Who's behind the news?
Who's behind the news?
1.5.2
Newsjunkie.net is a resource guide for journalists. We show who's behind the news, and provide tools to help navigate the modern business of information.
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1.5.2
1.5.2
The Once and Future Riot by Joe Sacco (Metropolitan Books, Henry Holt & Company)
In this humble scribbler’s opinion, there is no greater art form than comics, which are sequential drawings. But the form more broadly encompasses cartooning in all its varieties and firmly earns its place in the Western canon. Comics unite art and literature in a discipline expansive enough to contain both the surreal minimalism of Ernie Bushmiller’s Nancy and the deeply researched reportage of Joe Sacco. While not exclusively a journalist, he is best known for works such as Palestine, Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt (with Chris Hedges), War on Gaza, and now The Once and Future Riot. In this latest book, Sacco ventures into new territory—India, and specifically the 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots. Through interviews with people on both sides of the violence, Hindu and Muslim, he illustrates how communal unrest unfolds. Like Simone Weil’s observations in her influential essay on The Iliad, Sacco shows how unleashed force becomes uncontrollable, reducing both perpetrators and victims to objects in its wake. Look for an interview with Joe Sacco in Newsjunkie soon. – PL
Scoop by Evelyn Waugh (Black Bay Books)
Scoop (1938), Evelyn Waugh’s brilliantly sharp satire of journalism, follows the absurd rise of William Boot, a timid and wholly unqualified nature columnist who is mistakenly sent abroad to cover a civil war in the fictional African country of Ishmaelia. What begins as a bureaucratic error becomes a biting comedy of press arrogance, competitive sensationalism, and the manufactured nature of foreign correspondence. Waugh, drawing on his own experience reporting in Abyssinia, skewers the self-importance of major newspapers and the way “news” is often shaped more by metropolitan expectations than by reality on the ground. Still wildly funny and surprisingly relevant, Scoop remains one of the most enduring literary portraits of journalism’s vanity, chaos, and occasional accidental truth. – PL
What Is Free Speech? The History of a Dangerous Idea (Harvard University Press) by Fara Dabhoiwala
In What Is Free Speech?, historian Fara Dabhoiwala delivers a sweeping, lucid, and deeply humane history of an idea that is far older—and far more contested—than modern democracies often admit. Ranging from early modern Europe to the Atlantic world, Dabhoiwala shows that free speech was not born fully formed in the Enlightenment but emerged through messy struggles involving religion, censorship, printing, and popular dissent. What makes the book remarkable is its refusal to treat free speech as an abstract ideal; instead, it is grounded in real people, real conflicts, and the constant tension between authority and expression. Elegantly written and intellectually generous, the book reminds readers that free speech has never been absolute, never been easy, and has always depended on social trust as much as legal principle. – PL
The Journalist and the Murderer by Janet Malcolm (Penguin Random House)
In The Journalist and the Murderer, Janet Malcolm delivers one of the most unsettling and essential examinations of journalism ever written. Using the legal battle between writer Joe McGinniss and murder suspect Jeffrey MacDonald as its core case, Malcolm dismantles the comforting myth of journalistic innocence, arguing that the reporter–subject relationship is inherently unequal and morally fraught. Her famous opening line—“Every journalist who is not too stupid or too full of himself to notice what is going on knows that what he does is morally indefensible”—sets the tone for a book that forces readers to confront the ethics of trust, manipulation, and narrative control. Less a true-crime account than a philosophical inquiry, the book remains a bracing challenge to anyone who believes journalism can ever be entirely neutral, or entirely clean. – PL
Mumbai: A Million Islands by Sidharth Bhatia (HarperCollins India)
Since our publisher is in India for the month, we thought a related book would be appropriate to highlight this week. Mumbai: A Million Islands by Sidharth Bhatia, co-founder of The Wire, is a richly detailed exploration of how Mumbai evolved from a scattered group of islands into one of the world’s most complex and densely populated cities. The book traces the city’s layered history—from colonial engineering projects that literally stitched the islands together, to the social, economic, and political forces that shaped modern Mumbai. Bhatia blends urban history with sharp cultural observation, showing how land reclamation, migration, capitalism, and resilience defined the city’s character, while also highlighting the tensions between development, inequality, and memory that continue to shape Mumbai today. – PL
