Brothers Karamazov* by Fyodor Dostoyevsky - I'm going to plug a few great non-fiction books that are easy(ish) to read and deep on content. I'm sure there are a lot more out there.
Thinking, Fast and Slow - Daniel Kahneman
Coming Into the Country - John McPhee
The Unwinding - George Packer
Anything by James C Scott (Thinking Like a State, The Art of Not Being Governed)
The Righteous Mind - John Haidt
The Selfish Gene - Richard Dawkins (Regardless of how you feel about his current public persona, this book published in 1976 is an absolute classic)
- I would also reccomend 'The Unwinding' by George Packer.
- You'd probably enjoy The Unwinding by George Packer[0].
I consider it "The Great American Non-fiction Novel".
[0] https://www.amazon.com/Unwinding-Inner-History-New-America/d...
- There's another story of a dinner with Thiel in George Packer's The Unwinding (https://www.amazon.com/Unwinding-Inner-History-New-America/d...). The vignettes about Thiel are a small but interesting part of a great book.
- Barbara Erenreich's book "Nickled and Dimed" [1] is a good illustration of how lack of cash forces the working poor to make economically sub-optimal choices.
An example will suffice: without the savings needed to put down a security deposit for an apartment, you are forced to leave in cheap motels (absent options like living with others or in a shelter), even though the monthly rate is higher. There's no kitchen in those motels and you may be working multiple jobs, which limits your ability to cook nutritious food and eat cheaply. And the cycle continues.
Some of the stories in George Packer's "The Unwinding" [2] emphasize how narrow the margin of error is. Everyone makes poor choices from time to time; those with resources (financial & social) can weather them.
[1] http://www.amazon.com/Nickel-Dimed-Not-Getting-America/dp/03... [2] http://www.amazon.com/Unwinding-Inner-History-New-America/dp...
