Wildland: The Making of America's Fury
(Libby/OverDrive eBook, Kindle)

Book Cover
Average Rating
Contributors
Osnos, Evan Author
Published
Farrar, Straus and Giroux , 2021.
Status
Available from Libby/OverDrive

Available Platforms

Libby/OverDrive
Titles may be read via Libby/OverDrive. Libby/OverDrive is a free app that allows users to borrow and read digital media from their local library, including ebooks, audiobooks, and magazines. Users can access Libby/OverDrive through the Libby/OverDrive app or online. The app is available for Android and iOS devices.
Kindle
Titles may be read using Kindle devices or with the Kindle app.

Description

INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERAfter a decade abroad, the National Book Award and Pulitzer Prizewinning writer Evan Osnos returns to three places he has lived in the United States—Greenwich, CT; Clarksburg, WV; and Chicago, IL—to illuminate the origins of America’s political fury.Evan Osnos moved to Washington, D.C., in 2013 after a decade away from the United States, first reporting from the Middle East before becoming the Beijing bureau chief at the Chicago Tribune and then the China correspondent for The New Yorker. While abroad, he often found himself making a case for America, urging the citizens of Egypt, Iraq, or China to trust that even though America had made grave mistakes throughout its history, it aspired to some foundational moral commitments: the rule of law, the power of truth, the right of equal opportunity for all. But when he returned to the United States, he found each of these principles under assault.In search of an explanation for the crisis that reached an unsettling crescendo in 2020—a year of pandemic, civil unrest, and political turmoil—he focused on three places he knew firsthand: Greenwich, Connecticut; Clarksburg, West Virginia; and Chicago, Illinois. Reported over the course of six years, Wildland follows ordinary individuals as they navigate the varied landscapes of twenty-first-century America. Through their powerful, often poignant stories, Osnos traces the sources of America’s political dissolution. He finds answers in the rightward shift of the financial elite in Greenwich, in the collapse of social infrastructure and possibility in Clarksburg, and in the compounded effects of segregation and violence in Chicago. The truth about the state of the nation may be found not in the slogans of political leaders but in the intricate details of individual lives, and in the hidden connections between them. As Wildland weaves in and out of these personal stories, events in Washington occasionally intrude, like flames licking up on the horizon.A dramatic, prescient examination of seismic changes in American politics and culture, Wildland is the story of a crucible, a period bounded by two shocks to America’s psyche, two assaults on the country’s sense of itself: the attacks of September 11 in 2001 and the storming of the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. Following the lives of everyday Americans in three cities and across two decades, Osnos illuminates the country in a startling light, revealing how we lost the moral confidence to see ourselves as larger than the sum of our parts.

More Details

Format
eBook
Street Date
09/14/2021
Language
English
ISBN
9780374720735

Discover More

Author Notes

Loading Author Notes...

Similar Titles From NoveList

NoveList provides detailed suggestions for titles you might like if you enjoyed this book. Suggestions are based on recommendations from librarians and other contributors.
These books have the appeal factors incisive, concise, and issue-oriented, and they have the genre "impartial writing"; and the subjects "identity," "political culture," and "political science."
These books have the genre "politics and global affairs -- general"; and the subjects "inequality," "polarization (social sciences)," and "american dream."
These books have the appeal factors incisive and sweeping, and they have the genres "impartial writing" and "politics and global affairs -- general"; and the subjects "polarization (social sciences)," "political culture," and "politics and government."
These incisive looks at American political culture examine the history and roots of polarization in the United States and the ways in which the left-right divide has exploded in American social and political life. -- Michael Jenkins
These books have the appeal factors hopeful, and they have the genres "impartial writing" and "politics and global affairs -- general"; and the subjects "polarization (social sciences)," "political culture," and "public opinion."
These books have the genre "impartial writing"; and the subjects "polarization (social sciences)," "political culture," and "politics and government."
By surveying three distinct American communities (Wildland) and closely following the life of a war veteran (American Dreamer), these compellingly written books offer insight into the polarized state of American culture. -- Basia Wilson
These books have the appeal factors serious and well-researched, and they have the genre "impartial writing"; and the subjects "economics," "inequality," and "politics and government."
These thought-provoking books delve into recent history and contemporary American politics to examine the country's current polarization. Polarized is more purely analytical, while Wildland contains many specific examples of the political climate around the country. -- Michael Shumate
These books have the appeal factors incisive and issue-oriented, and they have the subjects "inequality," "political culture," and "politics and government."
These books have the appeal factors incisive, and they have the genres "impartial writing" and "society and culture -- urban and regional studies"; and the subjects "polarization (social sciences)," "political culture," and "public opinion."
Where Wildland delves into the roots of American dissolution, The Upswing offers another possibility: rebuilding American unity. Both are impartial, well-researched looks at American political culture and polarization. -- Michael Jenkins

