America faced another challenging year in 2021, Dear Reader, and so once again I sought solace in the printed word. Pandemics can linger, prices can rise, and elections may not go your way, but books are always faithful companions in turmoil. It was with that attitude that I approached 2021 and the many books it had to offer.
Given the manifest challenges we face, I focused much of my journey on books that addressed our current condition and what to do about it. Lawrence Wright in The Plague Year: America in the Time of Covid examined America from a variety of perspectives during 2020. He looked at the federal government and its floundering efforts to get a handle on things, but he also looked at the virus’s origin in China, as well as at local virus mitigation efforts outside of Washington. He is particularly and appropriately hard on outgoing New York mayor Bill de Blasio, who minimized the virus in the early days while saying things like “New York City’s Chinatowns are open for business!” until he was given an ultimatum by his public-health staff, who told him, Wright writes, “Either pivot to pandemic planning today or they start to deal with a health department that won’t follow his orders.” On March 5, 2020, New York governor Andrew Cuomo issued a stay-home order, but, Wright points out, “this was at a time when New York’s mayor was still urging citizens to go out on the town.”
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