ISBN: 0195313208
I wasn't sure what to expect when I started this book. Being overweight causes all sorts of problems, right? Well...maybe.
Starting with the point that obesity does not meet the definition of a disease until it's so high that only a fraction of Americans would qualify, he looks at why weight is so focused on.
The answers are, not surprisingly, industry, capitalism, and politics. There is a lot of money to be made if lots of people are "sick" and in "helping" them to get thin. Money means political power. Trying to be thin often causes diseases and damage and deaths well above what weight does.
The author makes the solid claim that fat is not the problem (with the exception of overweight does cause damage to joints). Fat is an effect of the problem that also causes everything laid at fat's door. There is no theorized method that fat makes one have diabetes--but the type of eating that would cause insulin resistance also causes fat. Losing the fat doesn't drop the chance of diabetes without also changing the lifestyle.
He makes the reasonable argument that the focus should be on fitness, not on weight. Someone who is fit is much less likely to have all sorts of diseases, no matter their weight, than someone who isn't fit, no matter their weight. Unfortunately, weight is an easy thing to terrorize people with and sell products to help, and an easy thing to check in a doctor's office, so that's where the focus is. Even if it's not an accurate measure of health.
One very excellent point he makes, and I knew the pieces but never connected them, is that the BMI scale is the same for men and women. Yet women are SUPPOSED to have more body fat than men, it's a gender difference in how our bodies work. So why is it the same, especially when BMI is weighted to favor the taller? I hadn't known the report used to justify lowering a "normal" BMI actually was in favor of raising it.
This was a very interesting & eye-opening book. The focus on weight in our culture is not healthy. It's distracting from the actual problems, results in discrimination, and actually causes a lot of health issues as people try to become something their body is not meant to be--making themselves unhealthy when they weren't.
With the help of plenty of companies willing to sell a method to get there...
IBSN: 0743267516
( RPS Review ).
ISBN: 0-915308-94-0
On first starting this book, it seems to ramble. Wander, ramble, not be well focused. Odd for a book on how to write. Even by the end, I would not hold this up as an example of excellent word craft/choice or sentence design.
On the other hand, it WORKS. I realized at some point that I had been pulled in, that she was speaking to ME and I was hearing. It has yet to be seen if I can put her ideas into practice, but they rang very true. The words just rang true, so the book seemed perfectly written. Stepping back and looking at pieces it didn't, but taking it as a whole, it just is.
Her main push is you have to be true when writing. Write what you felt, and this will infect the reader with the same feeling. In fiction SEE the characters--and editing just means seeing them clearly. If you can see them, then describe what they are doing, it will work. In non-fiction (which seemed to be more what she was talking about, though she did quote someone who said a lie in fiction is more glaring than in non-fiction) you need to write what you feel. Often the first inclination is the best. When editing, if you have written from within, it will be very obvious which sentences aren't and you can then fix those.
I also liked her idea for editing a story--if you don't think a story works, set it aside. Write two more. Then go back and read the first. It will be clear what didn't work and needs fixing!
Excellent quotes through the book as well. Sometimes I felt it was proof-by-famous-person (as we used to describe in grad school), but she well contained them within the writing and seemed so excited by them it was hard not to be. Not all of them spoke to me, but usually the thrill she had had when finding a discussion that clarified something for her was infectious.
Everyone is talented, original, and has something important to say. Everyone needs to exercise imagination/creativity and a great way to do that is writing. So sit down, and write for yourself, true, and worry not about anything but writing what you feel and see, be it seen outside or in your mind.
Good read, useful. Going on my keeper shelf
IBSN: 0674639316
This books takes a look at the viewpoints & situation of several French Feminists as they argued for women's rights as France went through its turmoil and repeated revolutions. The basic paradox is that feminists say politically there should be no difference between men & women--then politically act on behalf of women. There are others that come out, but that is the basic one.
Some of the women held to being women and claimed their rights that way, some did their best to minimize the differences and claimed that way. Others found other variants. All had some sameness and some difference with men, and the arguments they put forth were based on the political, philosophical, and social structure they found themselves in. The one who pointed to women's duties as proof of their rights was using that political argument. The one who claimed women on the basis that the state was House and home was women's sphere was working in another. One worked via the system--others staged demonstrations because they were barred from working within.
