books

In Praise of Pleasure

Unabashed ravishment, whether from binge eating or drug use, makes those of us who strive for autonomous individuality deeply uncomfortable.…

April 17, 2026

Jair Bolsonaro, Enemy of Books, Now in Brazil’s Prison Reading Program

In 2020, Brazil’s then-president Jair Bolsonaro criticized grade-school didactic books for having “too much written in them.” Apparently the Left,…

April 2, 2026

“Would You Want to Live Next to a Clinic?”—Methadone NIMBYism

The speeches at the press conference in Harlem were a distillation of stigmatizing ideas about methadone, clinics and patients that…

March 2, 2026

Blowing the Lid Off the Scandal of US Rehab

Trigger warning! Shoshana Walter’s new book, Rehab: An American Scandal, is going to make you cry and scream. Cry for…

October 16, 2025

It Shouldn’t Be Quite This Hard to Get Into Our Prison’s Library

Recently one of our prison’s library clerks, Polo*, remarked in passing that the Georgia Department of Corrections prison system was…

June 10, 2025

To See the US Prisons Crisis, Look at the Books We’re Trying to Read

The library at South Central Correctional Facility, a Tennessee prison privately operated by CoreCivic, consists of a single wall of…

August 1, 2024

“Sleep’s Cave”—The Speculation Around Ovid’s Opium References

Publius Ovidius Naso, known today as Ovid, was a Roman poet of great acclaim and some infamy. His works remain…

September 29, 2023

A Daughter’s Life and Death, Seen Through a Harm Reduction Lens

The book Addicted and Convicted: Letters from a Lost Daughter, published in August, tells the story of how Elizabeth Elliot…

September 6, 2023

Belladonna and Bad Actors: The Telling History of Addiction Treatment

The roots of today’s stigmatization of people who use drugs—and of paternalistic, exploitative, often cruel approaches to what we now…

April 25, 2023

Pliny the Elder’s Ancient But Refreshing Take on Opium

Pliny the Elder, a Roman statesman and writer, lived during the 1st Century CE. He died, famously, during the eruption…

March 31, 2023