Terra Kaffe - Shop now
Add Prime to get Fast, Free delivery
Amazon prime logo
Buy new:
-47% $10.69
FREE delivery Tuesday, March 4 on orders shipped by Amazon over $35
Ships from: Amazon.com
Sold by: Amazon.com
$10.69 with 47 percent savings
List Price: $20.00
Get Fast, Free Shipping with Amazon Prime FREE Returns
FREE delivery Tuesday, March 4 on orders shipped by Amazon over $35
Or Prime members get FREE delivery Tomorrow, February 28. Order within 13 hrs 48 mins.
In Stock
$$10.69 () Includes selected options. Includes initial monthly payment and selected options. Details
Price
Subtotal
$$10.69
Subtotal
Initial payment breakdown
Shipping cost, delivery date, and order total (including tax) shown at checkout.
Ships from
Amazon.com
Amazon.com
Ships from
Amazon.com
Sold by
Amazon.com
Amazon.com
Sold by
Amazon.com
Returns
30-day refund/replacement
30-day refund/replacement
This item can be returned in its original condition for a full refund or replacement within 30 days of receipt.
Payment
Secure transaction
Your transaction is secure
We work hard to protect your security and privacy. Our payment security system encrypts your information during transmission. We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others. Learn more
$7.99
Used books cannot guarantee unused access codes or working CD's! Ships fast! Used books cannot guarantee unused access codes or working CD's! Ships fast! See less
FREE delivery March 7 - 12. Details
Or fastest delivery March 5 - 7. Details
Only 1 left in stock - order soon.
$$10.69 () Includes selected options. Includes initial monthly payment and selected options. Details
Price
Subtotal
$$10.69
Subtotal
Initial payment breakdown
Shipping cost, delivery date, and order total (including tax) shown at checkout.
Access codes and supplements are not guaranteed with used items.
Ships from and sold by firstclassbooks.
Kindle app logo image

Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required.

Read instantly on your browser with Kindle for Web.

Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.

QR code to download the Kindle App

Follow the author

Something went wrong. Please try your request again later.

Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City Paperback – February 28, 2017

4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars 10,501 ratings

{"desktop_buybox_group_1":[{"displayPrice":"$10.69","priceAmount":10.69,"currencySymbol":"$","integerValue":"10","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"69","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"g4BI6o1QK0UFsZu4wMNdtJ2R01nGpss1hbRMtPRPKHFrI%2B03ltw2MAPE9AlHtdYeYHIgZq524%2FsPz3GzXwhdJIoEsz7wY0NXRm95GckzICFlSIkpTuCFUiKMTnF8Vx2FsTY2c7Tyr4tez7ngpi1auw%3D%3D","locale":"en-US","buyingOptionType":"NEW","aapiBuyingOptionIndex":0}, {"displayPrice":"$7.99","priceAmount":7.99,"currencySymbol":"$","integerValue":"7","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"99","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"g4BI6o1QK0UFsZu4wMNdtJ2R01nGpss1CMEMgSu3uUpdodqH5ef2Hk9wuJhUPn%2BOpexCE5h%2BSIU%2F55f%2FxZQ%2Bqwyf5QLKxjMRzajxLyvQ1R2s%2BkbB7xJPWHOFqBGLWNi03BEMHVP7HOpeG2xCCoc5M9Rt7fU7bz0L4%2FNgVjrdcmlfPJ5U2wZ1Fw%3D%3D","locale":"en-US","buyingOptionType":"USED","aapiBuyingOptionIndex":1}]}

Purchase options and add-ons

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE • ONE OF TIME’S TEN BEST NONFICTION BOOKS OF THE DECADE • ONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES’S 100 BEST BOOKS OF THE 21ST CENTURY

One of the most acclaimed books of our time, this modern classic “has set a new standard for reporting on poverty” (Barbara Ehrenreich,
The New York Times Book Review).