It was a difficult book to read to start with--not everyone interested in feminism speaks French and there was a bit much. After getting through the introduction--which was dense and very academic, laying out what was coming--the chapters on the women were easier. Still meaty, but easier to comprehend, probably because they were more concrete.
I am glad to have read it. It was not "fun" but it was well done non-fiction writing that presented many ideas I had not fully thought through, and a history I did not know.IBSN 1-59228-1737
It's now known that spending some percentage of your day not working, ie playing, is actually good for your productivity. So, what should you do, especially if your employer isn't forward thinking enough to actually let you away from your desk or condone such things? Enter desk toys!
Separated into the type of person who would enjoy them the most, this book provides a smorgasbord of ideas of ways to goof off while still being chained to your desk. Gadeteers will enjoy the soundbug to help avoid being caught by approaching bosses, executives are nearly required to have a pin art or small rock garden. The classics are here, with their own badge of honor who doesn't love Koosh balls and fighting nuns?
The authors attempted to rate the toys on various scales, two of which were chosen for each toy, such as chance of being fired if caught playing with it or status gained by owning it. The ratings seemed totally random so I quit looking at them fairly quickly. Didn't miss them, and the rest of the book more than stood on its own. The photography is good and the blurbs entertaining. There are enough shown that everyone should be able to find something that looks like fun, and they nicely include an index of where to purchase them if you find one you must have. (Hopefully most places are still in business!) I may have some holiday shopping planned out in advance this year!
But first, I need to find my Newton's Cradle...clack clack clack clack...Tom Christopher & Marty Asher
ISBN: 0-679-44814-4
Ha! Who knew a gardening book could be interesting and highly entertaining? Even if you don't garden, if you have any interest in green things that grow (even if you aren't so much into growing them), I recommend this book.
This was a very entertaining book that preached being realistic in gardening. 20 minutes is enough. Pick things that can be done in 20 minutes, have a healthy sense of what you want to do (do that) what you don't (then don't) and define gardening so it fits in 20 minutes and you enjoy it.
They split yard work and gardening. They do have some hints for making yardwork less work, but it isn't the focus of the book. (Hire a teen, make sure you don't have to back up to mow the lawn--if you do, move whatever it is or plant something else so you don't).
I was interested in their discussion of weeds, though I still am not going to eat mine. It was useful to be reminded the main problem with weeds is the soil is always disturbed. If it wasn't, then eventually non-weeds would take over.
They had quite a few 20 minute projects. I'm not convinced yet by the tubs. If I have to dig/store plants over winter I'm not doing it. On the other hand, the evening garden is fascinating and I might do that. I can put a trellis out back.
The author's play off each other. One is a horticulturist, the other is a city-transplant. I'm more on the city-transplant attitude (You want me to do what?! No, I'm not watering every day if it means hauling four hoses out every time. Why designs, can't we just plant something?)
I giggled through the book, learned some stuff, gained some motivation, and am now looking for two more books. Another copy of this one for my father-in-law, and a copy of their composting book because I think it would also be a hoot to read!
I debated a while before getting this book. While reviews were positive, some implied if you weren't interested in gambling, especially poker, it wouldn't be interesting.
I'm glad I didn't listen to those reviews and picked it up. First off, while there is a long poker chapter, it is hardly the entire book. He wanders through all sorts of various gambling--dogs, horses, poker, casino, sports betting, etc. He writes about some of the colorful characters, or those behind the scenes that make it go, and sometimes just about the game itself. None of which am I inherently interested in -- I am risk averse and not that interested in the flashing lights of Las Vegas or similar. I entered a football pool once mainly to go to the party at the end, and buy a scratch-off lotto ticket now and then b/c they bring back fun childhood memories (I could make one last ALL afternoon).
Doesn't matter.
The author loves his subject and it comes through in the writing. I'm reading Euland's book on writing and she says as long as you write what you see and feel the reader will be infected by the same feeling. Konik can do it. I was fascinated start to finish in the book. People who live in a world I am barely aware of came to life on the page, the comparisons of dog racing to black jack (here's a hint--house cut is much higher in the first), the feel of a Miami dog park racing. The discussion of card counting and Big Game nights which are the only time the counters are allowed in the casinos (legal doesn't mean the casino's let you play if they figure out you know what you are doing). I understand better how odds are set, why, and what problems this can cause.
