http://www.goodreads.com/review/list_rss/769376 en-US Thu, 07 Feb 2008 19:26:03 -0800 60 http://www.goodreads.com/ 200 41 http://www.goodreads.com/images/layout/gr_logo.gif 14872092 Thu, 07 Feb 2008 19:26:03 -0800
author: Sarah Vowell
name: Spencer
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2006
rating: 4
read at: 02/08
date added: 02/07/08
shelves:
review:
I learned lots of presidential assassination arcana from this [audio]book. Also that I have a crush on Sarah Vowell. I'd recommend the audiobook just cause she reads it, though the special guests (Dave Eggers, Jon Stewart etc.) are an added bonus.
]]> 13403731 Thu, 07 Feb 2008 19:23:28 -0800
This book was really eye opening. I think (or thought) of myself as having a pretty healthy diet-- I have the whole wheat blend flaxseed enhanced pasta, the total cereal with nonfat soy milk, the bran muffins and the fish oil capsules.

I AM A DUPE! I've been sucked into the cult of "nutritionism" as Pollans calls it, the belief that what's healthy about the food are the identified micronutrients it contains, and that foods are either healthful elixers or near poisons, depending on whether or not they contain the nutritional demon of the moment (once this was saturated fat, now it's trans fats). I was a believer in progress-- I regularly two-fist diet coke and tasti-d-lite, drink the vitamin water and snack on the bars-- the luna, the balance, the zone. Yes, I notice that the more we Americans seem to discover about the inner workings of food, the fatter and sicker we seem to become, but I figured that was just because we don't know how to control ourselves and we, as a culture, drive everywhere.

Pollans' theory is so simple, so obvious, it makes me kind of angry I didn't notice it before. Scientists obviously don't know a lot about the inner workings of food-- nutrition is a new science, and we've witnessed such faddish changes in its fundamental precepts (margarine is better for you! antioxidants will prevent cancer! carbs are the cornerstone of a healthy diet! carbs are SATAN!) we should already be skeptical of its claims. We know so little about how food really works in the body that it's preposterous to think that we could reengineer it better than nature could. Even the produce we grow-- so carefully engineered to produce high yields and easily transportable produce, has fewer nutrients than the same food did in the 1940s. The modern, largely refined and processed, "western diet" is lethal, fattening, and leads to chronic diseases unknown in societies that eat much simpler, traditional foodstuffs. If we're so good at food science, how come we're so much worse off?

So he advises us to eat food (as in, something our great grandmothers would recognize as such-- not, in his example, a "go-gurt" squeezable yogurt tube), not too much, and mostly plants. This is enormously freeing. Until you try to avoid eating processed foods, in which case it also becomes enormously challenging. And time consuming, and expensive.

But if you can do it, it's worth it. He doesn't promise a panacea, and his recommendations don't make any health claims. That's the point. There is a mystery to the foods themselves-- how they have evolved to satisfy and sustain us-- and an art to bringing that food forth from the earth. This book is a reminder of what nutritionism taught us to forget.

]]>
author: Michael Pollan
name: Spencer
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2008
rating: 5
read at: 01/08
date added: 02/07/08
shelves:
review:
Thanks for the reminder to update, Ethan!

This book was really eye opening. I think (or thought) of myself as having a pretty healthy diet-- I have the whole wheat blend flaxseed enhanced pasta, the total cereal with nonfat soy milk, the bran muffins and the fish oil capsules.

I AM A DUPE! I've been sucked into the cult of "nutritionism" as Pollans calls it, the belief that what's healthy about the food are the identified micronutrients it contains, and that foods are either healthful elixers or near poisons, depending on whether or not they contain the nutritional demon of the moment (once this was saturated fat, now it's trans fats). I was a believer in progress-- I regularly two-fist diet coke and tasti-d-lite, drink the vitamin water and snack on the bars-- the luna, the balance, the zone. Yes, I notice that the more we Americans seem to discover about the inner workings of food, the fatter and sicker we seem to become, but I figured that was just because we don't know how to control ourselves and we, as a culture, drive everywhere.

Pollans' theory is so simple, so obvious, it makes me kind of angry I didn't notice it before. Scientists obviously don't know a lot about the inner workings of food-- nutrition is a new science, and we've witnessed such faddish changes in its fundamental precepts (margarine is better for you! antioxidants will prevent cancer! carbs are the cornerstone of a healthy diet! carbs are SATAN!) we should already be skeptical of its claims. We know so little about how food really works in the body that it's preposterous to think that we could reengineer it better than nature could. Even the produce we grow-- so carefully engineered to produce high yields and easily transportable produce, has fewer nutrients than the same food did in the 1940s. The modern, largely refined and processed, "western diet" is lethal, fattening, and leads to chronic diseases unknown in societies that eat much simpler, traditional foodstuffs. If we're so good at food science, how come we're so much worse off?