In
Evicted, Princeton sociologist and MacArthur “Genius” Matthew Desmond follows eight families in Milwaukee as they each struggle to keep a roof over their heads. Hailed as “wrenching and revelatory” (The Nation), “vivid and unsettling” (New York Review of Books), Evicted transforms our understanding of poverty and economic exploitation while providing fresh ideas for solving one of twenty-first-century America’s most devastating problems. Its unforgettable scenes of hope and loss remind us of the centrality of home, without which nothing else is possible. 

A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: President Barack Obama, The New York Times Book Review, The Boston Globe, The Washington Post, NPR, Entertainment Weekly, The New Yorker, Bloomberg, Esquire, BuzzFeed, Fortune, San Francisco Chronicle, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Politico, The Week, Chicago Public Library, BookPage, Kirkus Reviews, Library Journal,  Publishers Weekly, Booklist, Shelf Awareness

WINNER OF: The National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction • The PEN/John Kenneth Galbraith Award for Nonfiction • The Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction • The Hillman Prize for Book Journalism • The PEN/New England Award • The Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize

FINALIST FOR THE LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE AND THE KIRKUS PRIZE

Evicted stands among the very best of the social justice books.”—Ann Patchett, author of Bel Canto and Commonwealth

“Gripping and moving—tragic, too.”
—Jesmyn Ward, author of Salvage the Bones

Evicted is that rare work that has something genuinely new to say about poverty.”—San Francisco Chronicle
The%20Amazon%20Book%20Review
The Amazon Book Review
Book recommendations, author interviews, editors' picks, and more. Read it now

Frequently bought together

This item: Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City
$10.69
Get it as soon as Tuesday, Mar 4
In Stock
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
+
$14.31
Get it as soon as Tuesday, Mar 4
In Stock
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
+
$9.05
Get it as soon as Tuesday, Mar 4
In Stock
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.
Total price: $00
To see our price, add these items to your cart.
Details
Added to Cart
spCSRF_Treatment
Choose items to buy together.
Popular Highlights in this book

From the Publisher

Barbara Ehrenreich says, “One of the most acclaimed books of our time.”

Ann Patchett says, “Evicted stands among the very best of the social justice books.”

Roxane Gay says, “It is devastating and infuriating and a necessary read.”

Jennifer Senior says, “The book is that good, and it’s that unignorable.”

Editorial Reviews

Review

“Astonishing... Desmond has set a new standard for reporting on poverty.”Barbara Ehrenreich, New York Times Book Review

“After reading Evicted, you’ll realize you cannot have a serious conversation about poverty without talking about housing. . . . The book is that good, and it’s that unignorable.”—Jennifer Senior, New York Times

“This book gave me a better sense of what it is like to be very poor in this country than anything else I have read. . . . It is beautifully written, thought-provoking, and unforgettable.”—Bill Gates

“Inside my copy of his book, Mr. Desmond scribbled a note: ‘home = life.’ Too many in Washington don’t understand that. We need a government that will partner with communities, from Appalachia to the suburbs to downtown Cleveland, to make hard work pay off for all these overlooked Americans.”—Senator Sherrod Brown, Wall Street Journal

“My God, what [Evicted] lays bare about American poverty. It is devastating and infuriating and a necessary read.”—Roxane Gay, author of Bad Feminist and Difficult Women

“Written with the vividness of a novel, [
Evicted] offers a dark mirror of middle-class America’s obsession with real estate, laying bare the workings of the low end of the market, where evictions have become just another part of an often lucrative business model.”—Jennifer Schuessler, New York Times

“In spare and penetrating prose . . . Desmond has made it impossible to consider poverty without grappling with the role of housing. This pick [as best book of 2016] was not close.”—Carlos Lozada, Washington Post

“An essential piece of reportage about poverty and profit in urban America.”Geoff Dyer, The Guardian

“It doesn't happen every week (or every month, or even year), but every once in a while a book comes along that changes the national conversation. . . . Evicted looks to be one of those books.”—Pamela Paul, editor of the New York Times Book Review

“Should be required reading in an election year, or any other.”—Entertainment Weekly

“Powerful, monstrously effective . . . The power of this book abides in the indelible impression left by its stories.”
—Jill Leovy, The American Scholar

“Gripping and important . . . [Desmond's] portraits are vivid and unsettling.”—Jason DeParle, New York Review of Books

