Corvus’s Reviews > Scapegoat: What the Invasive Species Story Gets Wrong > Status Update
Corvus
is on page 55 of 224
Very strong intro veres into a book about the semiotics of health and science writing that rarely mentions the topic of the book. Then eres into some conspiracist territory so I'm fact checking sources and asking a researcher friend. Disappointing for the topic, but most crit I agree with as a book about language.
— Apr 23, 2026 10:54AM
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Corvus
is on page 96 of 224
After the small out of place chair, this book is so beyond important. I'm glad ak press put it out, too, as maybe it will bridge some divides between communities. The section on barred/spotted owl "conflict" made me tear up and should be required reading for everyon. Killing thousands of barred owls while still allowing logging in spotted habitat and the killing of spotted by logging companies is brutal insanity.
— Apr 27, 2026 09:01AM
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Colton
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Apr 23, 2026 10:18PM
I thought about reading this is I like AK Press. Is it worth adding to my long reading list?
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I haven't finished it yet, but I'll let you know when i have!
I think it would have been better if she had a map of her argument in the intro, to explain or justify her tangents then maybe start with chapter 3, explaining the invasive species story, then go to chapter 2, then 1 unpacking how we got here. What were the conspiracist territory you were fact checking?
Max wrote: "I think it would have been better if she had a map of her argument in the intro, to explain or justify her tangents then maybe start with chapter 3, explaining the invasive species story, then go t..."It sorta seems like it was several different articles then put together as a book without making them into actual book format.
Conspiracist stuff is where she starts claiming that pharma controls how all results are published and only favors positive results for their drugs. There's also an accusation that those taking pharma grants to do research don't write their own papers. I'm very aware of the problems and corruption throughout research, but these two points seemed inaccurate and her sources were a PLOS article (for those who don't know that's where people can publish almost anything without peer review) and a book written by a journalist that I'm gonna audiobook but based on reviews appears to be conspiracist in its own writing.
I also find it odd that there's all this criticism of inaccessible science writing and reductive pop science writing while using inaccessible academic language and reductive representation of publishing and research processes.
I'm in the sections now where she goes back to actual invasive species stuff and it's good again. The book mostly feels grounded and well researched so I don't mean for my crit here of a fraction of it to be misrepresentative.
