avatarPagebound Royalty Badge

Avalon

NZ | 🐕☕👹 | Fantasy, Japanese Lit, Romance, Poetry & some Non-Fic |

25447 points

0% overlap
Dia de los Muertos 2025Cherry Blossom Festival 2026Mardi Gras + Carnival 2026Pride 2026Level 11
Summer 2025 Readalong
Fall 2025 Readalong
Winter 2026 Readalong
Spring 2026 Readalong
Summer 2026 Readalong
My Taste
Piranesi
One Dark Window
I Who Have Never Known Men
The Everlasting
Disappoint Me
Reading...
MADK 2
0%
The Financial Colonisation of Aotearoa
65%
The Odyssey
9%
Fervor
70%
Throne of Nightmares
50%
Dark Rise
9%
avatarPagebound Royalty Badge

Avalon is interested in reading...

2d

The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together

The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together

Heather McGhee

Heather McGhee's specialty is the American economy--and the mystery of why it so often fails the American public. From the financial crisis to rising student debt to collapsing public infrastructure, she found a common root problem: racism. But not just in the most obvious indignities for people of color. Racism has costs for white people, too. It is the common denominator of our most vexing public problems, the core dysfunction of our democracy and constitutive of the spiritual and moral crises that grip us all. But how did this happen? And is there a way out? McGhee embarks on a deeply personal journey across the country from Maine to Mississippi to California, tallying what we lose when we buy into the zero-sum paradigm--the idea that progress for some of us must come at the expense of others. Along the way, she meets white people who confide in her about losing their homes, their dreams, and their shot at better jobs to the toxic mix of American racism and greed. This is the story of how public goods in this country--from parks and pools to functioning schools--have become private luxuries; of how unions collapsed, wages stagnated, and inequality increased; and of how this country, unique among the world's advanced economies, has thwarted universal healthcare. But in unlikely places of worship and work, McGhee finds proof of what she calls the Solidarity Dividend: gains that come when people come together across race, to accomplish what we simply can't do on our own. McGhee marshals economic and sociological research to paint a story of racism's costs, but at the heart of the book are the humble stories of people yearning to be part of a better America, including white supremacy's collateral victims: white people themselves. With startling empathy, this heartfelt message from a Black woman to a multiracial America leaves us with a new vision for a future in which we finally realize that life can be more than a zero-sum game.

0
avatarPagebound Royalty Badge

Avalon commented...

3d

  • Thoughts from 100%
    2
    1
  • avatarPagebound Royalty Badge

    Avalon commented...

    3d

    That cover is eyecatching

    avatarPagebound Royalty Badge

    Avalon commented...

    3d

    Ooo interesting, funny how that works hey? Able to acknowledge good writing but story doesn’t pull you in. I’m picking this up from the library this week!

    avatarPagebound Royalty Badge

    Avalon commented...

    3d

    🖐️ are you going to be over level thirty by the time I hit 12? RIDICULOUS, go you legend ❤️

    avatarPagebound Royalty Badge

    Avalon commented...

    4d

    Congratulations!!

    avatarPagebound Royalty Badge

    Avalon commented...

    4d

    It was odd right! And that's coming from me who has an accent well known for doing something similar with intonation 😅

  • Mexican Gothic
    avatarPagebound Royalty Badge
    Avalon reviewed...
    May 24, 2026
    Mexican GothicSilvia Moreno-Garcia
    4.0
    Enjoyment: 3.5Quality: 4.0Characters: 4.0Plot: 3.5
    🍄
    🏚️
    🚬

    Not scared but definitely disgusted, Mexican Gothic provided a descent into a surreal, grotesque haze that had me rooting for Noemí and out for blood. It was a slower start, setting the Gothic atmosphere, but the second half ramped up providing quite gruesome imagery and dismay as you uncovered more fucked up pieces of the decaying puzzle. There is a lot of symbolism and historical reference here with the mine and the white Doyle family. The book is full of misogynistic and racist moments, and there are some unsettling instances that may affect more sensitive readers. If you have specific triggers it may pay to check ahead of time. You're going into a horror, but a horror book that includes women being taken advantage of, colonialist mindsets and actions, assault and more.

    I was not a fan of the audiobook narration sadly, it fell relatively flat and I found how she finished her sentences to be slightly annoying (tonal choice).

    5
  • avatarPagebound Royalty Badge

    Avalon commented...

    4d

    Have wanted to read this for soooo long, fill me in next time we see each other x