“An exquisitely crafted, meticulously researched exploration of life on the margins, providing a voice to people who have been shamefully ignored—or, worse, demonized—by opinion makers over the course of decades.”—The Boston Globe

“[An] impressive work of scholarship . . . As Mr. Desmond points out, eviction has been neglected by urban sociologists, so his account fills a gap. His methodology is scrupulous.”Wall Street Journal

About the Author

Matthew Desmond is a professor of sociology at Princeton University. After receiving his Ph.D. in 2010 from the University of Wisconsin at Madison, he joined the Harvard Society of Fellows as a Junior Fellow. He is the author of four books, including Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City, which won the Pulitzer Prize, National Book Critics Circle Award, and Carnegie Medal, and PEN / John Kenneth Galbraith Award for Nonfiction. The principal investigator of The Eviction Lab, Desmond’s research focuses on poverty in America, city life, housing insecurity, public policy, racial inequality, and ethnography. He is the recipient of a MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship, the American Bar Association’s Silver Gavel Award, and the William Julius Wilson Early Career Award. A contributing writer for the New York Times Magazine, Desmond was listed in 2016 among the Politico 50 as one of “fifty people across the country who are most influencing the national political debate.”

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Crown; Reprint edition (February 28, 2017)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 448 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0553447459
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0553447453
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 2.31 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.15 x 0.93 x 7.96 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars 10,501 ratings

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.
Matthew Desmond
Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.
Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Matthew Desmond is social scientist and urban ethnographer. He is the Maurice P. During Professor of Sociology and the Director of the Eviction Lab at Princeton University. He is also a Contributing Writer for The New York Times Magazine.

Desmond is the author of over fifty academic studies and several books, including "Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City," which won the Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction, National Book Critics Circle Award, Carnegie Medal, and PEN / John Kenneth Galbraith Award for Nonfiction.

"Evicted" was listed as one of the Best Books of 2016 by The New York Times, New Yorker, Washington Post, National Public Radio, and several other outlets. It has been named one of the Best 50 Nonfiction Books of the Last 100 Years and was included in the 100 Best Social Policy Books of All Time.

Desmond's research and reporting focuses on American poverty and public policy. He is the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship, the American Bar Association’s Silver Gavel Award, and is an elected member of the American Philosophical Society. He has been listed among the Politico 50, as one of “fifty people across the country who are most influencing the national political debate.”

Customer reviews

4.6 out of 5 stars
10,501 global ratings

Review this product

Share your thoughts with other customers

Customers say

Customers find the book easy to read and well-researched. They appreciate the objective information and personal stories that provide an enlightening look at the housing crisis in the US. Readers praise the strong narrative and consider it an important read for both renters and landlords. The book provides a profoundly moving, up-close look at poverty reinforced by eviction.

AI-generated from the text of customer reviews

650 customers mention "Readability"586 positive64 negative

Customers find the book well-written and engaging. They praise the author's research and writing style, describing it as an expert ethnography of the poorest tenants in America. The book is described as remarkable and important, though it can be difficult reading without feeling convicted.

"...This book though, reads like a novel. Desmond lived with, and visited with many of these families on a daily basis for three years...." Read more

"...This book is very well written and thoroughly researched. They don’t hand out the Pulitzer to just anybody!" Read more

"...All in all, it is a worthwhile read. And the author does a good job in furthering the on-going conversion in the housing crisis in this country." Read more

"...It's masterfully done, and the commitment to getting the details right and to reporting from the literal front lines of poverty should be applauded...." Read more

522 customers mention "Insight"522 positive0 negative

Customers find the book insightful and moving. It provides objective information and well-researched details about the underlying problem. They describe it as an important document, with heartfelt documentation of the lives of a handful of people living in poverty. The author does an amazing job of sharing real-life events of a handful of those living in the area.