Similar Authors From NoveList

NoveList provides detailed suggestions for other authors you might want to read if you enjoyed this book. Suggestions are based on recommendations from librarians and other contributors.
These authors' works have the genres "politics and global affairs" and "impartial writing"; and the subjects "populism," "politicians," and "political science."
These authors' works have the appeal factors scholarly, and they have the genres "politics and global affairs" and "impartial writing"; and the subject "political leadership."
These authors' works have the appeal factors well-researched, and they have the genres "politics and global affairs" and "impartial writing"; and the subject "politics and government."
These authors' works have the genres "politics and global affairs" and "conservative writing"; and the subjects "politics and government," "politics and culture," and "political science."
These authors' works have the appeal factors persuasive, and they have the genres "politics and global affairs" and "impartial writing"; and the subjects "individualism" and "social change."
These authors' works have the appeal factors well-researched and comprehensive, and they have the genres "politics and global affairs" and "impartial writing"; and the subject "politics and government."
These authors' works have the genre "politics and global affairs"; and the subjects "economic development" and "social change."
These authors' works have the genre "politics and global affairs"; and the subjects "politics and government" and "politics and culture."
These authors' works have the genres "politics and global affairs" and "impartial writing"; and the subjects "politics and government," "social change," and "presidential candidates."
These authors' works have the genres "biographies" and "politics and global affairs"; and the subjects "politics and government," "political science," and "politicians."
These authors' works have the subjects "authoritarianism," "political leadership," and "dictatorship."
These authors' works have the genres "politics and global affairs" and "impartial writing"; and the subjects "authoritarianism," "social change," and "populism."

Published Reviews

Publisher's Weekly Review

Inequalities of wealth, class, and culture are tearing the country apart, according to this incisive panorama of America's discontents. New Yorker writer Osnos (Joe Biden) conducts a loose survey of socio-politics from 9/11 to the January 6 Capitol riot, grounded in journalistic portraits of three places where he's lived: Greenwich, Conn., where corrupt Wall Street plutocrats live on the profits from hollowing out the heartland's economy; Clarksburg, W.Va., in an Appalachia floundering in opioid abuse and Trumpian white identity politics; and Chicago, where the South and West sides are awash in poverty and gang violence, a world away from that city's glittering downtown. These locales represent, Osnos contends, a country fragmented by mutual incomprehension, conspiracy theories, and a "combat mindset," where people have "lost their vision for the common good." Osnos vividly sketches hedge-fund managers, ex-cons, Barack Obama, and white nationalist Richard Spencer, among others, and encapsulates worldviews in elegant, pithy prose. ("You could hone every edge of your family's life--from your life expectancy to your tax avoidance to your child's performance on the SATs," he writes of the Greenwich gentry.) The result is an engrossing and revealing look at how deeply connected yet far apart Americans are. Agent: Jennifer Joel, ICM Partners. (Sept.)

(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Powered by Syndetics

Library Journal Review

New Yorker writer Osnos (Age of Ambition) uses the metaphor of "wildland" (a firefighting term for tinder-ready territory) to describe the buildup of economic, political, and social resentments that ignited three disparate communities where he has lived--Greenwich, CT; Clarksburg, WV; and Chicago--between 9/11/01 and the Capitol Insurrection of 1/6/21. In a personal, somewhat autobiographical account intended for concerned Americans, Osnos considers the dissimilitude among residents, which he memorably presents in vignettes illustrating differences in credulousness (of the media and politicians); feelings of safety; and expectations of intergenerational mobility and the American Dream. The author dissects the widening socioeconomic chasms between Greenwich (with its several hedge funds and financial services firms), the economically declining Clarksburg (which is navigating the opioid epidemic), and Chicago (whose neighborhoods are alternately experiencing blight or gentrification). Osnos relies on extensive research in social sciences and history, archival records, local newspaper articles, and numerous interviews. VERDICT This cogently written book is a useful review of intertwined events in the early 21st-century United States.--Frederick J. Augustyn Jr., Lib. of Congress, Washington, DC

(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Powered by Syndetics

Kirkus Book Review

The National Book Award--winning journalist examines the ideological gaps that have widened between 9/11 and the Jan. 6, 2021 assault on the U.S. Capitol. After years of reporting from China, the longtime New Yorker staffer returned to find that America had lost its gift for "the rational approach, reason, the meeting of minds in honorable agreement after open argument" that John Gunther described in his 1947 bestseller, Inside U.S.A. "If American history is a story of constant rebalancing--between greed and generosity, industry and nature, identity and assimilation--then the country had spun so far out of balance it had lost its center of gravity," writes Osnos. He explores how it happened through stellar reporting that blends a high-altitude view of national changes with close-ups of private citizens in three places he's lived in the U.S. Osnos is at his best in his superb portrait of Greenwich, Connecticut, where he grew up in the "Golden Triangle" that "represented the highest concentration of wealth in America" and where values shifted along with an influx of hedge fund money. Greenwich grandees once included people like Prescott Bush, the father and grandfather of future presidents, "who believed, fundamentally, in the duty of government to help people who did not enjoy his considerable advantages." Conversely, the current generation tends to see its wealth as self-justifying and to prefer "targeted private philanthropy" to activities like serving on "local charity boards." Osnos is slightly less insightful about Chicago, where Black residents have felt stung by the gap between their Obama-era hopes and the persistence of bigotry, and West Virginia, where predatory tactics by so-called vulture investors and others have robbed mineworkers of precious benefits. Other recent books have dealt more astutely with some of his subjects--Chris McGreal's American Overdose with West Virginia's opioid epidemic and John Woodrow Cox's Children Under Fire with gun violence--but as an overview of a fractious ideological landscape, this skillful treatment is hard to beat. An elegant survey of the causes and effects of polarization in America. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Powered by Syndetics

