Confused and confusing. Odell's conception of the "attention economy" is muddy enough that the critique ends up being hopelessly disorganized.

A charitable way to describe it would be that she attempts a kaleidoscopic vision of some better world, constantly jumping between reference points to pull out a passage here or a note there that some way illuminates what she wants us to strive for. But in practice, there ends up being meager light and mostly aimless vibes.

It's tough to write a book like this because the obvious answer, like with so many other problems, is we need to build a welfare state that removes precarity from people's lives so they can focus on other things than day-to-day survival—with everyone having the opportunity for escape and enlightened attention that Odell wants to give to the upper-middle-class. But a whole book just pounding that conclusion in would be repetitive, so we get this self-help goulash.

The book is certainly written for a specific audience, but it's one that doesn't include me.