I have a complicated relationship with Puerto Rico. I'm ethnically Puerto Rican but I don't look it, never had a good grasp of the language, and have only visited once. I simultaneously want to have it be a bigger part of my identity and don't feel like I deserve to. But the least I could do is stay informed on what's going on down there.

This book was a pretty specific snapshot of 2018, just one year after Hurricane Maria, and what conditions on the ground were like. And I guess there's value in knowing what things were like in a pivotal time like that, but I almost feel like it was written too early? It sets up a ton of different directions the local economy, government, and culture could go in the post-disaster aftermath, and suggests that any change would be made quickly. So a part of me feels like only five years out, this book is probably already outdated? But I don't typically read contemporary nonfiction, so maybe that just comes with the territory for this kind of book.

Anyway it paints a pretty bleak picture for local autonomy and I feel more justified than ever in saying: fuck cryptobros.