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  "path": "/post/212019/jd-vance-new-book-reviews",
  "publishedAt": "2026-06-17T21:26:42.000Z",
  "site": "https://newrepublic.com",
  "tags": [
    "Breaking News",
    "Politics",
    "Republican Party",
    "Donald Trump",
    "J.D. Vance",
    "Books",
    "Review",
    "Memoir",
    "Catholicism",
    "Christianity",
    "Christian Right",
    "Goodreads",
    "The Cut",
    "The Wall Street Journal",
    "The Atlantic"
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  "textContent": "The reviews are rolling in, and it’s clear that Vice President JD Vance’s new book _Communion_ is not the next _Hillbilly Elegy_ —not even close.\n\nTen years after Vance released his bestselling book that was made into a major motion picture, he has released _Communion_ , a reflection on his late-in-life conversion to the Catholic faith that has already earned a meager 1.27 stars on Goodreads. Apparently reading it is painful.\n\n“I got a colonoscopy on Friday,” Ginny Hogan wrote for The Cut. “If only that were the least pleasant experience of my last week. But no, that would be when I pulled an all-nighter on Monday reading _Communion_.”\n\n“Vance’s hypocrisy alone makes _Communion_ nearly unreadable,” Hogan wrote.\n\n“You don’t need me to tell you this, but he is not a good Catholic,” she wrote. “A good Catholic would never support [Donald] Trump’s hateful immigration policies, cruel Medicaid cuts, hatred toward trans children, and unnecessary foreign wars.”\n\nHogan also criticized Vance for how he managed to say so much about Second Lady Usha Vance, “without saying anything at all.”\n\n“Vance came to fame on his writing talent, and all he could muster to describe his wife of 12 years were ‘beauty’ and ‘intelligence.’ JD, ask ChatGPT for some synonyms! Be romantic,” Hogan wrote.\n\nThe Wall Street Journal’s Barton Swaim wrote that the book suffered from “egregious sloppiness.”\n\nSwaim found that Vance oversimplified complex issues and misunderstood research he cited. “Whether Mr. Vance’s error arose from laziness or dishonesty or something else, I don’t know, but alas it typifies the low regard he has for people who profess views he dislikes,” he wrote.\n\nThe Atlantic’s Alexandra Petri similarly called out Vance’s frothy phrasing that seemed to lack any understanding of his source material. “Here’s Vance’s gloss on the Book of Job and the problem of suffering: ‘We are like golden retrievers trying to understand how an iPhone functions.’ Well, the Book of Job left me troubled, but that golden-retriever analogy has fixed things!”\n\nAnd Christopher Howse, for _The Telegraph_ , wrote that _Communion_ simply “lacks the raw impact of _Hillbilly Elegy_.”",
  "title": "Everyone Hates JD Vance’s New Book"
}