Our very first event after opening the shop in August 2021 was with Vincent Bevins to discuss his masterpiece of History writing, the Jakarta Method. It was also the very first bookstore event he had done since publishing over a year earlier. Now we are delighted to announce he is coming back to launch the book he was working on when we last met him.



From 2010 to 2020, more people took part in protests than at any other point in human history. Why has success been so elusive?

From the so-called Arab Spring to Gezi Park in Turkey, from Ukraine’s Euromaidan to student rebellions in Chile and Hong Kong, the second decade of the twenty-first century was propelled by explosive mass demonstrations. But few people got what they wanted. In too many cases, the protests led to the opposite of what they asked for.

If We Burn is a stirring work of global history built around that strange but fundamental paradox. Acclaimed journalist Vincent Bevins interviewed hundreds of people around the world, and weaves their insights and recollections into a fast-paced, gripping narrative. We follow his own troubling experiences in Brazil, where a protest movement ignited by leftists and anarchists led to an extreme-right government that torched the Amazon.

In the mass protest decade, humanity demonstrated a deep desire for change, and brave individuals started something that has been left unfinished. In this ground-breaking study of an extraordinary chain of events, protesters and major actors offer urgent lessons for those who wish to understand geopolitics today, and create a better world tomorrow.



Vincent will be in conversation with our manager Darran. Tickets cost £6 and include a glass of wine or soft drink and £3 off the book.

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