Controversial: The Substack Essays

Polemics, 2022-2024

Between 2022 and 2024 contrarian polemicist Michael Mohr—author of three books: The Crew (punk rock YA); Two Years in New York: Before, During and After COVID (fictional memoir); and The Grim Room (suspense fiction)—wrote feverishly about the hot-button topics of his time. Eventually, after pumping out hundreds of thousands of words over the course of 450 posts over almost two-and-a-half years, Michael realized he had a book on his hands.

Covering a wide range of topics, from politics (the Trump assassination attempt; J.D. Vance; identity politics; Karl Marx) to culture (masculinity; tribalism; alcoholics anonymous; book banning on both sides) to literature and writing (Henry Miller; Bukowski; Nabokov; Kerouac; Orwell), this slim but powerful collection pulls no punches.

The entire collection is pulled from Mohr’s Substack, Sincere American Writing. And the essays are just that: Sincere, searing, honest and incisive. Mohr takes no central political stance. He remains “politically homeless.” He rejects authoritarianism and anti-democratic values on both sides of the aisle. No one is safe in Mohr’s world.