Home › Books › Health and Safety: A Breakdown
Health and Safety: A Breakdown
by
71/99
Critics' Rating Index
4/99
Readers' Rating Index
n/a
Scholars' Citation Index
84/99
Volume of Reviews
74/99
Volume of Reader Ratings
Sign in to add to your shelf, rate, or review this book.
About This Book
From the New Yorker staff writer and acclaimed author of Future Sex ("introspective and breathtakingly honest"—New York Times Book Review,), a memoir about sex, drugs, and techno in a time of madness In the summer of 2016, a divisive presidential election was underway, and a new breed of right-wing rage was on the rise. Emily Witt, who would soon publish her first book on sex in the digital age, had recently quit antidepressants for a more expansive world of psychedelic experimentation. From her apartment in Brooklyn, she began to catch glimpses of the clandestine nightlife scene thrumming around her. In Health and Safety, Witt charts her immersion into New York City's dance music underground. Emily would come to lead a double life. By day she worked as a journalist, covering gun violence, climate catastrophes, and the rallies of right-wing militias. And by night she pushed the limits of consciousness in hollowed-out office spaces and warehouses to music that sounded like the future. But no counterculture, no matter how utopian, could stave off the squalor of American politics and the cataclysm of 2020. Affectionate yet never sentimental, Health and Safety is a lament for a broken relationship, for a changed nightlife scene, and for New York City just before the fall. Sparing no one—least of all herself—Witt offers her life as a lens onto an era of American delirium and dissolution.
Reviews
"Rather the book is about striving for all those states of being in a tumultuous, difficult, and violent period."
"n the end, readers who prefer a tidy memoir that culminates in a single awakening may find Health and Safety wanting; it's more like a spider web glistening with many realizations that branch out in connecting threads."
"It's that such an eloquent and perceptive writer seems to be genuinely more cynical about writing itself than she is about getting high with people who work in tech."
"As important as Andrew was for her, exactly what it was that made him such an enthralling presence is never quite conveyed ..."
"Witt's directness and sincerity are disarming."
"Her enthusiasm for capturing the experience is also grounded in her sociological and historical observations on dance music ..."
"For those familiar with the music and places she mentions, Witt's reporting can be pleasurable to read."
"Self-eviscerating, honest, often painful—a superbly realized chronicle of an ever-darkening age."
Preview
Reader Reviews
0 reviewsSign in to write a review.
No reader reviews yet. Be the first!