I think my favorite chapter was the legal betting on anything--the insurance company that insures any promotion you want to have. They charge based on the chance of having to pay out--so they didn't charge much for the "Win a million if you can find Elvis", for example. They know the chance of making a half-court shot, and how it compares with the chance of landing a paper airplane in a garbage can at the same range. Someone had a good idea for a company and the odds-making skills to back it up. I also enjoyed the old poker gambler, who played in the old west right through til not long ago. He used to carry a gun, and used it at times.
Even if you aren't interested in gambling, if you are interested in life in general, this book provides some fascinating reading. If you are heading to Vegas, there is a chapter on which games you can expect to lose the least, and why not to listen to any "expert" you meet on the plane! (If you read an earlier chapter he shows, with the help of a man who wrote the book and many of the rules he showed in the book, of how to get complimentary items for as little as possible).
ISBN: 0-06-095530-9)
Supposedly a memoir combined with a cookbook. It's more personal reminiscences. A memoir to me would have some chronology or some structure related to life. This jumps all over and is just loosely connected stories with recipes here and there.
This book never quite reached its potential to me. It started out all right, but seemed to dither about. It didn't really manage to be a memoir so much as short stories here and there, tossed together with some recipes. The ordering was random, the stories ranging from humorous to uninteresting.
That is overstating it a bit. It is not a bad book, and many of the recipes look good. I may try one of them, but in general I read books like this to enjoy the idea of the recipes (since I do not use cookbooks that don't have indexes) and to be drawn into the author's interaction with food. The recipes held up their end, the author varied. Sometimes I was pulled in, some times it seemed like a long story told by someone who didn't tell good stories. I finished it with no problem, but was always able to put the book down and doubt I will seek out other items by the author.
I like the occasional "that's why you should know a good baker" for getting to eat a dessert without having to make one. :) Good idea!
I also fundamentally disagree with her on a couple points. If you are grating your knuckles every time you grate anything your grater is NOT a good one. A microwave oven is not dangerous (at least, not compared to a stove or an oven!) and has well more uses than for a fast food--this was, however published in 1993 so I allow this as being a difference in time. I do agree--many things should only be purchased at rummage sales, because they are easy to find there and much cheaper.
(For any of you in Urbana/Champaign, mark your calendars--the CCHS Giant Garage Sale is coming up end of May over Memorial Day weekend!)
Dangerous Space by Kelley Eskridge
This is a collection of short stories. While it is fiction, and I probably won't post that many fiction reviews, this one was commented on on my flist by a few people before I read it, so I figured it made sense to stick it here myself.
--
Her wordcraft and sentence craft are wonderful. Her stringing these into stories was much more inconsistent.
Dangerous Space, however, is one of the best short stories I have ever read. I almost quit reading the book before it, and I am so very glad I didn't. 5+ stars for that story, 1-4 for the others.
Her writing is nicely illustrated in Somewhere Down the Diamondback Road, with the driver being modified/controlled/something. Wonderfully done gritty atmosphere. Kept thinking I almost knew what was going on, then it skittered off again with a new twist, but it was basically just a situation (unclear) and an atmosphere (wonderful).
Strings was a good story, of a world where only classical music is allowed to be played. I think knowing that bit of information, from the introduction, actually improved the story slightly. This was a well written story along with being able to enjoy the writing for writing. It was a bit too long, though--some of the middle drug. The ending was predictable (which was somewhat sad), but still enjoyable.
City Life had excellent overall imagery and good ending imagery. I might reread it with the latter in mind, as I think it would improve the story. I suspect I will still feel major pacing issues, though.
Alien Jane was a well written story, but Ick. The patient who felt no pain and the one who didn't want to fit in. It just isn't my type of story--it's not gorey, it just makes me go eeeech. It is probably the second best written story in the book. Her wordcraft does not stand out as well, but it melds well into a story that is well constructed. It's just not my thing.
