My column this month is about truth and includes several nonfiction titles that I think all tell stories worth knowing. One in particular though, People Like Us by Joris Luyendijk, really impressed the hell out of me. Here's a bit of my review:

As he [Luyendijk] riffs on one level of insanity after another (“Egypt’s dictator is called ‘President’ even though he inherited his job from his predecessor who, in turn, used force to gain power. This particular dictator leads the ‘National Democratic Party’ which is neither democratic nor a party.”), Luyendijk maintains an attitude of wit and bemused sarcasm that will be particularly appealing to older teens. He isn’t talking down to his readers at all, but in fact is actually trusting them to be smart enough to be talked up to. This is a journalist who says: Let me tell you how it really is, even though it isn’t easy to hear. The mind reels with one revelation after another. Those all too commonly displayed images of protestors damning America, and burning its flag in spontaneous riots, that instill the conviction of “them vs. us” into our national conversation? “Guys,” he writes, “you probably think that a demonstration is something citizens use freely to express whatever they are for or against, but in a dictatorship such ‘outbursts of anger’ are often staged or are at least heavily managed by the regime.”

...With every word, Luyendijk provides a different perspective on what we think we know, and challenges head on what we are accustomed to believing. Killer smart and devastatingly direct, this is journalism at its best. A book for back pockets and backpacks, for classroom discussion and those determined to take on the world, People Like Us is not to be missed.

I know a lot of people are intimidated by books on current events - especially in the Middle East - but this is a very easy book to read. Luyendijk knows his audience and he speaks to them in a hip, casual tone - as someone who wants to hang out and talk international politics like it's football or the latest American Idol results. In other words, he's not pontificating, he's not some politician or partisan talking head demanding that you see things only his way. He's simply a guy whose been there and seen it and is smart enough to write about it all in a very appealing manner. And you want to hang out with him, because he really has some very interesting things to say. Consider this from an interview he gave last fall with ABC Australia:

They'd like to pretend that it is all very heroic and then someone comes up and just says well actually, um, it wasn't heroic at all. You just exposed a politician for what he really does. He won't be grateful either.

I really meant what I said in my review - that People Like Us belongs in backpacks and back pockets. It's the kind of truth that I think will be embraced by anyone of any age who wants to know what is going on - that just want a straight shooter with no political ax of their own to grind to tell them how it is or if they don't know then admit that and explain what they do know. If I was 17 and dreamed of changing the world this is the book I would reach for, hands down. I can't wait to see what this very talented journalist does next. (Oh - and no surprise, it's the fabulous Soft Skull Press who published the U.S. edition.)

[Post pic of the man himself. Is it wrong that I find this photo wildly appealing? :)]