This was way more interesting than I expected (I’m not the kind of person who innately cares about cults). I’ve been really feeling Amanda Montell’s linguistic approach to different aspects of our society.

This was less about the inner workings of specific cults, and more about how cultish language is literally everywhere. From social media influencers, to fitness culture, to pyramid schemes, and the typical bad guys we think of when we think of a cult.

It was really illuminating and it completely sidestepped the usual stereotyping of people who join cults—because it turns out we’re all a part of at least one cult, linguistically speaking.

It had that same ‘neither here nor there’ writing style as Wordslut, which isn’t my fav (and why they’ve both been knocked down to a four star). I like my nonfiction to have either a tighter argument style or be more ‘here is some facts, draw your own conclusions.’ But that’s just personal preference.