The Vintage Mencken: The Finest and Fiercest Essays of the Great Literary Iconoclast is a bracing reminder of H. L. Mencken’s unmatched ability to puncture pretension and expose the hypocrisies of American public life. Spanning decades of his writing, the collection showcases Mencken at his most incisive—skewering politics, religion, mass culture, and the habits of the American middle class with wit that is at once elegant and merciless. While some of his views are firmly rooted in his era, the essays remain valuable for their clarity of thought and fearless prose, offering a master class in argumentative writing and editorial voice. For readers interested in the tradition of sharp, opinionated journalism, The Vintage Mencken stands as both an artifact of its time and a reminder of how powerful—and unsettling—strong writing can be. – PL
Reporting at Wit’s End: Tales from The New Yorker by St. Clair McKelway (Bloomsbury)
This sharp, often dryly funny reminder of a period when reporting prized patience, close observation, and narrative restraint. McKelway, a longtime New Yorker writer and editor, offers behind-the-scenes accounts of reporting assignments, newsroom culture, and the small human absurdities that accumulate when journalists spend years cultivating sources and chasing elusive truths. The book isn’t a how-to manual so much as a portrait of reporting as a lived practice—slow, meticulous, and frequently humbling. For readers interested in how institutional journalism once worked at its best, Reporting at Wit’s End is less nostalgic than instructive, showing how wit, skepticism, and endurance can coexist with rigor. – PL
East West Street: On the Origins of "Genocide" and "Crimes Against Humanity (Penguin Random House)
Philippe Sands’s East West Street reads like a legal thriller with a historian’s spine and a memoirist’s nerve: it traces how two foundational ideas of modern international justice—“crimes against humanity” and “genocide”—were shaped by two jurists from the same city (Lviv/Lemberg/Lwów), then follows the trail back through family history, archives, and the wreckage of World War II. Sands toggles between courtroom concepts and lived consequences, showing how abstract language gets forged under pressure—and how it can both reveal and obscure what happened to real people. The book is also propelled by a chilling parallel biography of Hans Frank, the Nazi governor of occupied Poland, which turns the narrative into something sharper than intellectual history: a meditation on accountability, memory, and what it means to name a crime correctly when the stakes are life, death, and legacy. – PL
Dispatches by Michael Herr
Michael Herr’s Dispatches isn’t just a Vietnam War book—it’s the book that taught a lot of modern war reporting how to sound. Written in a wired, breathless, sometimes hallucinatory voice, readers feel the heat and hear the noise of the late-’60s conflict as experienced by grunts, correspondents, and anyone else caught in the churn. Herr isn’t interested in tidy lessons or distant strategy; he’s after the way war rewires language and perception, how rumor hardens into “truth,” and how the spectacle metastasizes until it’s hard to tell where the battlefield ends and the story about it begins. The result is immersive and unsettling—equal parts reportage and reckoning—and it leaves you with the feeling that the war didn’t just happen to Vietnam, but to everyone who tried to witness it. And if it feels like you’ve seen some of the scenes before, you probably have if you’ve watched Apocalypse Now (1979). The movie pulls much of its absurdity from Herr’s classic piece of war reportage. – PL
The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark by Carl Sagan
"Carl Sagan was a friendly and reliable voice about serious concerns, from public school failure to global warming. His optimistic embrace of the wonders of the natural world was infectious. This non-fiction bestseller from 1996, published just before his death at age 62, speaks to the role science has played in quelling the fears, panic and bad decisions plaguing the inherently superstitious human race over the centuries.Yet, three decades since its release, it is shocking to re-read. Society has not progressed. Society has not progressed as it might have, and the consequences of steady anti-science propaganda and disinformation have undermined our capacity to self-govern." |
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Murder Your Darlings: And other Gentle Writing Advice from Aristotle to Zinsser by Roy Peter Clark
Clark is the author of some 20 books on writing, and has taught the craft for
40 years. This volume draws upon 50 of the best writing books on his list and
has more than 100 tips on good, effective writing. His counsel is for writers of
any kind: journalists, essayists, novelists: for anyone who writes, at whatever
level. What does “Murder Your Darlings” mean? As advice to writers, who
sometimes believe they’ve composed a wonderful, clever, cute, or funny line,
they should take a close second look, because what they’ve done may not be
all they believe it’s cracked up to be. These are the “darlings,” that authors
may take great pride in, but they might do well to murder (delete) them, or
have their editor advise on how to murder these darlings. Who said “Murder
Your Darlings” first? The NJ staff discussed this: one said Oscar Wilde, another
said William Faulkner. But the prize goes to Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch, British
writer and editor, 1863–1944.