Eye of the Storm, with the war orphan who goes off and joins a quad to become guards, developing a new type of fighting along the way, I'm not sure what to say about. I had actually forgotten it and had to go look up which story I was missing in this list. I don't know why I forgot it. I do know that this is the one story where the gender-ignoring bothered me. The Prince is a Princess, and other than because that's what the author does, I don't see any reason for this. It threw me when she showed up--and not in a good gender-relevant way, just in a "Huh? Is he a cross-dresser? Is that the oddity?". I think it was a matter of principal with the author, but it was a bump in this story. Thinking back, the story was nice, so I don't know why it didn't stay with me.
Finally, Dangerous Space. Which probably makes the entire collection worthwhile. A friend read it and said "If it is possible to have sex with a story I think I just did" and that's not an inaccurate description. I don't think she needed to bring in the live-in-someone's-head technology, and I wish she hadn't. It isn't that it didn't work, I just think it distracted from the very well done core story of Mars and Duncan. Following an excellent sound guy (who isn't a guy, but yer point?) and an indie band as they make it big, partially with her help. The tension and issues between the two--sexual mainly, but much of the sexual tension is because of the professional relationship, as music is too personal to be just professional for either of them, and for Mars music is better than almost anything. It was just an excellent excellent story that sucked me in and made me feel.
The Secret Garden: Dawn to Dusk in the Astonishing Hidden World of the Garden: David Bodanis
Two similar books, though they take a very different tact.
The first is a children's book (but an older children, enough to be reading paragraphs and not huge text) exploring the world with an electron microscope. The book is filled with pictures of things you'd find all around: Pollen, butterfly wings, pepper, algae, blood, etc. Each chapter has a "can you guess what this is?" image (I believe I had one right). Along with the images, which made the largest impact, is a discussion of the science behind both making the images and what is seen in the images. Why do butterfly wings look like that? Why the differences in pollen? Fascinating. The text is straightforward about the items shown.
Bodanis's takes a narrative, but scientific, look at what goes on at a similar level in the garden, starting as the sun comes up and ending as the sun goes down, and in which humans are stomping about. There are some pictures throughout the book, and I think most were taken with an electron microscope, in comparing them to the pictures in the previous book.
Bodanis will introduce you to tiny little ET fungus below, bugs with guns of pure asprin above, trees that control them, and cucumbers waged in war against their neighbors. Laying down in the grass to enjoy a summer's day? You can find out what comes exploring, and how they know how to get back home.
I have read this book several times. I found it on my father-in-law's bookshelf before he was my FIL and very much enjoyed it. When they gave me a bookstore gift card for my birthday I tried to buy a copy--only to find it was out of print! I recently found a copy and couldn't resist picking it up and reading it again. I discovered when I went to shelf it I already had one from somewhere. Oh well! I'm glad I picked up the most recent copy if only because then I re-read it again.
The book has photographs scattered through, many of them I believe with an electron microscope. This was a nice pairing with the Microscopic Aliens I read a couple months ago. His discussion of what humans do to try to help plants, and why they should pay more attention to labels talking about which fertilizer and plant spacing, was fascinating. He is a pleasant writer; it is just nice to curl up with the book and read.
The introduction is worth starting with. He discusses his time on the farms, and then learning in college none of what he learned from old farmer's could be true. Then science caught up with practice, and yes, plants do "know" what is planted around them and where they are being eaten!
A spoof on Chicken Soup for the Soul, this book shares soul-baring stories from a cat's point of view. Woody is well represented, but voices mew in from all over.
It strikes a decent balance between being a spoof and taking its chosen subject seriously enough to have some substance. Some of the selections are stretching a bit too much with no soul-touching, and the editor needed a heavier claw.
Unfortunately, that said, I also couldn't finish the book. I am a very firm believer that cats are indoor pets, and definitely not neighborhood pets! If I had a cat it would not be outside in my yard, and the fact other owners think it reasonable to send their cat to run through my driveway, hunt birds & other wildlife I work to attract, and use my yard as a litterbox I find very rude & irresponsible.
Thus, the frequent musings on patrolling outside, chasing chipmunks, running through neighboring cat's yards, meeting humans on walks, bringing home fresh kills (to help teach humans how to hunt), etc...just got on my nerves. I made it about halfway before stopping because it was simply way too common of a theme and made the book irritating rather than sweet.
Someone more in love with cats (I have grown to appreciate them after marrying a cat lover & fostering a bunch for the humane society but am not a "cat person") would probably enjoy this and be able to overlook the problems. I hope, however, they would also agree cats are pets and not wildlife.
