4 out of 5 stars

A copy of this was provided free of charge from the publisher in return for an honest review

What is Europe?

Is it straight bananas and red tape or a serious effort by a continent to see if the can actually make a collection of countries with some common aims but disparate views actually work together. The EU isn’t perfect by any manner, it has deep flaws that need addressing and is ripe for wholesale reform to correct. This part of the world had two major wars last century that was responsible for millions of deaths has to make it work. However, it does work, to a fashion, the amount of prosperity in the region is proof of that.

Anyone with any rational sense would see that Brexit is a really bad idea, but I can see why some people voted for it at the time. The feeling that we would get our sovereignty back and not be ruled by a bunch of anonymous autocrats, has a lot of appeals, but it was also a protest vote against the political establishment that had for years ignored all outside the Westminster bubble except when they need their votes.

This collection of essays and poems is a response to that vote. T the disparate voices of politicians, EU nationals, poets and even financiers tell us what they think of the result, what they think will happen, possible flaws and problems we will probably have as the changes begin to take effect. The most worrying trend is the rise of nationalism and fascism as the various interested parties push their agendas. The Leave party is now discredited with the ruling by the electoral commission that their campaign was illegal, but still, May pushes ahead egged on by the ultra-right elements of her fractured party. For a change a fundamental as this that potentially could take 50 years (yes 50) for us to ‘see the benefits’, there has to be something wrong with it.

Will this book make a difference though? I fear it won’t. This, though, is the voice of the 48% who didn’t want to leave, the people who care about the future of families, our culture and nation and still deserves to be heard over the shrill from the far-right.

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