February 2025 Cookbook Reviews

 

Start With a Vegetable by Jessica Smith

I'm not a vegetarian but I do love vegetables and don't mind a meatless meal now and then. This book isn't pushing a vegetarian agenda - just showcasing how you can use vegetables in different ways. The recipes could be a side dish or a main dish. The author does include a chapter at the beginning about a few plant proteins but most of the dishes just focus on vegetables without pushing a specific diet agenda. I also liked that the recipes are organized by vegetable. There are also a few chapters at the end that were different - pizza night, sauces/dressings/extras, and meal plans using the recipes in the book. The author also gives some great tips at the beginning including a vegetable storage guide (which need to be refrigerated, best storage, etc.). Overall, I thought this was a great cookbook and there are several recipes I'd like to try.

The Modern Pioneer Cookbook by Mary Shrader

If you're looking to make more food from scratch this cookbook has a lot of info on making basics - stocks/bone broth, rendering fat, yogurt, pickles, and bread. There are also chapters on condiments and homemade drinks. While all of that is great, I agree with some other reviews I read that there aren't very many actual meal recipes - just one chapter at the very end. While you can do a lot with the basics that Shrader focuses on, I do think having more meal recipes would be helpful. I personally already can and make my own stock, bread, etc. I do think this would be great for someone starting out trying to make more homemade food but I do with there were more recipes using the basics. I also found the font and layout of the pages odd - it was almost large print and the margins seemed very small as well.

Simply Jamie by Jamie Oliver

I've always liked Jamie Oliver but I didn't love this cookbook. It's organized into normal cookbook categories - midweek meals, weekend wins, one pan dinners, pantry love, and delicious desserts. But within these chapters the recipes still felt kind of random or oddly organized. I also felt like the pictures of Jamie in the cookbook were weird - did he see these and approve them? The pictures of the food were great and a lot of the recipes did seem pretty easy to make. I just didn't find much that I wanted to try from this one.

February 2025 Reviews

 

Custodians of Wonder by Eliot Stein

Eliot Stein travels the world interviewing people who are some of the last people keeping a custom or tradition alive. He explores 10 traditions - everything from how they began, the cultural significance, and the person who's currently still keeping that tradition alive. It's everything from a very unique musical instrument, a sacred pasta recipe, to the mailman who delivers mail to a tree in the German woods and beekeepers who continue to practice of "telling the bees." As some reviews I read mentioned, Stein often gives a LOT of background or history. While some history is necessary, I do think it could have been cut down more and the reader still gotten the gist. Overall, I did really like the book - some traditions more than others. I also found myself googling some of the traditions to see what exactly these things looked like. I think a few pictures could have helped too. Stein does a good job of exploring the concept of tradition and why some traditions are worth keeping despite advances in technology. A unique and interesting book.

Some quotes I liked:

"According to modern tests conducted by MIT professor and structural engineer Dr. John Ochsendorf, the Q'eswachaka's four base cables can support 9,388 kilograms - or roughly 110 men spaced evenly apart. And unlike the arched stone bridges of Europe, the Inca's grass-woven creations could quickly be cut as a defensive measure to avoid advancing armies, and then rebuilt. In some cases, the very sight of these engineering wonders was enough to force foreign clans to surrender...They stitched cotton and alpaca wool between layers of leather to make armored helmets and body suits that were lighter and nearly as strong, pound for pound, as Spanish steel. These quilted garments were so effective at stopping fired arrows that conquistadors adopted them during the conquest and reported leaving battles with so many projectiles lodged into them that they looked like porcupines...The Inca even communicated in fiber, relying on a sophisticated system of colored-and-spun knotted cords called quipus to store information. These intricate necklace-looking webs could hold hundreds of strings and record decimals up to 10,000. In the absence of a written language, the Inca used quipus for everything from documenting family genealogy and sending military orders to measuring state taxes and taking the census." (p. 73-74)

"'Sardinia is one of the richest grain cultures in the world, and each of its 377 villages and towns has their own unique type,' said Michelin-starred Sardinian chef Roberto Petza, who has dedicated his career to spreading awareness of Sardinian ingredients and documenting the island's rural pasta traditions. 'There are roughly 700 types of pasta in all of Italy. In Sardinia alone, there are 500, and that is a direct result of our history of invasions and mixing those influences with our own recipes.'" (p. 109)

