Matthew D’Ancona’s Post-Truth is a brilliant assessment of our world today. He analyses the concept of post-truth and the circumstances through which it came to dominate – arguing that Trump is a symptom of post-truth not a cause of it. He looks at how post-truth affects our society today in the form of fake news, conspiracy theories, and the devaluation of science and truth. He explains how people can be presented with incontrovertible proof that something is untrue but the conspiracy theories they have allied themselves with allow them to force causation and meaning onto an event – this is more comforting to them than the cold facts that leave them fearing a world where bad things just happen. If they can find someone or something (the government, big pharma) to blame then they feel more secure. He helps makes sense of the phenomenon so that we can arm ourselves against it. This is quite a chilling read but it is fascinating and hugely relevant. It does offer up some hope too. The subhead of the book is very important - ‘The war on truth and how to fight back’ – because D’Ancona gives guidance for how ordinary people can resist and fight back against this situation. He aims to provide us with the tools to fight back – encouraging the reader to be their own fact checker, to check whether a story comes from a legitimate source, to use fact-checking websites. Well worth a read.

A really compelling read. D'Ancona's deft writing is intensely thought provoking and highly relevant to the state of the world today.