The 100-Mile Diet- A Year of Local Eating

Co-authored by Alisa Smith & J.B. MacKinnon, a couple who decided to try a local-eating experiment for one year, limiting themselves to a 100-mile radius surrounding their Vancouver home. By now everyone's heard of the 100-mile diet, and these are the two who coined it. Overall it was a good read, both engaging and inspiring, it had some great facts about our current global food system, some new and some I'd heard before. It definitely argues some of the common disbeliefs: I can't do this if I live in a city (they did), or it's a diet designed only for their area (they polled lots of farmers in various areas and the consensus seemed to be that if agriculture is possible in your area, so is eating local).

A couple of minor beefs though: the running commentary about relationship discontent, as far as I can tell, has no contribution to the storyline and seems misplaced. (Or maybe it is the discontent in general, which Smith expresses and seems to blame on- though ultimately fails to connect to, thus the seeming irrelevance- our culture's disconnectedness with nature and mass consumerism.) And then there is the sometimes borderline melodrama- maybe it's a characteristic of (some) writers in general, to embellish or dramatize events for the sake of story, but when it's non-fiction, and you're reading about something familiar, it's both obvious and ridiculous. Example: it is common knowledge that the earthquakes of Vancouver Island, generally minor occurrences, will cause a devastating quake sometime in the next 200 years (which works out to be something like a 5% chance of it happening today). It's not as if people walk around waiting for the sky to fall on them, but according to this book they do, all that and more:

"It is both exciting and horrible to know that the earth beneath your feet is constantly shifting. My whole generation, I think, feels these tensions. No one I know seems able to settle into one calling or one place."

Maybe it's just me, but I find this kind of stuff annoying. If I met anyone in real life who walked around daily freaking out about the minor chance of major earthquakes, I probably wouldn't be rushing out to read their memoir. I mean, I had no idea that the discontentedness and inability to commit of people today had to do with.... earthquakes. Nothing to do with being constantly bombarded by 300 to 3000 advertisements every day telling us we should be discontented with our lot (and therefore, buy more). Nope. Not that. It's the earthquakes, fellas. Golly.

Anyway, ranting aside, despite being a little overdone in small moments (and much less so than 'Animal, Vegetable, Miracle', I might add) I still found it a good and worthwhile read, good food for thought, and worth recommending. Read it, and hopefully find ways to live it!

How To Be Good by Nick Hornby

Yep, another Nick Hornby book, but you just can't beat his fabulous writing. This book was still a pleasure to read despite the fact that I wasn't too fond of the story... A middle-aged woman is fed up with her cynical husband, unhappy with her life, and contemplating divorce. Meanwhile, the husband has a sort of spiritual experience and suddenly loses all of his pessimism and cynicism for life. Overnight, he has become everything the wife has wished for- he is good and kind and considerate- but is it really what she wants?

Anyway, too much mid-life cynicism and crisis for me to really connect with or enjoy (I can't say I'm a fan of reading about the nothing-to-do-but-accept-how-depressing-life-is storyline) but in spite of all of that, I found it enjoyable and the writing itself a pleasure to read. But probably wouldn't really recommend it.

High Fidelity by Nick Hornby

Another good read by Nick Hornby, I must confess that 'About A Boy' hooked me so deep that I've gone out and read everything else of his I can get my hands on. There's no denying that he is a fabulous writer, whip-smart and funny, even though this book didn't strike quite the same chords as AbAB. Partly I think because I could relate more personally to the other book, but I think also because AbAB was more heartfelt (while still witty) whereas 'High Fidelity' was much more humourous. Once again, they did a fabulous job of turning the book into a movie, and I would have to say the book and the movie are on pretty equal par. Definitely worth reading.

About A Boy by Nick Hornby

Picked up this book because I loved the movie version of it (it's for sure on my top ten- heh heh, that's a little High Fidelity reference though, we'll get to that later) and figured all that wit had to be based on something. I didn't like the writing style at first, but persevered because of my good faith in the movie, and it didn't take long to adjust to the Hornby's writing style and really get into it. I loved it- I loved the writing style, the humour, the story, and the themes- relationships and community and family. Such a good read. Quick and sharp. I won't bother getting into the plot. If you've seen the movie, you already know. If you haven't seen the movie... maybe you should.