One round little dude with a time machine of history books (some overdue), dinosaurs split by continental drift, Helen of Troy as a goose face, and Pericles saying "Eat your veggies, Athenians!", but otherwise fairly historically accurate....
Must be The Cartoon History of the Universe (well, from the Big Bang to Alexander the Great at least).
History, in graphical form with some commentary. Footnotes of commentary with some graphics. It wanders around Europe and upper Africa and parts of Asia (China is left for a later volume) trying to sort out who did what to (or with) whom to when.
My complaints are minor, and focus early on in the book. To the author's credit, he carefully brings in women's prehistory as well, such as the fact she had tools they just were not made of stone so did not survive for digging up (he even references Descent of Woman, one of my favorite books, which gives him extra brownie points). The discussion about children belonging to the mother's clan was specifically interesting. However, it made the graphics in the rest of the prehistory section a bit glaring. Other than where he is carefully discussing women, men take the center stage in the graphics. The worst is two clans meeting and one giving the other a marriageable daughter (having offered rocks or the daughter and the other man saying he already had rocks). If the mother determined clan belonging, and tended to run things at camp.....then it makes a LOT more sense for it to be SONS exchanged, not the daughters, and for the women arrange the exchanging!
Taken as a whole, however, the book is excellently done. A lot of information crammed into a small space, still entertaining and cartoon-y. (Egyptian hieroglyphics fit right in). Well worth reading, whether you happen to know that part of history or not. Entertaining, and you'll find you've learned something by the end!
ISBN: 1579121624
So, this isn't the type of book I'd normally post a review on, since it's a Solve It Yourself.
However, it's a Really Good One, and for adults. A grown up Encyclopedia Brown. If you enjoy these books you owe it to yourself to try this one--and puzzle over each one, not just look at the answers if you can't figure it out quickly. Many of these require thought.
This is one of my favorite solve it yourself books. Well written, in increasing difficulty, creative, etc. I actually worked through these one at a time because they were interesting enough to put the extra time on my part through. The one-page logic puzzles tossed in for good measure were a nice break--but they weren't part of the mysteries--no logic puzzles disguised as mysteries, which is nice.
My only quibble is the last one (dead judge in the study) I think the judge is laying the wrong way up. I didn't manage to figure that one out and even knowing the solution, I think they have the scene wrong.
However, the rest of the book was very much done well enough I still give it high marks! In fact, I gave it a year then worked my way through it again--I'd forgotten enough & it is interesting enough that it was still a challenge. I don't know that I could do a third time, though--eventually I will learn. :)
Fascinating and amusing book. The title & back cover are misleading, though. The first essay talks about what he currently won't eat and needs to dispense himself of the invalid hang-ups. However, he only twice leaves the Western world after that--once to Japan, and once to Tunsia. So he never runs into really strange concoctions.
Which isn't to say the book isn't good--it very much is--it's just not what I was expecting. The author has a fun view on life and food, and little patience for un-supported health-caused food pickiness. I think he underplays allergies a bit, but his discussion (rant?) on raw foods was intriquing. He claims many raw vegetables prevent you from absorbing some of their nutriets, as a defense mechanism that breaks down after they are cooked. Which, if true, changes a lot of information on veggies. But I want to find it elsewhere first.
I also like his wife (who gets grumpy if it's midnight and dinner isn't ready). She's not a large part of the book, but he mentions her here and there, and she seems to serve as a reality check for him. I don't cook large, complicated meals, but somehow I feel with him as he struggles through a particularly obtuse one, or watches a skilled cook make the same thing over and over so he can learn how. And the food...I'm almost convinced I will love fish--despite many many data points to the contrary!
He tosses in a handful of recipes, which I didn't try, though I am copying the pie crust one out. The "Drying Sneaker" one was amusing, in his experimentation with microwaves. I was also amused (for unintended reasons) by the comment about a diet being a throwback to the Atkins diet. Atkins hadn't resurfaced when the book was printed, but it certainly has now!
I enjoyed this book quite a bit. Enough I gave it to my father-in-law as a gift, and he says he did as well.
