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Out of the Ashes
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Review
'This is one of the best political books of 2012' --Mark D'Arcy, BBC Politics Online
'Out Of The Ashes is full of ideas and insight, and presents a politician with a genuine understanding of the difficulties and fears of the people he represents - a quality we're going to need as much of as possible in the years ahead' --Huffington Post UK
'Lammy offers thoughtful arguments about immigration, work, masculinity and crime and punishment' --New Statesman
'Part memoir, part political essay, Out of the Ashes aims to "offer a way forward for Britain" following this summer's riots. This is an ambitious task. But David Lammy hits the ground running ... and his book demands to be read' --David Matthews, Guardian
'Compelling' --Independent
'The book has an authenticity that only David Lammy, with his upbringing and all-consuming dedication to Tottenham, could achieve. Anyone who has trouble understanding why these riots happened will find this book enlightening. I learnt much from it' --Katharine Birbalsingh, Telegraph.co.uk
'An engaging mix of autobiography and a sharp critique of New Labour (and Britain) in decline ... this is an important book for both Labour and Britain' --Spectator.co.uk
'Few people are better qualified to pronounce on August's riots than the Labour MP David Lammy ... An astonishingly thorough and finely nuanced analysis ... [and] instructed and impassioned book' --Mick Brown, Daily Telegraph
'The most surprising and thought-provoking analysis ... completely free from the usual political jargon ...[Lammy's] fearless book could well mark a turning-point for the Labour Party' --Fraser Nelson, Daily Telegraph
'Rooted in [Lammy's] own experiences and those of his constituents; his passion for them, and for their troubles, shines out. Full of ideas and well researched ... His views on the police, social responsibility, punishment, benefits and low-paid work are all absorbing ... The tragedy for the UK and the real cause behind the riots is that in our society Lammy is the exception and not the norm' --Harriet Sargent, Sunday Times
'Out Of The Ashes is full of ideas and insight, and presents a politician with a genuine understanding of the difficulties and fears of the people he represents - a quality we're going to need as much of as possible in the years ahead' --Huffington Post UK
'Lammy offers thoughtful arguments about immigration, work, masculinity and crime and punishment' --New Statesman
'Part memoir, part political essay, Out of the Ashes aims to "offer a way forward for Britain" following this summer's riots. This is an ambitious task. But David Lammy hits the ground running ... and his book demands to be read' --David Matthews, Guardian
'Compelling' --Independent
'The book has an authenticity that only David Lammy, with his upbringing and all-consuming dedication to Tottenham, could achieve. Anyone who has trouble understanding why these riots happened will find this book enlightening. I learnt much from it' --Katharine Birbalsingh, Telegraph.co.uk
'An engaging mix of autobiography and a sharp critique of New Labour (and Britain) in decline ... this is an important book for both Labour and Britain' --Spectator.co.uk
'Few people are better qualified to pronounce on August's riots than the Labour MP David Lammy ... An astonishingly thorough and finely nuanced analysis ... [and] instructed and impassioned book' --Mick Brown, Daily Telegraph
'The most surprising and thought-provoking analysis ... completely free from the usual political jargon ...[Lammy's] fearless book could well mark a turning-point for the Labour Party' --Fraser Nelson, Daily Telegraph
'Rooted in [Lammy's] own experiences and those of his constituents; his passion for them, and for their troubles, shines out. Full of ideas and well researched ... His views on the police, social responsibility, punishment, benefits and low-paid work are all absorbing ... The tragedy for the UK and the real cause behind the riots is that in our society Lammy is the exception and not the norm' --Harriet Sargent, Sunday Times
Review
"One of the best political books of 2012." --Mark D'Arcy, "BBC Politics Online"
"His book is rooted in his own experiences and those of his constituents; his passion for them, and for their troubles, shines out. Full of ideas and well researched... absorbing." --"Sunday Times"
"The first significant attempt to frame a popular politics and language for Labour in the coming period of austerity." -- "New Statesman"
"His book is rooted in his own experiences and those of his constituents; his passion for them, and for their troubles, shines out. Full of ideas and well researched... absorbing." --"Sunday Times"
"The first significant attempt to frame a popular politics and language for Labour in the coming period of austerity." -- "New Statesman"
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
9 of 9 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
David Lammy grew up near the Broadwater Farm estate; he spent much of his childhood without his father; he understood, as a boy on a scholarship to a private school, what it was like to be black in a white man's world; and he knew first hand the tensions of living in a deprived area. You might expect this to at least give him an edge of bitterness, or at any rate to indulge in what another reviewer has called 'lefty Guardian hand-wringing'. It is to his credit, and his book's readability, that he has done neither of these things. What one appreciates about this book is the grace with which he brings his own background and experiences to bear on outlining lessons to be learnt from the second social catastrophe in a generation to be visited on Tottenham.