“In the introduction to Chapter 15 of Clark’s book, he admonishes all writers and would-be writers: “Develop the writing habit. Find a reliable work space, free of distractions, where you can aim for a daily level of production.” Sound advice, but most books on writing contain this injunction or one just like it. But he goes on, in ’The Toolbox’ section of this chapter: “Stephen King offers an odd bit of advice: that you should read bad writing so you can learn what not to write.” King is known for his tales of horror, but many writing teachers look to him as a master of the craft, and recommend his book “On Writing: a Memoir of the Craft.” |
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Trust: The Social Virtues and The Creation of Prosperity by Francis Fukuyama
Fukuyama argues that only societies with a high degree of social trust can create the flexible, large-scale business organizations needed to compete in the global economy. His take on American individualism challenges the reality of the U.S. economy and its ability to sustain mega-corporations while maintaining traditional values. He states, "We cannot divorce economic life from cultural life," a concept so deeply entrenched in American mythology that it has become its cultural movement.
“A people’s ability to maintain a shared ‘language of good and evil’ is critical to the creation of trust, social capital, and all the other positive economic consequences that flow from these attributes. Diversity surely can bring real economic benefits, but past a certain point it erects new barriers to communication and cooperation with potentially devastating economic and political consequences.” |
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Tattva Bodha by Sankanacharya
In this book Sankaracharya explores the creation, composition, and characteristics of the mind, intellect, memory, and ego. He discusses the three types of bodies we possess during waking, dreaming, and deep sleep. Ultimately, he reveals that which is uncreated is our true self, a reality transcending all bodies and definitions.
“Just as a bangle, an earring, a house, etc., are thought to be mine, they are distinctly different from me. One can therefore see the error to the conclusions ‘my body’, ‘my physiological functions', 'my mind', 'my intellect', 'my ignorance'; recognizing clearly that 'I' am none of these things.” |
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Whose Freedom? The Battle over America’s Most Important Idea by George Lakoff
Lakoff’s book examines America’s obsession with the concept of freedom and its ongoing struggle to translate that idea into reality. His argument is framed by the aftermath of the September 11, 2001, attacks, when President George W. Bush declared the US could strike political enemies first because “freedom is on the march.”
“Political freedom is about the state and how well a state can maximize freedom for all its citizens. A state can act to guarantee freedoms, to provide more freedom, or to take away freedom. From this perspective, states are to be judged on the basis of how well they guarantee freedoms for all their citizens and provide for as much freedom as possible, while restricting freedom as little as possible.” |
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Great American Prose Poems from Poe to the Present edited by David Lehman
A prose poem is a poem written in prose rather than verse. A bit of
controversy surrounds the prose poem, as some writers of verse have said,
That’s not poetry, that’s just paragraphs! This troubling debate continues to
the present day.
Lehman, editor of The Best American Poetry series, defines the prose poem in
his 16-page introduction to the anthology, describing the prose plem as a kind
of ‘living contradiction’, or something of an oxymoron—which ‘squares the
circle.’ Is it prose? Is it poetry? The answer to both questions is: Yes. Lehman
describes its French origins and its history in the United States. Many great
masters of American literature are included, as are contemporary writers.
The form has become an attractive option for many poets today. Some
American prose poems are more than a little humorous, and this collection is
sure to entertain and inform anyone interested in the state of the art today. -dg
The Enchantments of Mammon: How Capitalism Became the Religion of Modernity by Eugene McCarraher
McCarraher's book explores how capitalism, through its allure of success and purpose, has exploited spiritual yearning, resulting in a warped kind of enchantment centered on material gain instead of genuine liberation.