"Scientists have found that the way individual bees work together in the hive is similar to how individual neurons function in the human brain, and the colony's collective decision-making has all the hallmarks of our most harmonious societies." (p. 186)

"Over the next 14 years, Gonzalez Martinez would go on to write 18 more novels in notebooks and stationary, just so she could read them aloud to the factory's 130 workers. None of them are published. Instead, after cooking dinner, cleaning the house, and putting her daughter to bed, the reader would get to work writing in longhand until 2:00 a.m. and then recite each chapter to her audience later that day before she's finished writing the book. 'Based on their reactions as I read it, I'd change the plot to surprise them or create an ending I thought they'd really like,' she said. 'In a way, the workers became like my editors.'...Then in 2003, after 14 years of only sharing her writing with her colleagues at the leaf-stripping factory, the lector learned that one of her books was finally going to be published...Gonzalez Martinez has since gone on to publish nine children's books in Cuba, winning four national awards for her work." (p. 212-13)

Slow Productivity by Cal Newport

I really liked Newport's previous book, Digital Minimalism, so I was interested to check out this one. While I like the premise of getting away from pseudo-productivity (tons of meetings, emails, phone calls, etc.) to more well-done Slow Productivity, this book is not geared towards everyone's career. I'm a public librarian and while I do spend a decent amount of time in front of a computer, I'm also expected to work a public service desk and present in person programs. Newport acknowledges that this is more for "knowledge work" but I do think some of the principles could still apply to other fields. My main complaint is that most of his examples are of people who were able to take months of time off to focus on their art/writing/whatever or freelance/self-employed people who have MUCH more control over their work time than the average person. But I do think he makes some interesting points and really what I think it boils down to is whether you're willing to go against the mainstream flow and make your own way (even in a more traditional career path). If you ARE self-employed or have more control of your own schedule, then I would highly recommend this one as it probably applies to you more than me.

Some quotes I liked:

"As Michael Pollan summarizes in an insightful 2003 article about Slow Food, by the 1980s Carlo Petrini had become 'dismayed by the hangdog dourness of his comrades on the left.' There's a personal satisfaction in grimly pointing out the flaws in a system, but sustainable change, Petini came to believe, requires providing people with an enjoyable and life-affirming alternative. Petrini didn't simply write a sharply worded op-ed about the corruptive forces of McDonald's, he instead promoted an appealing new relationship with food that would make fast food seem self-evidently vulgar. 'Those who suffer for others do more damage to humanity than those who enjoy themselves,' Petrini explained." (p. 33)

"As previously argued, for most of recorded human history, the working lives of the vast majority of people on earth were intertwined with agriculture, a (literally) seasonal activity. To work without change or rest all year would have seemed unusual to most of our ancestors. Seasonality was deeply integrated into the human existence." (p. 139)

The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt

I had heard so much about this book that I decided to read it even though I don't have children. In The Anxious Generation, Jonathan Haidt looks at why Gen Z and younger are struggling so much with mental health, anxiety, failure to launch, etc. From the research that he sites there seems to be a direct correlation between smartphones/social media and the increase in anxiety and mental health issues with kids who had what he calls a "phone-based childhood" instead of a "play-based childhood." A lot of what he says makes a lot of sense. Since the 1990's kids have been much more scheduled - tons of after school activities, sports, tutoring, etc. instead of just downtime and free play. But there are other factors beyond just smartphone use - society has changed. People don't know their neighbors so they're not as comfortable letting their kids free range and play outside. People are much more litigious so schools/counties/etc. make sure playgrounds are super safe so kids can't get hurt and people are afraid to discipline or intervene with stranger's children so there's not as much of a sense of community anymore. There is no easy answer for any of these issues. But Haidt has some good suggestions - his main 4 are: 1) no smartphones before high school, 2) no social media before 16, 3) phone-free schools, and 4) more unsupervised play and childhood independence.

There were a LOT of mixed reviews about this book. Again, I'm not a parent but I grew up in the 1980's and spent most of my free time outside and in the woods with other kids. I'm SO thankful to have NOT grown up with social media and smartphones. While you may not agree with everything Haidt says or how he used research for this book, I don't think many people could really argue against his 4 suggestions. He mentioned very little about pornography but that's the area I'm most worried about. Young kids having access to/being exposed to hardcore pornography is going to change things in devastating ways - but that could be another whole book. Overall, I liked the book and I thought his main suggestions seem reasonable and good. Even if you're not a parent, a worthwhile read.