There are insights into the work Lammy does as a genuinely local politician which might make one pause to wonder how the modern MP for a needy constituency is really meant to carry out his work, given current feeling against actually funding a half decent support system. But I digress. The real virtues of this book are the readable and engaging way in which Lammy takes us through the social and political tensions that both gave rise to, and were illuminated by, the 2011 Tottenham riots, together with his range of projected solutions. Certainly some of the solutions may seem to err on the utopian side of practicability, and I personally remain sceptical about the credibility of accurately measuring the repayment potential of social impact bonds. But many of his proposals are rooted in schemes that have already been tried, and could well benefit from a wider roll-out. And there are surprises for anyone who might still want to characterise this former Labour minister as a typical liberal - his firm conviction in the importance of fatherhood and male role modelling is eloquently and convincingly articulated. He is also excellent, in his last chapter, in making a heartfelt crie de couer on behalf of the poor and powerless against the entrenched interests of the parasitically wealthy, using a range of compelling examples. This is how a Labour MP should be talking.
This is a valuable and worthwhile book. I have always considered Lammy to have been a bit of a workmanlike politician before, but if his authorial voice in 'Out of the Ashes' is his true one, then I hope he gives it much more of a public airing and be damned to the chances of political promotion.
There are insights into the work Lammy does as a genuinely local politician which might make one pause to wonder how the modern MP for a needy constituency is really meant to carry out his work, given current feeling against actually funding a half decent support system. But I digress. The real virtues of this book are the readable and engaging way in which Lammy takes us through the social and political tensions that both gave rise to, and were illuminated by, the 2011 Tottenham riots, together with his range of projected solutions. Certainly some of the solutions may seem to err on the utopian side of practicability, and I personally remain sceptical about the credibility of accurately measuring the repayment potential of social impact bonds. But many of his proposals are rooted in schemes that have already been tried, and could well benefit from a wider roll-out. And there are surprises for anyone who might still want to characterise this former Labour minister as a typical liberal - his firm conviction in the importance of fatherhood and male role modelling is eloquently and convincingly articulated. He is also excellent, in his last chapter, in making a heartfelt crie de couer on behalf of the poor and powerless against the entrenched interests of the parasitically wealthy, using a range of compelling examples. This is how a Labour MP should be talking.
This is a valuable and worthwhile book. I have always considered Lammy to have been a bit of a workmanlike politician before, but if his authorial voice in 'Out of the Ashes' is his true one, then I hope he gives it much more of a public airing and be damned to the chances of political promotion.
15 of 16 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
With `Out of the Ashes' David Lammy has risen like a Phoenix from the flames in my estimations. Which is not to say I thought he was particularly bad before - it's just I didn't think he was particularly anything apart from not being the British Barack. I knew he'd been a relatively young and precocious MP, that he'd held various government positions under Blair and Brown, and that he was generally well meaning and well liked.
But given that I have never voted Labour, and under `Two Nose Jobs' Miliband probably never will, Lammy hasn't really loomed large on my political radar. However, having come across `Out of the Ashes', and enjoyed it very much - in fact, I found myself nodding and grunting in agreement on the tube every morning this week - I'll be keeping a close eye on Lammy from now on.
The thing is, while Obama's autobiographical treatise reads a bit like the kind of soaring rhetorical wet dream Aaron Sorkin would have had while writing The West Wing, Lammy keeps things simple and sensible. Sure, the book is part autobiography, part manifesto. But as the MP for the same Tottenham constituency where he grew up, Lammy brings an authenticity and a genuine sense of compassion to what could otherwise have been a standard bit of post-riots lefty hand-wringing from Guardian Books.
Lammy talks about tackling the root causes of the riots, not just the symptoms, but you get the real sense that he means it - that this isn't just another politician spouting off with idealistic, unachievable platitudes. Lammy's upbringing in Thatcher's 80s, with proud working parents who were hit hard by the recession (his father turned to drink and then emigrated to the US, leaving Lammy's mother to raise three boys on her own) gives him a keen insight into some of the challenges facing families in Tottenham today - essentially, low paid jobs, absent fathers and no stake in society. And his response is pleasingly robust: he chides previous Labour governments for trying to provide statist solutions ("we have ended up nationalising society rather than bolstering it") and instead urges government to focus on improving the resilience of our society by bolstering its foundations ("rather than try to replace society, government should seek to reinforce society in everything that it does. This should be the golden thread running through its attitude to families, communities, workplaces, our justice system, taxation, immigration rules and the welfare state.")