"...Through thorough and expansive research, Desmond walks the reader through the lives of these people — their decision making processes, the choices..." Read more

"Matthew Desmond's "Evicted" is a brilliant ethnography of poverty in America and its impact on one of humanity's most basic needs, shelter. &#..." Read more

"...Dr. Desmond does an excellent job of illustrating how sub-standard living, eviction, and homelessness serves to keep people from being able to get..." Read more

"...I thought it was a good raw, heartfelt documentation of the lives of a handful of poor and their landlords...." Read more

183 customers mention "Story quality"173 positive10 negative

Customers find the book engaging with its use of stories and detailed information. They appreciate the personal stories and how the author brings the stories of his neighbors to life. The narrative is strong and the book chronicles an important topic through real-life experiences. Readers find the book compelling and interesting, with masterful reporting of events.

"...Desmond left his own opinion out of his reporting – he recalled these events masterfully – completely and chock full of detail, but without any..." Read more

"...stories with a lot of facts and statistics so that both are equally interesting. We see things from the perspective of landlords and tenants...." Read more

"...reveals what it means to be truly, unstably poor, but also provides interesting insights in the shape of in-depth stories from the perspective of..." Read more

"...Evicted is mostly real human stories about life below the poverty line and the all-too-common lack of due process for evictions...." Read more

47 customers mention "Housing crisis"47 positive0 negative

Customers find the book helpful for understanding the housing crisis in the US. It sheds light on many contributing factors to homelessness, urban poverty, and the eviction process. The book provides a clearer picture of the chronic housing shortage and its consequences for those who spend money on it. They appreciate the account of the rental market in inner cities.

"...It is my belief that blending neighborhoods will cut down on crime and thus save a lot of money spent in that area." Read more

"...Also puts said assistance, as well as public housing in better context. An excellent read...." Read more

"...He also explored the housing divide and housing discrimination in America...." Read more

"A very revealing look at the racial and economic inequalities in the rental housing market...." Read more

47 customers mention "Reading requirement"47 positive0 negative

Customers find the book a must-read for everyone, including members of Congress. They say it helps both renters and landlords understand the landlord-tenant relationship in America. The book is also recommended for housing attorneys, civil rights advocates, and social justice advocates.

"...It's crushing, sobering, and extremely important that it be read." Read more

"...be painful reading but overall the book is really important for both renters and landlords to read and understand the problem our country faces with..." Read more

"...All of them are being repeated all over the country. This book should be required reading." Read more

"...This is necessary reading. It's painful, and will make you think. But that's what counts." Read more

43 customers mention "Pacing"43 positive0 negative

Customers find the book's pacing engaging. They describe it as an up-close look at poverty reinforced by eviction. The book informs and moves them in equal measure. Readers appreciate the detailed, fair descriptions and the seamless way the author ties the various lives together. Overall, they find the book inspiring and thought-provoking.

"...The ability most show to take things day-to-day and continue marching on is remarkable...." Read more

"...He captures their plight in an effective and moving way by interweaving their stories into personal narratives...." Read more

"...At the same time, it is evenhanded, objective and unvarnished. While it often left me sad and frustrated, in the end it seemed to me to be hopeful...." Read more

"...Scrupulously fair, Desmond provides fascinating footnotes throughout to validate his observations.. At times both funny and heartbreaking, his..." Read more

38 customers mention "Character development"32 positive6 negative

Customers find the book's character development engaging. They describe the characters as fascinating, unique, and human. The author does a great job of humanizing people on both sides of the real estate market.

"...most opaque passages into vernacular English, and has retained his subjects’ coarse language, he sometimes has to explain difficult context, which..." Read more

"...It is hard not to empathize with his subjects even though some try to escape their dire situation by self-medicating with drugs, resorting to crime,..." Read more

"Desmond is a genius and a saint, up there with Caro, Wilkerson, et al...." Read more

"...Best of all, Desmond obviously pours his soul into the book and it reads as an engrossing saga of love rather than a textbook , which it so easily..." Read more

214 customers mention "Heartbreaking"125 positive89 negative

Customers have mixed opinions about the book. Some find it empathetic and heartbreaking, with well-founded ideas on how to solve issues. Others describe it as depressing at times, hard to put down, and not an eye-opener.