This is one rare case where I thought that the movie was as good as the book- in some ways better, because all of the ideas from the book are condensed and crystallized and so perhaps pack a bit more punch. But on the other hand, it was really enjoyable to have all of those ideas elaborated upon on the page and I certainly didn't mind those extra pages of great reading. As quick a read as it is, it gave a great satisfaction upon finishing- everything about it was just right I'd say.

Water For Elephants by Sara Gruen

I read this on a friend's recommendation. The story is about a young man who joins a circus, having just gotten out of veterinary college. It's a good book, the type that swallows you up into another place. The characters are interesting and maybe the best part is simply learning about what circus life was like back in its heyday. The plot itself keeps a good pace although as things started to snowball towards the climax I started skipping paragraphs in order to get there faster. Guess I'm not one for suspense!

Stardust by Neil Gaiman

There are probably a few people who've read this book, seeing as I borrowed it from the family bookshelf. Neil Gaiman seems to be the It guy of fantasy these days, with his name popping up everywhere. Having read this book, I can say that he seems well-deserving of it.

Stardust, to me, had everything a classic fantasy novel should have, with a magical world that is both long ago and far away but with enough here-and-now to give it a sense of timelessness yet also of having taken place not-so-long ago. The villains are appropriately wicked, there are plenty of magical elements, and the plot keeps a brisk pace without leaving out any of the elements that make for a satisfying read. I definitely found it both amusing and engaging!

Through Black Spruce by Joseph Boyden

I borrowed this book from the library on the basis that it won the Giller Prize, having read all of last year's nominees which, although weren't all necessarily my type of book, were all very well-written, good reads (and last year's Giller Prize winner made it into the ranks of my all-time favourite books.) This year's winner did not disappoint and was engaging from page one.

Set in Moosonee, far in northern Ontario near James Bay, the story alternates between an old Cree bush pilot and his niece, jumping from past to present to follow their paths to the current circumstances. Mixed in is a lot of story about life in this small town far north in Ontario, I enjoyed the descriptions of hunting, fishing, and trapping and the beauty and isolation of the surrounding wilderness. The story revolves around an old rivalry between two families in the town and the two main characters, Will Bird who battles with the sorrows of his past and tries to protect his loved ones, and his niece Annie Bird who goes south to search for her disappeared sister and for her own identity. It's beautifully written and a pleasure to read and the characters are well-developed and engaging. I enjoyed it so much that I am going to reserve all of this authour's other books for future reading! Read it!

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver

"Barbara Kingsolver and her family sweep readers along on their journey away from the industrial-food pipeline to a rural life in which they vow to buy only food raised in their own neighborhood, grow it themselves, or learn to live without it." -from inside book jacket-

I was inspired by some of Tach's reads about the food industry to do a little reading in this area too, figuring that I enjoy reading about cooking and nutrition, and this book was a pretty good introduction. Barbara Kingsolver is a fiction novelist so this non-fiction memoir about her family's commitment to eating only locally-grown food for one year was as engaging as a good fiction novel. It's a nice, broad read on the US food industry as it intersects with the farming industry and the politics, economics, and energy costs involved in bringing food to today's table, going into all kinds of topics such as local eating, food security, sustainable farming, food policy, organic versus conventional farming, fair trade, nutrition, big business, and preserving farming traditions and heirloom seeds. The book doesn't go into so much depth as to overwhelm you but I think it gives enough information to really motivate change and provides some good resources for further research, too.

If you're interested in the local food movement and understanding why it's important, this is a good book choice. If you are already well-read on this topic then maybe not so much. The authour undertook this project around the same time as other local food projects such as the authours of the 100 Mile Diet and Gary Paul Nabhan's local food project in the Arizona desert, but Kingsolver wanted to prove that you didn't have to be an extremist to eat local (that being said, some people might not consider homemade cheese-making and turkey-breeding exactly typical of the average person) and I would say that it is written for a general audience. I did find her to be a tad too earnest at times (y'know- such a noble, valiant quest and all) but I guess that comes with the enthusiasm of any new project. All in all a pretty good read!