Annie
The Fate of Food by Amanda Little and Three Women by Lisa Taddeo
A couple of non-fiction titles have held my attention this month.
Amanda Little’s search for answers about the future of food production has led her over the course of several years to write The Fate of Food: What We’ll Eat in a Bigger, Hotter, Smarter World. Following the release of a report stating that climate change with irrevocably alter our world over the next 30 years (alongside all the other science that says we’re headed for disaster) I was feeling quite despondent. This book gave me some hope that while our situation is indeed dire, there are some very clever people working to solve or work around the issues that will arise for farmers and food producers in years to come.
Little has traveled from Uganda to Mexico to talk to people who are combining technology and traditional farming methods to varying degrees of success in order to battle drought, frost, rising sea levels and water shortages. She is frank about the mental hurdles she comes up against – for example her deep-seated prejudice against GMO food, which is challenged by multiple farmers and scientists. Far from being a stodgy science book, Little also weaves her own discoveries and experiences as a parent, a foodie and a failed gardener into the writing to create a fascinating look at how food is produced currently as well as how we will need to adapt into the future.
The other book that I’m part way through at the moment which is totally engrossing is Lisa Taddeo’s much-hyped Three Women. It is being hailed as Truman Capote for the #MeToo generation and it is a truly astounding work of longform journalism. Over the course of eight years, Taddeo found three women who agreed to share their stories and truly immersed herself in their lives, attempting to uncover female desire.
Maggie was a student when she began an affair with one of her teachers, which she remembers as her first love. Now that she is older, however, she is attempting to prosecute him for his inappropriate sexual conduct while she was still a minor – but does she want justice or attention? Sloane is a successful business woman living in Rhode Island who is happily married to a man who likes to watch her having sex with other men, which she also finds exhilarating. Lina is a small-town woman in an unhappy, sexless marriage and has recently taken up an affair with her high school boyfriend, with whom she split up after being gang raped at a party in her youth. By submerging herself in these women’s very different and quite extreme stories, Taddeo manages to reveal truths about female relationships, self-esteem, bodies, sexuality and the desires that underpin all of our actions – whether they are acted upon or not. The writing is lyrical, hypnotic and sometimes painfully real, but Taddeo manages to honour and uphold her subjects with great dignity even as they share their most vulnerable thoughts.
Charmaine
I am having a great time reading the 5th book in Kate Atkinson’s private eye series revolving around her beloved character, Jackson Brodie. But don’t worry if you haven’t read the others, this one stands alone and you will be rewarded. Some of this is laugh out loud funny, some very detailed human experiences, a cast of fabulous characters and a very sinister storyline running through it.
It has taken 9 years for this 5th book in the series and you won’t be disappointed.