Some quotes I liked:

"As soon as Gen Z arrived on campus, college counseling centers were overwhelmed. The previously exuberant culture of millennial students in discover mode gave way to a more anxious culture of Gen Z students in defense mode. Books, words, speakers, and ideas that caused little or no controversy in 2010 were, by 2015, said to be harmful, dangerous, or traumatizing. America's residential universities are not perfect, but they are among the safest, most welcoming and inclusive environments ever created for young adults. Yet campus culture changed around 2015, not just in the United States but also at British and Canadian universities." (p. 71-72)

"One of the most widely noted traits of Gen Z is that they are not doing as much of the bad stuff that teenagers used to do. They drink less alcohol, have fewer car accidents, and get fewer speeding tickets. They have far fewer physical fights or unplanned pregnancies. These are, of course, wonderful trends - nobody wants more car accidents. But because the rate of change for so many risky behaviors has been so rapid, I also look at these trends with concern. What if these changes came about not because Gen Z is getting wiser, but because they are withdrawing from the physical world? What if they are engaging in less risk-taking overall - healthy as well as unhealthy - and therefore learning less about how to manage risks in the real world?" (p. 181-82)

[Louisiana mandated a law in 2023 that would require age verification for access to pornography websites] "The law required sites whose content is more than one-third pornography to verify its visitors were over 18, using the state's digital wallet app to present their Louisiana driver's license. Of course, few visitors to a porn site would be willing to give the site their legal name, let alone an image of their driver's license. In response, Pornhub simply blocked access to its site from residents who appear to be in Louisiana." (p. 237) [In my opinion, Louisiana has some CRAZY laws and stuff going on in their state but this one I can support!]

[A school in South Carolina started offering longer recesses, opening the school playground half an hour before school started, and a "play club" open access to the playground or gym after school and the benefits to the students was remarkable.] "Compared with the previous year, truancy cases went from a total of 54 down to 30, and school bus violation incidents dropped from 85 to 31. 'In any given school year we used to have around 225 office referrals,' Kevin [Stinehart] reported. 'But now that we've added so much play we only have around 45.'" (p. 253)

How the World Eats by Julian Baggini

I picked this book up because I read a lot about food and farming. At first I was liking it but then he kind of seemed to lose to plot (for me at least). I agree with his premise that, "A food system needs to be underpinned with principles, and if we are not clear what they are, they will often default to values we may not hold to be the highest, such as economic efficiency, convenience and productivity." (p. 41) The book is divided into 4 categories - land, people, other animals, and technology. In each, Baggini looks at how people have eaten both historically and today and what we can learn from these food cultures in order to attempt to shape a global food philosophy. Still sounds great, but in my opinion it was a little all over the place. I also felt like he didn't show much in the way of farmers/cultures doing things well - more of don't do this or the ones that he highlighted as doing well were things that couldn't be reproduced (like Native Inuit or Hadza hunter/gatherers). In the end his seven principles of a global food philosophy won't stand up to actual implementation because of one thing - money. Corporations will NEVER do better if it means they make less money and for the most part our current food system in most of the world is a business for making money. Overall, there were some parts I liked, some I had to drag myself through. I'm not a philosopher or into philosophy so maybe I'm not the intended reader. But I am VERY into food, farming, and humane meat so this should appeal to someone like me.

Some quotes that stood out to me:

Quotes I liked:

"But it should at least give pause for thought: is disgust at meat eating really a sign of a more civilised society or simply a mark of one that has become detached from the realities of life and death?" (p. 15)

"The right goal is for people to have enough money to eat, not for food to be made so cheap that even the destitute can afford to eat it and only the desperate are willing to produce it." (p. 116)

Quotes I disagree with:

"Now, for the first time, we have the option of a vegan future. If we do not take it, our continued use of livestock and the methods we use to rear them will both stand in need of justification." (p. 258) [NOT everyone who eats meat, eats industrial, CAFO meat - I will NOT become vegan and I will continue to support local farmers doing things in regenerative ways.]

"If you are regularly working with glyphosate, concerns about the health risks of your exposure are legitimate, but as someone who eats food made from glyphosate-treated GM crops, there is no good evidence that your health is at risk." (p. 269) [I vehemently disagree with this. We have NO idea what this stuff is doing over time, to children, etc. Glyphosate and Monsanto don't need to be ANY part of any food system.]

