The first thing you should know about Dave Rubin’s new book, Don’t Burn This Book is that a flurry of fake 1-star reviews have hit Amazon. It proves the point he makes in the book about the regressive Left and their cancel culture. I’m here to tell you I enjoyed the book. Let me tell you why.

Now, I’ll be honest and say that ideologically there weren’t any surprises here for me. I describe myself as a Constitutional Conservative and I live in California (born and raised!). A deep-blue state, I can’t escape the Left’s constant harangues and tantrums. However, this means I’m quite familiar with the Left’s dogma and that allows me to muster and hone my arguments.

Dave, on the other hand, the product of a liberal Jewish family, born and raised Democrat in Manhattan, was cosseted in an ideological echo chamber. Yet over the years, he started noticing all was not right in the leftwing realm he grew up in. Dave admits this book was first written as a recounting of his personal journey and the awakening that his own values and principles were no longer really a part of the ideology he with which he had comfortably identified.

Dave’s Road to Damascus is littered with sign posts, from fellow Young Turk Cenk Uygur flying into a racist rant against conservative commentator David Webb to the scorched-earth treatment of James Damore. Indeed, Dave dedicates his book “For Ben Afflect” because of Affleck’s irrational, screaming tantrum on Bill Maher’s show directed at both Sam Harris and Maher, calling them racists. That episode is what Dave identifies as his We are not in Kansas anymore, Toto moment.

But Don’t Burn This Book is much more than detailing a personal journey. It’s also a book of encouragement, offered with an open hand to other liberals caught in the same struggle he found himself in. This is where the book excels and why I enjoyed it. Dave’s humble candor. humor and sincerity are evident in every page. The same person I see in The Rubin Report is the same one writing in this book. There doesn’t seem to be a strident bone in his body, and rather than lashing out, he internalizes the attacks that have come his way. Sometimes at great personal cost. In November 2014, as his show gained popularity he was also experiencing what he calls a biblical flood of hate. He could ignore it from strangers, but he was receiving what can only be described as insane personal attacks from ostensible friends and former colleagues.

Suddenly, longtime friends are leaving venomous voice mails, calling me racist and misogynist. while others send emails denouncing me as a bigot who deserves to die.

It gets worse from there. Does Dave lash out? No, he gets develops alopecia areata and his hair starts falling out in clumps.

Dave recounts all this in a very straight-forward manner, not to garner sympathy but to demonstrate when he hit his ideological bottom — the tipping point he reached when he internalized all the vitriol and hate leveled at him by people he had trusted and had let into his life. He realizes that bottom, climbs out and offers this journey as encouragement to any distressed liberal reading a secret copy of his book while locked behind the bathroom door.

Dave isn’t afraid to show his personal defeats in this book. The first actual conservative he interviewed on his show was Larry Elder, who, as Dave admits,

Although I was prepared on one level — as the host asking all the questions — nothing could have prepared me for the red pill that Larry was going to put in my mouth and force me to swallow.

To Dave’s credit, he allowed the full interview, unedited, to be aired … where it lives in all its glory today on Youtube.

Throughout the book, Dave’s message is always “Don’t feel alone. Don’t be afraid. And if you let me, I can point you in the direction that will allow you to learn to live the authentic life that is yours by right.”

Don’t Burn This Book is a worthy addition to your book shelf. I’m certainly glad I bought it.

featured image, original artwork and composite of “Don’t Burn This Book” cover by VG Darleen Click