"...It's not a strictly apologetic piece, either: frequently those featured in the book explain that they know the mistakes they've made, and even..." Read more

"..."Evicted" is an important, albeit dispiriting look at the widening gulf between rich and poor and the consequences the lack of affordable..." Read more

"...Eye-opening, educational, disturbing—this book is all of these and more." Read more

"...so much for your writing the book - it certainly was a work and labor of love." Read more

The 'Hood is Actually Not So Good
4 out of 5 stars
The 'Hood is Actually Not So Good
I have been involved with low income housing in Milwaukee for over three decades as a landlord and as an attorney for landlords and tenants. I know the neighborhoods and characters in this book all too well. If you want insight into poor people’s lives as they struggle to keep a roof over their heads, you should buy this book. The other reviews are right about how gripping those stories are. But if you are a graduate of Trump University and think you’ll get some insight into how to make obscene profits by renting to the poor you’ll find anecdotes but no real verified research about the business of landlording. Most significantly, you will not learn the truth that bringing evictions totally destroyed the rental business of Sherrena, the leading landlord protagonist.Strangely, though Desmond interviewed 30 landlords he only focuses on two. One is Tobin, a mobile home park operator on Milwaukee’s south side, which is largely white and Hispanic. Tobin indeed makes a lot of money but that is because he does not have to maintain or repair 95% of the “dwellings” in his park. Tobin rents out a concrete slab with utility connections and the tenants buy or bring their own trailers and pay their own utilities. As owners they are responsible for the exterior and interior condition of their dwelling. Only 5% of the trailers are owned by the park and rented to tenants as a living unit. So Tobin is a landlord only in the sense that you might have a landlord this summer when you drive your Winnebago to a Jellystone Park and pay rent for the parking pad and utility hookups.Then we have Sherrena who with her husband runs about 18 buildings (mostly two-family flats) in the African-American neighborhoods on the north side of Milwaukee. In a chapter titled “The ‘Hood is Good” Desmond blithely accepts Sherrena’s boast that she has a net worth of $2 million and nets $10,000 a month in rental income. Desmond is honest in portraying the many difficulties Sherrena has in collecting rent from her struggling tenants but he doesn’t do the background research (available from local court records) about the many thousands of dollars in unpaid rents and damaged units which sort of cut into profits a little bit.As to her supposed net worth of $2 million, that averages out to $111,000 for each of these 18 ghetto properties - certainly far more than some of the real dumpy ones are worth – but the author does not research the amounts of the recorded mortgages against these properties (ranging between $64,000 and $119,200) which further greatly reduce the claimed net worth. That would have been revealed in the many foreclosures filed against Sherrena’s properties which started within a year after Desmond’s visit to Milwaukee.So when this book came out in 2016 the curious reader might want to know: if the ‘hood is good for the landlord how much better has it gotten since the author did his study in 2009? Research so far shows that not one of Sherrena’s properties remains in her ownership. Starting in 2010 many were bulldozed, went into city ownership via foreclosure for nonpayment of real estate taxes or today sit as haunting, blighted eyesores. A few were foreclosed by lenders, were fixed up and are under new ownership. Evictions by Sherrena ended in the year 2010. So did her non-existent profit. She joins many small-time under-capitalized landlords who have gone bust in Milwaukee and elsewhere since the Great Recession started in 2008 with the bursting of the housing bubble.Please note that I still give the book 4 stars. Its significant defects in reporting on the “profit” aspect of its subtitle are outweighed by the important and detailed research on the effects of eviction in creating and perpetuating poverty. A better and expanded housing voucher program for low income tenants is much needed. Landlords nationwide should join Matt Desmond’s call for its implementation.
Thank you for your feedback
Sorry, there was an error
Sorry we couldn't load the review

Top reviews from the United States

  • Reviewed in the United States on March 20, 2016
    In this work of non-fiction, Matthew Desmond, a Harvard sociologist, takes us to Milwaukee where we become intimately engaged in the lives of eight impoverished families. Among these, we meet Arleen- who is trying to raise her children on food stamps, Crystal – who has been in and out of the foster system since she was a young child, and Scott – who is a successful nurse-turned heroin addict who lost it all (among others). We also meet their landlords Sherrena (who owns many dilapidated inner-city units) and Tobin (the owner of a run-down trailer park).

