*received for free from netgalley for honest review* Really interesting, great read, have recommended it to several people already

The statistic gathering and analysis contained in this book were both incredibly thorough and well-compiled, with a lot of credence given to the way in which socioeconomic factors influence the culture of fear in the United States of America. This book provides an interesting base for a lot of assertions that have been floated since time immemorial regarding American biases, political leanings, and consumption of certain types of media (looking at you, Fox News).

My difficulty with this book is that it does seem somewhat restricted in its analysis (I'm unsure if this is because it was developed from a thesis or something of that nature), but I wish it had delved deeper into the sociological reasoning behind fear. The media output correlated with fear sentiment at a given time (i.e. during particular social events) would have been interesting to see as a graph as well- there was a more generalised variant of this but a bit more depth would have been wonderful. A full analysis of the scientific and social mechanisms behind fear also would have gone far.

I really feel like this is an important book in a lot of ways, and it reveals a uniquely American plague of suspicion surrounding absurd things. Fear of zombies is higher up on a fear list than many debilitating illnesses and the maltreatment of others- a terrifying fact if I've ever seen one. While this book isn't representative of the entire country, it focuses on a reasonably sized cohort, which is a scary thing to mull over in the future thinking back on this title.