(Edited to add later: I have now read his It Must Have Been Something I Ate, the sequel, and in that one he does go eat lots of odd and strange foods. So I guess they should have switched the titles!)
This is a book I looked much forward to reading. And I didn't finish. I didn't even make it a quarter of the way through. The author has some fundamental problems that underlie his attitudes and conclusions, and I just couldn't get through them.
The biggest one (that I'd found so far) is the belief that ANY trait humans currently have MUST have had an evolutionary purpose at one time. Nothing is just there because it is, so any trait he can find he can relate to something evolutionary (specifically, anything different between men and women must be because of preferences of the other which means it must be because of ability to get food/protection/babies/etc. Of course the two come up radically different in his opinion). The problem with this is it's proven to be completely false. I wish I had bookmarked the study someone did with birds. They tied little hats on the male birds' heads. The females went gaga over those with white (I think) hats, and refused to have anything to do with those with red hats. The color of the hats had NOTHING to do with the birds ability to provide--it was tied on by a scientist. But if a mutation has produced a male bird with a white feather on his head, he'd have had his pick of females (and more than one a mating season), so it likely would have spread. But it had nothing to do with ability to do anything!
The second insistence is has (and where I finally gave up) was that any differences found between men & women that cross wide societies must be biologically based. There is no need to look at the society or the socialization--if wide-spread cultures have women looking to men with money, then it must be biological that women want men with resources. Completely ignoring the fact that in the majority of cultures, women aren't allowed to own (or weren't not that long ago) resources--so it's a matter of survival they do so. His widely varying cultures have some things that are similar across cultures--and those things explain his "biological" differences quite well. But it's a matter of survival culturally, not biologically. He also ignores evidence from older cultures that his "universal" evidence isn't so universal when you go back in time--you know, back closer to the original biological urges relevance?
There may be biological differences in how women & men seek mates. I wouldn't be at all surprised if there are. However, this book is a horrible way to try and find those differences--when all the differences he trumpets can be easily explained by cultural factors. This isn't to say biology doesn't influence culture--but you need to prove it, not just try and ignore culture because you find a difference in more than one culture---when the cultures are not that different in the relevant areas.
I consider this nothing more than a book to prove that patriarchy is biologically based, using pseudo-science to back it up. Nice and splashy copy--horribly flawed at its base. We will have to wait until a better scientist takes a look to examine this topic.
If you are interested in this type of topic, I highly recommend Anne Fausto-Sterling's books instead.
Excellent book. Highly recommended. That's the short review, here's the long one:
A heavy book discussing how the food industry influences the information the public receives about health. An excellent examination of the ties between industry & the government, how lobbyists prevent poor press on their products, how congress has gimped the FDA's ability to regulate just about everything.
The USDA is responsible for encouraging American agriculture (especially meat & dairy--fruit/veggies seem red-headed stepchildren at best) and also for dispersing nutrition information to the public? This worked fine when the main problem was not enough calories and the message was "eat more, and varied". Now the problem is too many calories, and the message should be "eat less--especially animal products & sweets". You aren't likely to hear that message, at least not in any fashion understandable, because of the food industry's influence.
Nutrition research hasn't changed much in years. To borrow from another author, eat food. Not too much. Mostly veggies. The confusion comes from the fact that details of nutrients are changing--and the food companies would like to push nutrients rather than food, because they can add nutrients and then make health claims. The difference between "Good for a healthy heart" and "lowers the risk of heart disease" is apparently dramatic from a regulatory standpoint--if not from a consumer's.
A look into the laws that were passed (and why) and the FDA's fight to actually be allowed to do its job was illuminating. The FDA has to take companies to court to get "foods" removed from the shelves, and it only takes one apparently scientific study to require health claims to be allowed (under first amendment rights). The FDA has been recently gimped so badly that the situation, especially for supplements, is nearly as unregulated as it was when the FDA was set up -- which was done to stop the problems.
I had no idea that candy makers were designing lesson plans to sell to schools. Ugh! (Not only do they advertise what kids should be eating in VERY moderated amounts, but apparently they aren't very good lesson plans either).
Fascinating book. It is long, but it is quite readable and I just wanted to keep going. I had to stop occasionally to digest what I had read. Highly highly recommended--my next problem is deciding who among a lot of people I know I want to try and get to read it next!
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