    Through thorough and expansive research, Desmond walks the reader through the lives of these people — their decision making processes, the choices (and non-choices) that led them to where they are, and the laws and loopholes that work against the poorest and most vulnerable members of our society.

    To me, Evicted was an extremely worthwhile read, for many reasons. First, I do not read a lot of non-fiction, because the writing is often too clinical to hold my interest. This book though, reads like a novel. Desmond lived with, and visited with many of these families on a daily basis for three years. We come to know them as we would a friend, and he tells their stories in a chronological, plot-like way. I wanted to know what would happen next to each of them– I felt invested in their well-being, and frustrated when I read about their lives’ numerous drawbacks.

    Desmond did an excellent job of writing this book from a non-biased view. I personally believe this to be an accomplishment in and of itself; since he witnessed most of the noted events first-hand, I can only imagine how difficult it was to keep his opinion free and clear of his writing. Yet, he managed it and I appreciated that. I despise when an author tells me, either implicitly or explicitly how I am supposed to feel about about an event. In doing this, an author is not only suggesting that his/her thought and opinion is the “right” opinion, but also that I’m not intelligent enough to draw my own conclusions — which is an assumption based in condescension and inaccuracy, and is wholly insulting. Desmond left his own opinion out of his reporting – he recalled these events masterfully – completely and chock full of detail, but without any implied judgement. His writing is powerful, and allows the reader to form their own opinions.

    Further, Desmond provides the reader with significant background information regarding the laws around food-stamps, eviction processes, and the inaccessibility of resources for some of our cities’ most impoverished residents. Because he explained these laws and processes in layman’s terms, I was able to understand why a person might make the decisions that they did. I value logic, and when I cannot understand the logic behind one’s decisions, I become frustrated and impatient. For example, one of the women spent much of her food-stamp allocation for the month on lobster tails and lemon meringue pie. For one meal. Normally, I would think, “Now see — this, this here is the problem.” The author understood that his reader would feel this way, and went on to explain just how difficult it is to drive oneself out of grinding poverty. “People lived with so many compounded limitations that it was difficult to imagine the amount of good behavior or self-control that would allow them to lift themselves out of poverty….those at the bottom had little hope of climbing out even if they pinched every penny. So they chose not to. Instead, they tried to survive in color, to season the suffering with pleasure.” This actually made sense to me. I cannot even begin to imagine feeling so low, and with the author’s careful and logical explanation, I realized that until I live it, I shouldn’t judge it.

    This brings me to my final point. I admittedly understand little about our nation’s housing laws and the difficulties that are faced by those who live within the throes of urban decay. I know how expensive apartments are (the Boston area has some of the highest rents and mortgages in the country), and how exhausting the housing search can be. However, even at my poorest moments, when my bank account was completely in the red, I was not without my soft resources (successful parents who’d rather not watch their child become homeless or starve, friends with the ability and willingness to help, a graduate level education and the ability to procure a job that would pay me a steady salary). In short – I can’t fathom the struggle.

    The people highlighted in this book do not have these soft resources — they are completely on their own. The author surely knew that most of his readers, (with the ability to spend $13.99 on his book for their reading pleasure), might not be able to comprehend the lives and struggles that these people are living — but he made me want to try. I wasn’t left with any anger over the spending or perceived wasting of tax dollars; rather, I finished the book with a confused feeling – a “in what universe does that law make sense?” type of sentiment. I’m sure this was Desmond’s hope for his book, to provide his reader with an eye-opening experience which, at least in my case, was successful.

    To read more of my reviews, go to my blog at [...]
    51 people found this helpful
    Report
  • Reviewed in the United States on March 29, 2016
    Matthew Desmond's "Evicted" is a brilliant ethnography of poverty in America and its impact on one of humanity's most basic needs, shelter. "Evicted" calls to mind seminal ethnographic works like Jacob Riis's "How the Other Half Lives" and Michael Harrington's "The Other America". It is certain that "Evicted" will be at the top of virtually all 2016 best lists and is probably an odds on favorite to win top book awards for non-fiction.

