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4.1 AVERAGE
4.1 AVERAGE
funny
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
The Kingsolver family share with us the lessons they have learned not only from their having spent a year surviving on mostly what they could grow on their farm in Appalachia, but with their background in the biological sciences at well. They range as diverse as how the military industrial complex has led to high fructose corn syrup in many of our foods to how you can get vegetables into your kids' chocolate chip cookies. One of my all time favorite books that I recommend for anyone wanting to be a more engaged environmental citizen.
4.5 stars. It took awhile for me to get into this one. It started out a bit dry and, dare I say, slightly self-satisfied. However, once the year of local eating got rolling, I was really into it. Her tone became much more endearing and laugh-out-loud funny at times. The sidebars were dry but contained necessary information.
This is a life style that my family is trying to move toward. I learned a lot, filling the pages with book darts and annotations. My husband is about to start reading it as well. Overall, it was really good. I will be referencing it often. I am also now inspired to make our own cheese, which was unexpected.
This is a life style that my family is trying to move toward. I learned a lot, filling the pages with book darts and annotations. My husband is about to start reading it as well. Overall, it was really good. I will be referencing it often. I am also now inspired to make our own cheese, which was unexpected.
Stands out among books of this type that I've read (accounts of people's experiments with their lives: not buying things for a year, or in this instance eating only locally produced food for a year) due to Kingsolver's lovely writing style. Whether you end up agreeing with her conclusions or not (and I view them pretty favorably), there's plenty here to make you consider our national food system and the affects your eating choices have in a broad sense.
I picked this up as an audio cd because it was read by her and her husband and one of her daughters who also co-authored the book. And it was sooooooooooooo good! It was the most entertaining, informative, and at times devastating book I've 'read' for awhile. I was constantly scribbling down ideas of things I wanted to try or look into. Making my own bread has been so awesome and easy, and I'm soooo looking forward to the treats in my new bread book I just picked up, mmm! Cheese making is the next endeavor; it is supposed to be muy facil as well.
I really appreciated her exploration of relationships, relationships between people and food, between land and animal, modern urban living and consciousness. And as always her stories. So many amazing connections and moments because she took the time to notice them. It wasn't propaganda without room for questions and discovery, or idealism without accounting for differences in circumstance. It was practical poetry.
Someday I am going to see a field of fireflies.
I really appreciated her exploration of relationships, relationships between people and food, between land and animal, modern urban living and consciousness. And as always her stories. So many amazing connections and moments because she took the time to notice them. It wasn't propaganda without room for questions and discovery, or idealism without accounting for differences in circumstance. It was practical poetry.
Someday I am going to see a field of fireflies.
it took me a bit to really get into this but I'm so glad I stuck with it. very informative & interesting.
Victory gardens are in! If you want to know how to grow yours, this is a good book to start reading - one month at a time. If you are already doing it, this is a well written refresher course. If you just want to know what all the fuss is about, read this book. My one criticism is that it does get too preachy, but just when you think you can't take it anymore, Kingsolver takes you to Italy! Or to Dia de Los Muertos.
The book is about her family's journey through one year during their vow to eat only home grown or locally grown food. Is that even possible in this day and age? Here is a quote from Alice in Wonderland that Kingsolver came across during her journey:
"There is no use trying,' Alice said, 'One can't believe impossible things.'
"I daresay you haven't had much practice,' said the Queen, 'when I was your age, I always did it for half-an-hour a day. Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast."'
- A farmer's daughter myself, I long for fresh garden food and thought I had a pretty good handle on it, but this book helped expand my imagination and my garden. Give it a try!
The book is about her family's journey through one year during their vow to eat only home grown or locally grown food. Is that even possible in this day and age? Here is a quote from Alice in Wonderland that Kingsolver came across during her journey:
"There is no use trying,' Alice said, 'One can't believe impossible things.'
"I daresay you haven't had much practice,' said the Queen, 'when I was your age, I always did it for half-an-hour a day. Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast."'
- A farmer's daughter myself, I long for fresh garden food and thought I had a pretty good handle on it, but this book helped expand my imagination and my garden. Give it a try!
my sister loved this book. I liked it, though wasn't as in love with it as she. It has cool seasonal recipes that the family has come up with during their year of living locally. I enjoyed the descriptions and discussions of what it really means to grow and harvest your own food.
As with everything Kingsolver writes, the prose is stellar. We are immersed in the landscape of the garden, telescoping periodically to look at American food habits as a whole. I'm not sure how many of the facts have changed in the decades since the book was published, but gardening is still the same and the recipes are still delicious!
I feel like this book needs two separate star ratings. Five for content and instigation to action, two for tone. While I loved all the information and would seriously now love more than anything to plow out all of our backyard grass and just plant vegetables, there were times that I felt almost offended at the generalization of Americans as rude, uncaring, thoughtless consumers. Not all of us have the luxury of moving onto a fertile piece of land and starting our own family farm, and while she said she understood that was the case for most people in the book, she sure didn't convey that understanding in some of her more critical parts. I think many of us do our best to our part in the stewardship of our planet, choosing organic vegetables when when we can afford them, getting to the farmer's markets when we can, attempting to make changes in our homes to live more "green," and there were points in the book where I felt like those things wouldn't mean much to Kingsolver if I can't do it all, even if that is not what she intended. That said, there were several things she touched on that I had no idea about and challenges I have now issued myself as a consumer to meet. I was fascinated and enjoyed reading the anecdotes of their locavore year and learned a lot!
I love everything Kingsolver... and hope I still do even after reading this book. I am probably not the audience for Animal, Vegetable, Miracle but I found it to be a pretentious homage to Kingsolver's family. The paragraphs filled with interesting points I never knew would have been more poignant if they weren't bookended by paragraphs of praise from Kingsolver to the family she leads. I hope that this book doesn't taint my love for all other things Kingsolver.