Non-Fiction November is hosted this year by Kim (Sophisticated Dorkiness), Julie (JulzReads), Sarah (Sarah’s Book Shelves), Katie (Doing Dewey) and Rennie (What’s Nonfiction).

It’s a month-long celebration of everything nonfiction with a different prompt and a different host each week.

The final week is hosted by Katie @ Doing Dewey: “It’s been a month full of amazing nonfiction books! Which ones have made it onto your TBR?”

But before we finish the month, there is one more outstanding non-fiction read I’m itching to mention: Jamil Jivani’s Why Young Men: Rage, Race and the Crisis of Identity (2018).

One concept gleaned from this book, which I have used countless times in recent weeks, is Arjun Appadurai’s explanation of the contrast between “wishful thinking” and “thoughtful wishing”, which is important in terms of how one views the world, filled with frustration or possibility.

Wishful thinking (according to this New York University anthropologist) occurs when you want a better life but you don’t know how to plan for it, whereas thoughtful wishing occurs when you know the specific and attainable steps to get that better life.

When young men do not have the opportunity to thoughtfully wish in their everyday lives, radicalization can seem to offer alternatives where none exist elsewhere.

And there are a lot of interesting statistics and theories in Jamil Javani’s book for sure.

Did you know that 40% of job seekers from ethnic minorities across North America “whiten” their resumes to bypass biased screeners in the hiring chain? Or that black families represent 41% of the families in Toronto’s child welfare system which is about five times more than their representation in the city’s population overall?

Jamil Javani is based in Toronto, where 140 languages are spoken, with more than 200 ethnic groups in residence, and he writes openly and forthrightly about his personal experiences here in the city and shares the experiences of a handful of other young men.

The combination of personal narrative with international scholarship (emphasizing North American studies and trends) makes this both readable and enlightening.