“A wonderful piece of journalism that tries to draw links between the Arab Spring, the Syriza movement in Greece, the Podemos movement in Spain, Occupy.”
—Paul Greengrass, director of Jason Bourne
“The mix of wide-ranging reportage and historical analysis is lively and insightful.”
—Claire Allfree, Metro
“The writing of this reportage is compact, urgent, present-tense, declarative, and addictive.”
—Andy Beckett, Guardian
“Mason has had a ringside seat to some of the biggest news events of 2011. He has listened to the protestors in Tahrir Square. He followed Greek workers marching through Athens. He has travelled through America, watched first hand the collapse of blue-collar employment and the death of the dream of home ownership.”
—Guardian
“He’s lively, funny and engaging, trading in the energy derived from the thrill and significance of what he’s witnessing.
”—Phil Harrison, Time Out
“A cogent, accessible analysis of the ongoing forces of global upheaval.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“This book not only reads as an in-depth consideration of global politics today, but offers a personal memoir from a man who has had a ringside seat. We are blessed that the BBC, for all the criticisms, still employs journalists whose logic and unfailing inquisitiveness brings us such analysis.”
—Dan Carrier, Camden New Journal
“You will learn something new and challenging on every page of this book.”
—Kenny Farquharson, Scotland on Sunday
“Mason has emerged as possibly the most engaged mainstream journalist of our age.”
—George Eaton, New Statesman
“Concise global analysis with sympathetic news from the frontline, revealing angry and scared people staring into a bleak future amid the wreckage of shattered certainties.”
—Ian Birrell, Observer
“Superb overview of the global protest movements of 2011.”
—New Internationalist
“Testament to his instincts as a veteran journalist, Mason managed to be everywhere right as things were kicking off—traversing the globe from the Middle East to Europe to America to Asia. [T]he book combines a feel for the breathlessness of events as they unfold with a historian’s eye for patterns and precedents … Mason’s prose beautifully captures the almost surreal mood that often accompanies mass shifts in consciousness.”
—Leela Yellesetty, Socialist Worker
“An accessible insight into how the world is swiftly changing and what the implications are for women, politicians and business.”
—Daily Mail
“These reports are good journalism. One feels as if they are present at the rallies, occupations and riots that Mason describes. The anecdotal tales he provides should remind anyone who participated in any kind of popular resistance in the past decades of the energy and hope one finds and feels at such events. These are the stuff that makes one join such movements. Worthwhile and provocative.”
—Ron Jacobs, Counterpunch
“Paul Mason’s enthusiasm and curiosity are infectious. Adapting a rich vein of leftwing revolutionary thought for the wired generation, Mason argues passionately that the old rules have been broken.”
—John Kampfner, The Observer
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