Library Journal Reviews

A New Yorker staffer who wrote the National Book Award—winning and Pulitzer Prize finalist Age of Ambition and the internationally best-selling Joe Biden in his spare time, Osnos revisits places he has lived—Greenwich, CT; Clarksburg, WV; and Chicago, IL—to find out why Americans are so angry. In the end, he delivers six years' worth of stories from everyday individuals. With a 100,000-copy first printing.

Copyright 2021 Library Journal.

Copyright 2021 Library Journal.
Powered by Content Cafe

Library Journal Reviews

New Yorker writer Osnos (Age of Ambition) uses the metaphor of "wildland" (a firefighting term for tinder-ready territory) to describe the buildup of economic, political, and social resentments that ignited three disparate communities where he has lived—Greenwich, CT; Clarksburg, WV; and Chicago—between 9/11/01 and the Capitol Insurrection of 1/6/21. In a personal, somewhat autobiographical account intended for concerned Americans, Osnos considers the dissimilitude among residents, which he memorably presents in vignettes illustrating differences in credulousness (of the media and politicians); feelings of safety; and expectations of intergenerational mobility and the American Dream. The author dissects the widening socioeconomic chasms between Greenwich (with its several hedge funds and financial services firms), the economically declining Clarksburg (which is navigating the opioid epidemic), and Chicago (whose neighborhoods are alternately experiencing blight or gentrification). Osnos relies on extensive research in social sciences and history, archival records, local newspaper articles, and numerous interviews. VERDICT This cogently written book is a useful review of intertwined events in the early 21st-century United States.—Frederick J. Augustyn Jr., Lib. of Congress, Washington, DC

Copyright 2021 Library Journal.

Copyright 2021 Library Journal.
Powered by Content Cafe

Publishers Weekly Reviews

Inequalities of wealth, class, and culture are tearing the country apart, according to this incisive panorama of America's discontents. New Yorker writer Osnos (Joe Biden) conducts a loose survey of socio-politics from 9/11 to the January 6 Capitol riot, grounded in journalistic portraits of three places where he's lived: Greenwich, Conn., where corrupt Wall Street plutocrats live on the profits from hollowing out the heartland's economy; Clarksburg, W.Va., in an Appalachia floundering in opioid abuse and Trumpian white identity politics; and Chicago, where the South and West sides are awash in poverty and gang violence, a world away from that city's glittering downtown. These locales represent, Osnos contends, a country fragmented by mutual incomprehension, conspiracy theories, and a "combat mindset," where people have "lost their vision for the common good." Osnos vividly sketches hedge-fund managers, ex-cons, Barack Obama, and white nationalist Richard Spencer, among others, and encapsulates worldviews in elegant, pithy prose. ("You could hone every edge of your family's life—from your life expectancy to your tax avoidance to your child's performance on the SATs," he writes of the Greenwich gentry.) The result is an engrossing and revealing look at how deeply connected yet far apart Americans are. Agent: Jennifer Joel, ICM Partners. (Sept.)

Copyright 2021 Publishers Weekly.

Copyright 2021 Publishers Weekly.
Powered by Content Cafe

Reviews from GoodReads

Loading GoodReads Reviews.

Citations

APA Citation, 7th Edition (style guide)

Osnos, E. (2021). Wildland: The Making of America's Fury . Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

Chicago / Turabian - Author Date Citation, 17th Edition (style guide)

Osnos, Evan. 2021. Wildland: The Making of America's Fury. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

Chicago / Turabian - Humanities (Notes and Bibliography) Citation, 17th Edition (style guide)

Osnos, Evan. Wildland: The Making of America's Fury Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2021.

Harvard Citation (style guide)

Osnos, E. (2021). Wildland: the making of america's fury. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

MLA Citation, 9th Edition (style guide)

Osnos, Evan. Wildland: The Making of America's Fury Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2021.

Note! Citations contain only title, author, edition, publisher, and year published. Citations should be used as a guideline and should be double checked for accuracy. Citation formats are based on standards as of August 2021.

Copy Details

CollectionOwnedAvailableNumber of Holds
Libby110

Staff View

Loading Staff View.