“We will not be saved by our money, our weapons, or our technological virtuosity; we might be rescued by the joyful and unprofitable pursuits of love, beauty, and contemplation” |
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Black Pill: How I Witnessed the Darkest Corners of the Internet Come to Life, Poison Society, and Capture American Politics by Elle Reeve
Leaving conjecture behind, Elle Reeve steps into the center of a political storm and puts her journalistic skills into play. Black Pill is the product of months of direct contact with white supremacist groups who accepted her for her honesty and courage. As a reader, we can’t help but benefit from her story. There is no way you won’t finish this book once you start the first chapter—impressive.
“There is no more separation between the online world and the real world,” Fred said. It was getting close to midnight, and sports highlights were replaying on a huge screen behind him. “This notion we have that what is happening online, is happening online—is wrong. Everything happening online is happening in reality. Everything happening online is happening in the real world.” |
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The Medium is the Massage: An inventory of effects by Marshall McLuhan
McLuhan’s The Medium is the Message serves as a field guide to understanding the complexities of media, offering a framework rooted in sociology and philosophy. His work has inspired generations of scholars and theorists to look beyond the content itself and explore the methods of communication that shape how messages break through traditional barriers.
“The goose quill put an end to talk. It abolished mystery; it gave architecture and towns; it brought roads and armies, bureaucracy. It was the basic metaphor with which the cycle of civilization began, the step from the dark into the light of the mind. The hand that filled the parchment page built a city.” |
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Spunk and Bite by Arthur Plotnik
‘Spunk & Bite, A Writer’s Guide to Bold, Contemporary Style,’ a play on
the title of the famous writing guide ‘Strunk and White’, is a set of lessons for
bringing writing to life, and make it engaging, stimulating, and enjoyable to
read. Writers who want to break away from the pack and compose work with
punch, vivacity, wit, and vigor will benefit from this book. Author Arthur
Plotnik helps writers enliven and energize their style, with creative, offbeat,
and at times forceful ways of writing. While there are rules and conventions
that must be obeyed, Plotnick teaches writers how to get around them and to
be both “sheriff and outlaw” in their work.
“What we have here—a gulag for deviant writers? Whenever I review those dictates from ‘The Elements of Style’, that cynosure of American writing by William Strunk Jr. and E.B. White, I feel I should make a dash for it, vault the gates of the free zone.” |
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Death in the Ia Drang Valley by Specialist 4/C Jack P. Smith “The 1st Battalion had been fighting continuously for three or four days, and I had never seen such filthy troops. Some of them had blood on their faces from scratches and from other guys’ wounds. Some had long rips in their clothing where shrapnel and bullets had missed them. They all had that look of shock. They said little, just looked around with darting, nervous eyes.” |
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This week, we are reading the iconic novel It Can’t Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis. His 1935 piece investigates the rise of fascism in the United States, revealing the complex, but not so far fetched, pathways that facilitate oppressive systems on home soil. We ask our readers: can it happen here?
“More and more, as I think about history,” he pondered, “I am convinced that everything that is worth while in the world has been accomplished by the free, inquiring, critical spirit, and that the preservation of this spirit is more important than any social system whatsoever. But the men of ritual and the men of barbarism are capable of shutting up the men of science and of silencing them forever.” |
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Human Smoke: The Beginnings of World War II, the End of Civilization by Nicholson Baker (Simon and Schuster)
Nicholson Baker’s Human Smoke is less a conventional history of World War II than a stark, documentary collage of the years leading up to it. Composed almost entirely of chronologically arranged newspaper items, speeches, diary entries, and government memos, the book strips away hindsight and heroic mythmaking. Baker foregrounds pacifists, diplomats, and dissenters who warned against escalation, while casting a critical eye on figures like Churchill and Roosevelt. The cumulative effect is unsettling: war appears not as destiny, but as a chain of political decisions, miscalculations, and moral compromises. What makes Human Smoke linger is the alternate history it quietly sketches. By immersing readers in the uncertainty of the 1930s, Baker suggests that another path — fragile, improbable, but real — once existed. Peace was not inevitable, but neither, he implies, was total war. Whether you see the book as a necessary corrective to triumphalist narratives or as a provocative overreach, it forces a reconsideration of inevitability itself — and of how easily civilization can tip into catastrophe. – PL