Nevertheless, We Persisted by Amy Klobuchar (review)

"Failure is a big part of persisting," writes Senator Klobuchar in the foreword to this ambitious collection of forty-eight essays inspired in large part by the expression emerging from the Senate's attempt to silence Elizabeth Warren in 2017. The essays, penned by a diverse and impressive cast—from politicians to athletes to actors to activists, young and old—assert through personal accounts what persisting through adversity entails. While the inclusive approach to this collection, with authors of various racial and cultural backgrounds as well as genders and sexualities, is surely a strength, at times the conflation of disparate political concerns may for some readers weaken the efficacy of its progressive message. For example, drummer Nate Smith's account of being rejected for a prom date by a girl who didn't find him attractive may be an invaluable lesson on self-confidence, but it jars with the previous entry of a mother's losing her child in the Sandy Hook shootings of 2012 and working tirelessly to make the loss meaningful. Still, the sheer variation in writing styles, subject-matters, and structure to these narratives—which feature poetry, letters, and even a graphic narrative in easy-to-follow comic panels—provides readers with inspiration in assorted forms and a sufficiently complex interpretation of what it means to persist. WJ