In my work with a British health charity called Merlin, we are constantly trying to find solutions for societies in need - often these are countries with chronic levels of poverty which have been hit by some sort of additional disaster (earthquake, famine, conflict). At the other end of the scale, by drawing attention to Britain's chronically materialist, hyper-individualist `my rights' culture, and its devastating impact on the family unit, Lammy shows that disasters like the riots will continue to strike our society in the future unless politics becomes more practical and purposeful.
I kind of hope Lammy can emerge from Tottenham's ashes and do something about it.
But given that I have never voted Labour, and under `Two Nose Jobs' Miliband probably never will, Lammy hasn't really loomed large on my political radar. However, having come across `Out of the Ashes', and enjoyed it very much - in fact, I found myself nodding and grunting in agreement on the tube every morning this week - I'll be keeping a close eye on Lammy from now on.
The thing is, while Obama's autobiographical treatise reads a bit like the kind of soaring rhetorical wet dream Aaron Sorkin would have had while writing The West Wing, Lammy keeps things simple and sensible. Sure, the book is part autobiography, part manifesto. But as the MP for the same Tottenham constituency where he grew up, Lammy brings an authenticity and a genuine sense of compassion to what could otherwise have been a standard bit of post-riots lefty hand-wringing from Guardian Books.
Lammy talks about tackling the root causes of the riots, not just the symptoms, but you get the real sense that he means it - that this isn't just another politician spouting off with idealistic, unachievable platitudes. Lammy's upbringing in Thatcher's 80s, with proud working parents who were hit hard by the recession (his father turned to drink and then emigrated to the US, leaving Lammy's mother to raise three boys on her own) gives him a keen insight into some of the challenges facing families in Tottenham today - essentially, low paid jobs, absent fathers and no stake in society. And his response is pleasingly robust: he chides previous Labour governments for trying to provide statist solutions ("we have ended up nationalising society rather than bolstering it") and instead urges government to focus on improving the resilience of our society by bolstering its foundations ("rather than try to replace society, government should seek to reinforce society in everything that it does. This should be the golden thread running through its attitude to families, communities, workplaces, our justice system, taxation, immigration rules and the welfare state.")
In my work with a British health charity called Merlin, we are constantly trying to find solutions for societies in need - often these are countries with chronic levels of poverty which have been hit by some sort of additional disaster (earthquake, famine, conflict). At the other end of the scale, by drawing attention to Britain's chronically materialist, hyper-individualist `my rights' culture, and its devastating impact on the family unit, Lammy shows that disasters like the riots will continue to strike our society in the future unless politics becomes more practical and purposeful.
I kind of hope Lammy can emerge from Tottenham's ashes and do something about it.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Brave, thoughtful, moving. Lammy tackles issues head on and doesn't make excuses. He also tells us a lot about his own life. The result is a book which is moving and honest and defies easy characterisation. very definitely worth reading and worth owning.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
nice words - how about some action?
I for one raised an eyebrow when I discovered that Tottenham's MP David Lammy had released a book about August's riots, only a couple of months after they had happened. Read more
Published 3 months ago by culturevulturelee
A Chance to Move On
The Tottenham riots were devastating. Rarely do events haunt in this way and as the news spilled out - of shops broken into and households destroyed many took pause. Read more
Published 4 months ago by Kwaku Awuku-Asabre
A credible way forward
This book should be required reading for every politician, policy-maker and member of the public that cares about the society we live in. Read more
Published 6 months ago by Eugene Akwasi-Ayisi
Hope springs eternal.
Out of the Ashes: Britain after the riots
I can't say I "enjoyed" this book. I have known David for some time, and although I have heard him talk on many issues, and... Read more
I can't say I "enjoyed" this book. I have known David for some time, and although I have heard him talk on many issues, and... Read more
Published 6 months ago by J. Casale
A must-read for anyone interested in Britain today
David Lammy has written a book that deserves to be read by anyone who's interested in the state of Britain today. Read more
Published 6 months ago by Louise
out of the ashes
As a self-described centre-right voter I did not expect to be enamored with this book (it was forced upon me by a friend). Read more
Published 6 months ago by TJB
Interesting and accessible
Interesting and accessible, Out of the Ashes begins the discussion on what caused the most recent riots and offers practical suggestions for how more unrest can be prevented in the... Read more
Published 6 months ago by Sophie
Easy to Read and Lots of Great Ideas
David Lammy has written a great book about the London riots of August 2011 that started in Tottenham, his constituency. Read more
Published 6 months ago by Marcus
Out of the Ashes - Britain after the riots
A well observed and engaging 'state of the nation' analysis. Lammy does well to not only point problems but also suggest policy-based solutions. Read more
Published 6 months ago by nawabofhackney
Thought-provoking and insightful
The riots of August 2011 threw down the gauntlet to British politics and, as yet, many of the questions raised at the time about what caused them and how they can be prevented from... Read more
Published 6 months ago by ferguson104
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