    Desmond does his primary research (through first hand reporting that calls to mind Katherine Boo's remarkable "Behind the Beautiful Forevers") in Milwaukee by living among those he is “studying”. Milwaukee is a microcosm of broader trends happening throughout the rest of the country. Desmond does a brilliant job gaining proximity and trust among a wide range of people struggling through many hardships, some self-inflicted, others not. In spite of this proximity to his subjects, he is able to maintain role of impartial observer and never does one question any bias to about those he is writing about.

    The most harrowing aspect of "Evicted" is the vicious cycle the characters in the book (and others like them) find themselves confronting daily. There is virtually no margin for error in their lives -- any unforeseen event or small mistake has tragic and lasting consequences. Despite this, many display a fortitude to continue pressing on after multiple evictions, dead end housing searches, job losses, health tragedies, etc. The ability most show to take things day-to-day and continue marching on is remarkable. Their adversity would test others living in far better circumstances facing similar adversity. At the same time, Desmond doesn't try to portray any of the individuals as faultless in decisions that might have caused their problems.

    "Evicted" calls to mind another seminal work of the last few years, "The New Jim Crow". Where "The New Jim Crow" focused on mass incarceration of young African-American males, "Evicted", while not solely focused on African-Americans, underscores the significant impact eviction is having on African-American females. While the impact on African-American is tragic enough, the situation is even more devastating for African-American women with children. The long term implications of this are obvious --- children in formative years constantly moving schools, having to make new friends, etc. It was even striking even among most of the individuals Desmond follows, very few were struggling because of catastrophic medical situations which has been another factor leading to housing issues and homelessness.

    While much of the book covers those who've been evicted, Desmond does tackle the housing issue from the vantage point of the landlord. While there are challenges landlords face, I do find it hard to have as much sympathy for them as for tenants. Most of these landlords own multiple properties, particularly in these poorer neighborhoods. They make quite a bit of money off the less fortunate while minimizing investments in keeping their properties above the barely livable level. Since the “power” in the landlord/tenant relationship is often with the landlord, most have little incentive to address issues under legal order to do so. As a result, there is little incentive (and the constituent who would benefit has little political power) to have a more equitable system (like a broader national voucher program) even though it would likely alleviate evictions of tenants as well as force landlords to invest in their properties to upgrade the living conditions. At the same time, there would be benefits for landlords including less expense in the legal system and lost money due to unpaid rent.

    "Evicted" is an important, albeit dispiriting look at the widening gulf between rich and poor and the consequences the lack of affordable housing is creating on the poorest individuals in our society. A growing number of people are barely able to find shelter and even when they do, it is likely to be transient in conditions we'd barely tolerate for animals. Our shelters are bursting at the seams and many cities are facing homeless epidemics. Hopefully, "Evicted" can spur a broader public policy debate where we can find innovative solutions and programs that tackle this vast and growing problem.
    14 people found this helpful
    Report

Top reviews from other countries

  • Matthias
    5.0 out of 5 stars Powerful book
    Reviewed in Canada on February 20, 2024
    Incredibly intense read about one of America's greatest problems
  • Paolo
    5.0 out of 5 stars the title said it all
    Reviewed in Italy on July 2, 2024
    unbelievable that all that happens in the US, once the greatest country in the world.
  • zubedaky
    5.0 out of 5 stars Compelling read, albeit grim.
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 14, 2023
    Genuinely fantastic insight. What a system... profoundly disturbing. Makes you want to weep.
  • Shayan Dasgupta
    5.0 out of 5 stars An eye opener
    Reviewed in India on May 3, 2023
    Just started reading the book. It is very insightful and interesting
  • Aref Hakki
    5.0 out of 5 stars Heartbreaking
    Reviewed in Germany on September 7, 2020
    This book wakes one up to the human tragedies behind the foreclosures and evictions we read about without fully connecting to the suffering and pain associated with them. With another wave imminent as a result of the economic consequences of the corona virus, the top item for relief efforts should be to keep families in their homes until they can stand on their feet again.