Beautiful Souls: Saying No, Breaking Ranks, And Heeding The Voice Of Conscience In Dark Times (2012) - Plot & Excerpts
I would likely give this book 4.5 stars. 4 stars for organization and focus and 5 stars for content. It was full of inspirational and powerful true stories, which I would hope were also factual, no matter how underlying biased, but they were also choppy and confusing at parts. As a reader, it was easy to lose track of who press was talking about come page to page, as it almost seemed like he didn't want to work on a transitional comparison between subjects as much as forcing the reader to make a mental connection. I found 15 quotes to love by in this book, but something beautiful can be taken away from each page if you chose to allow it. All in all, a must read for anyone with a shred of humanity and an appreciation for the good many fail to look for or see in this world. I was really moved by this book and liked the way it combined individuals' life stories with forays into research and theory (these sections are selective rather than comprehensive). I appreciated that he profiles four individuals who really seem very ordinary, and doesn't romanticize or "hero-icize" them.Small criticism: I noticed that the author, when critiquing Kohlberg's moral reasoning scale, made absolutely no mention of feminist thinkers like Carol Gilligan who have been the major modern voices challenging Kohlberg and developing alternative models of moral reasoning. Instead he refers to older philosophers like Hume. I thought this was a strange and problematic oversight.
What do You think about Beautiful Souls: Saying No, Breaking Ranks, And Heeding The Voice Of Conscience In Dark Times (2012)?
A must-read for anyone interested in moral courage.
—memily103
One of the most inspiring books I've read
—catlittlepaws