So he advises us to eat food (as in, something our great grandmothers would recognize as such-- not, in his example, a "go-gurt" squeezable yogurt tube), not too much, and mostly plants. This is enormously freeing. Until you try to avoid eating processed foods, in which case it also becomes enormously challenging. And time consuming, and expensive.

But if you can do it, it's worth it. He doesn't promise a panacea, and his recommendations don't make any health claims. That's the point. There is a mystery to the foods themselves-- how they have evolved to satisfy and sustain us-- and an art to bringing that food forth from the earth. This book is a reminder of what nutritionism taught us to forget.


]]> 12540655 Thu, 24 Jan 2008 10:33:19 -0800
Addendum: Finished it. Nice epilogue too. Fraser made her out to be a sympathetic, but also flawed, figure. This makes her story all the more tragic, and also situates it in the larger picture of the changing nature of government in Europe. To a certain extent, Marie Antoinette was born into the end of the era of monarchal rule and extravagant court culture, and so very publicly went down on what was really a much larger sinking ship.

Also, the narrator actually mispronounced "eschew." Unless it's a Britishism.]]>
author: Antonia Fraser
name: Spencer
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2002
rating: 3
read at: 01/08
date added: 01/24/08
shelves:
review:
I'm listening to the audiobook. It's good, not cheesy salacious historical biofiction, but still engaging. I've learned a lot so far (I'm on cd 12 of 17 (!)) about Marie Antoinette that runs contrary to what I'd been taught growing up. I can't wait to rewatch the movie when I'm done, since it was based off of this biographer's exhaustively detailed portrayal. That said, you'd be better off with the actual book, because the narrator has a delightful British accent but apparently no knowledge of French, and I frequently find myself cringing on her behalf. Almost as bad as when I listened to the Da Vinci Code (please, G-d, let me have those hours of my life back) and the narrator described the Jewish notion of the feminine divine not as "shecheeNAH" or even "sheCHEEnah" but as "sheCHInah," striking an unfortunate (though apropos) rhyme with "vagina."

Addendum: Finished it. Nice epilogue too. Fraser made her out to be a sympathetic, but also flawed, figure. This makes her story all the more tragic, and also situates it in the larger picture of the changing nature of government in Europe. To a certain extent, Marie Antoinette was born into the end of the era of monarchal rule and extravagant court culture, and so very publicly went down on what was really a much larger sinking ship.

Also, the narrator actually mispronounced "eschew." Unless it's a Britishism.
]]> 12540101 Thu, 24 Jan 2008 10:25:32 -0800
author: Stephen King
name: Spencer
average rating: 4.11
book published: 1977
rating: 3
read at: 01/08
date added: 01/24/08
shelves:
review:
So scary once when I was reading it I slept with the light on. Enough said.
]]> 12540364 Thu, 24 Jan 2008 10:23:51 -0800
Having finished it... it was cute. I'd give it three and a half stars if it would let me. It made me laugh out loud often, squicked me at regular intervals and offered some of the most hilarious euphemisms for sexual behaviors and body parts I'd ever heard.

This book was saved from being just kind of sardonic and gross by near cliche of the down-on-his-luck private investigator with the heart of gold who manages somehow to be one step ahead of everyone else when it matters. Not that he doesn't end up meeting unsavory characters in some rather unfortunate situations. What prevents this from being a cliche is the freaky updating of the seedy underbelly in which he travels, and the fact that his lady companion is self-described as "very multiple" and polyamorous. I do think this is the only gumshoe novel in existence in which the main character ends up with his testicles full of saline and in a megaherpetophile (dinosaur) porn theater. Which brings me to my final point: You will learn more about kink than you probably ever wanted to know. Ever.]]>
author: Warren Ellis
name: Spencer
average rating: 3.72
book published: 2007
rating: 3
read at: 01/08
date added: 01/24/08
shelves:
review:
It's really funny, but I'm not sure I *like* it yet. And I find his frequent chapter breaks really annoying. Like if you want to pause, put some space in, but don't start a new chapter if you're not going to switch gears at all. I get disoriented when I start the next chapter and it follows to closely what came before, although I'm often glad the scene isn't over.

Having finished it... it was cute. I'd give it three and a half stars if it would let me. It made me laugh out loud often, squicked me at regular intervals and offered some of the most hilarious euphemisms for sexual behaviors and body parts I'd ever heard.

This book was saved from being just kind of sardonic and gross by near cliche of the down-on-his-luck private investigator with the heart of gold who manages somehow to be one step ahead of everyone else when it matters. Not that he doesn't end up meeting unsavory characters in some rather unfortunate situations. What prevents this from being a cliche is the freaky updating of the seedy underbelly in which he travels, and the fact that his lady companion is self-described as "very multiple" and polyamorous. I do think this is the only gumshoe novel in existence in which the main character ends up with his testicles full of saline and in a megaherpetophile (dinosaur) porn theater. Which brings me to my final point: You will learn more about kink than you probably ever wanted to know. Ever.
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