"Chu is a careful reader—when she takes someone down, it’s with the scalpel of obsession rather than the mere might of a chainsaw. Better yet, her work surprises us." —Grace Byron, Los Angeles Review of Books
"At the level of the sentence—one of my favorite levels—Chu is hard to match. She can be biting, and she can be beautiful. She can make language do anything she wants without even breaking a sweat." —Becca Rothfeld, The Washington Post
"Chu not only demonstrates the value of criticism at its boldest and, yes, most authoritative but also finds a way to effectively marry—in a way that her predecessors often struggled with—experience and expertise, aesthetics and politics.” —Kevin Lozano, The Nation
"Chu is refreshingly strident in her defense of politicizing art and culture criticism, rejecting mannered neutrality in favor of fervent politics, presented in playfully poisonous prose . . . What if, she asks, rather than an artist-cum-patriot, the critic was a simple “craftsman”? This is not a demotion, but an expansion of the critic’s possibilities as a political actor: from tyrant or complicit bureaucrat to spy, saboteur, or jester, from pretentious arbiter to loquacious mystic, channeling a spirit in impassioned directions rather than simply following its currents." —Emmeline Clein, Cultured
"Chu is one of our keenest critics . . . When she has an opinion it is with authority, the kind bestowed by many followers, awards, and true laser-perception . . . Humor, grit, psychoanalysis, despair, and measured lashes fill the pages of Authority. Few are as precise, even when she plays it fast and loose. Few can cut to the marrow." —Grace Byron, The Whitney Review
"Chu writes about culture, all of it . . . [She] employs her considerable expertise to argue that criticism can and should leave behind theoretical nitpicking and address the big, dangerous global issues at hand." —Bethanne Patrick, Los Angeles Times
“Every time Andrea Long Chu, the Pulitzer Prize-winning critic for New York Magazine, publishes a new essay, I make time to read it slowly, thoughtfully, and with relish . . . Chu’s subjects are wide-ranging but always relevant, and her critiques of The Last of Us, The Phantom of the Opera, and Zadie Smith rank amongst my favorites. If you care about culture in any of its endless forms, you should be reading Chu.” —Lauren Puckett-Pope, Elle
"Chu moves nimbly between genres, interleaving memoir, history, and polemic. Her acrobatic chains of reasoning are punctuated by bracing pronouncements. She is funny . . . Chu remains one of our most energetically clever writers." —Sam Huber, The Yale Review
"An extraordinary treatise on what it means to be critical . . . It’s a masterwork in criticism and an ode to the form itself . . . This is a book that made me want to be a better critic and writer, and one that reminded me exactly why it is I seek out Chu’s writing wherever it’s published." —Nic Harvey, Washington Independent Review of Books
"The Pulitzer Prize–winning critic examines everything from The Phantom of the Opera to social media, weaving a compelling narrative about how criticism, now more than ever, presents a solution to our current crises." —Eva M. Baron, The Millions
"Authority reveals that to be critical is not necessarily about gathering all the information you possibly can in order to poke holes in a piece of art, but more about organizing the knowledge you’re tending and then applying it to the media you’re consuming. Why do you love what you love, and why do you devote yourself to your own personal temples of entertainment? Chu asks a lot of her subjects, but she asks just as much of herself, and the result is the finest criticism of our time." —Cat Acree, Bookpage
"This brilliant collection from Chu showcases the Pulitzer Prize–winning critic’s reflections on literature, television, and the art of criticism . . . Intellectually rigorous and lucidly argued, this affirms Chu’s status as one of the most incisive critics working today." —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Chu is provocative, disruptive and very funny, and her criticism is as blistering as it is well-informed . . . Within these essays, we see Chu’s brain at work and at play, over many years and across various forms of media. " —Bookpage (starred review)
"This is an exciting book . . . [Chu] is fearless." —Joumana Khatib, The New York Times Book Review podcast
"Chu is an insightful writer with a sharp eye and little tolerance for hypocrisy. This is a sparkling read, timely and relevant." —Booklist
"A critic wields a sharp scalpel. . . [Chu's] stance is nothing less than assertive, uncompromising ... [an] acerbic social and cultural critique." —Kirkus
"I can’t wait to disappear into this collection of essays from one of my favorite critics . . . tackling culture in all its forms—and also, in two new essays, taking on criticism itself, and how it should (or can) be practiced today. If anyone should know, it’s Chu." —LitHub
"Stirringly precise." —Emma Alpern, Vulture
"[Chu's] book and television reviews astutely examine some of the most fraught topics of our current cultural moment in often breathtaking ways. Authority, her first book since winning the award, explores the role of serious criticism in a world of unadulterated opinions." —Electric Literature
“The moral clarity and seriousness of purpose throughout Andrea Long Chu’s Authority feels so correct, so inevitable in her prose, one almost forgets how rare it is. In an era of ethical infantilization, shitty cynicisms, and limpid rhetorical hygienics, Chu names exactly, irreducibly, what she sees and feels and believes. It’s thrilling, riding the vortical currents of such a singular—generational—mind. Like all truly great works of criticism, Authority makes remaining alive feel not just possible but worthwhile.” —Kaveh Akbar, author of Martyr!
“On top of being a galaxy-brain-level thinker, Andrea Long Chu has the grace to be a generous hostess. You came for wonders of discernment—and those she will show you—but all the while she’s cracking jokes, warming a fire, disclosing catty gossip, and passing you tasty treats. Within these pages is the best salon in contemporary America.” —Torrey Peters, author of Detransition, Baby
“Andrea Long Chu is one of the most charismatic and original thinkers at work today. These essays made me want to call a friend and get into an argument—about literature, about culture, about life. With style and bracing humor, she has located the exact pulse of our moment and taken its measure. A writer and critic to be reckoned with.” —Brandon Taylor, author of The Late Americans
“Reading Andrea Long Chu is always an exhortation to dismantle some authority—outer, inner, or usually both. Chu demands we think counterintuitively, radically, and exactingly, with paradoxical precision and irreverent urgency. This collection coalesces around the dialectic of freedom and authority—a binary dismantlement increasingly vital to us as thinkers, readers, and citizens.” —Lexi Freiman, author of The Book of Ayn
“It is not enough, as Andrea Long Chu rightly sees it, for criticism to ask questions of art—readers are owed an honest stab at them. And Chu’s reputation for edge is well-earned. She wants, we want, as do the impressive range of cultural objects at her disposal. At her command, these wanting blobs—art, ourselves—acquire discipline in a form we should be so lucky to call criticism.” —Lauren Michele Jackson, author of White Negroes
