The Shriver Report

June 15, 2014

Hillary Clinton, Barbara Ehrenrich, Anne-Marie Slaughter, and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan are among those who have contributed to this compilation of essays, photographs, and "day-in-the-life" accounts of women "living on the brink" of poverty, by Peabody Award-winning journalist, author, and former first lady of California Shriver. Beyonce and Jennifer Garner are here, too, so serious conversations about policy achievements and disappointments are randomly interspersed with toothless, "we can do it"-style commentaries, along with well-meaning photographs and "Stunning Fact!" sidebars that are often unrelated to the text they accompany. In Beyonce's case, a brief passage in support of equal wages is paired with a photograph of the five-time Grammy Award winner posing with an unidentified group of young women; adding to the confusion, the girls are wearing T-shirts touting Michelle Obama's "Let's Move" campaign. It's left to readers--high school and undergraduate students, most likely--to choose among detailed, well-documented discussions such as Melissa Boteach and Shawn Fremstad's "Putting Women at the Center of Policymaking," Shriver's pleasant but not particularly useful reminiscences about her admirable parents (Eunice Kennedy and Sargent Shriver), and celebrity worship. VERDICT If the Shriver-Kennedy mystique (not to mention that of Beyonce) gets people to think about the issues facing women living on the edge of poverty in the United States, this book has some merit.--Ellen Gilbert, Princeton, NJ

Copyright 2014 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

April 15, 2014
If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich. Maria Shriver's uncle John F. Kennedy said this in his inauguration address more than 50 years ago. A war on poverty began in the 1960s, but how much progress has been made? The Shriver Report resumes this crusade by exposing disturbing facts about the growing marginalization of American women. More families now live in poverty or on the brink, thanks to the exploitation of women as cheap labor. America has lost the bedrock of a strong and abundant middle class. Family structure has crumbled. This collection of research, articles, and photographs compiled by Shriver and the Center for American Progress includes contributions from Hillary Rodham Clinton; Barbara Ehrenreich, author of Nickel and Dimed (2001); and others. It also provides a startling wake-up call for policymakers and anyone hoping to survive a culture that siphons wealth upward to a very powerful few.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)