January 2025 Reviews

 

Spare by Prince Harry (Evening Edition book club)

Bleh. I never understood the American fascination with the British Royal Family, so I'm not really the intended audience for this book. One of my book clubs picked this one so that's why I read it. I hate to give a memoir one star because you feel like you're rating the person, but this book was just a chore to get through. Here are my takeaways from reading it:

1) The Royal Family is super dysfunctional. You can't give your "Granny" a hug when you feel like it? Maybe if Diana had not been killed and had divorced Charles the kids could have experienced a slightly more "normal" life. His home life was just way too proper and emotionally distant to be healthy.
2) Boarding school also seems very dysfunctional and it didn't help Harry at all to be shipped back off to school right after his mother's funeral.
3) The paparazzi really are the devil.
4) Fame is awful, especially if you're born into it. I did feel bad that even when he joined the military his Royal position made him (and his fellow soldiers) even more of a target.

I think because of his contentious relationship with the press -both them printing false stories and his mother's tragic death being chased by the paparazzi - made him want to tell his own story. I just felt like the whole tone of the book was odd. He had a lot of unresolved trauma, but he really sounded like a petulant child who wanted to tell you all the ways he was wronged. This book is his perspective, so based on that it seems understandable why he would want to leave the Royal family when he was being HOUNDED by the press and not feeling supported or defended by his family. He still seemed shocked when they cut him off financially though - you can't have it both ways, you either suck it up and do your "duty" or you don't get the monetary support and benefits. I hope he can make a life for his family outside of the Royal Family, but I could have done without reading this one.

Sociopath: a memoir by Patric Gagne

From a very young age Patric Gagne understood that she was different from other people. She made people uncomfortable and didn't feel the same kinds of emotions her peers did. From a very young age Patric also figured out that by observing others she could figure out how to act more "normal." When she was in college she took an Intro to Psychology course and the topic of sociopaths came up. She fit every descriptor of a sociopath - it was eye opening for her and she starting researching everything she could find about sociopathy. Eventually after starting therapy and finding it was extremely hard to find treatments for sociopathy, she decided to go back and get her PhD with a focus on sociopathy and creating treatment plans for sociopaths.

I found her memoir extremely interesting. You can immediately see how sociopaths become serial killers - they don't worry about consequences, they have no guilt or empathy, and doing extreme things is the only way they can feel things. I was amazed at how self-aware she was from a very young age and also how hard she worked to figure herself out and find better ways to feel things outside of illegal activity. I was also amazed that she fell in love and had children. She has such a unique story and I really enjoyed reading this memoir.

Some quotes I liked:

"But, unlike every other time I'd done something bad, my physical attack on Syd had resulted in something different, a sort of euphoria. I walked away from the scene blissfully at ease. For weeks I'd been engaging in all manner of subversive behavior to make the pressure disappear and none of it had worked. But now - with that one violent act - all traces of pressure were eradicated. Not just gone but replaced by a deep sense of peace. It was like I'd discovered a fast track to tranquility, one that was equal parts efficacy and madness. None of it made sense, but I didn't care. I wandered around in a stupor for a while. Then I went home and calmly told my mom what had happened." (p. 21-22)

"I didn't crave attention or acknowledgement. I merely wanted to achieve my objective, to live life on my terms. Lying was clearly the best way to do it. It was like having a superpower that I had only recently let myself use. Being dishonest didn't just make me invisible. It made me invincible...I found that I loved being alone with my secrets almost more than anything. I loved being alone, period. Being alone was the only time I could truly be myself - and truly be free." (p. 64)

"My emotional constitution, it seemed, was a lot like a cheap set of crayons. I had access to primary colors - joy and sadness. But more nuanced hues - complex feelings like romantic love and passion - had always been outside my reach. I knew such things existed, because I'd read about them in books and seen examples on TV, but I'd never been able to relate to them." (p. 70)

"My bad acts were, in fact, a type of self-preservation. They counteracted my apathy. My internal emotional world, like Harlowe's Captain Apathy sketch, was in black and white. Doing something I knew was morally unacceptable was a way to force a pop of color. I craved it." (p. 94)

"Going to college parties was like gaining access to an unlimited amount of fabric with which I could craft my disguise. I experimented with as many emotions as I could, then altered the most suitable ones to fit. Alone in my dorm, I practiced mannerisms I'd picked up from people I saw at parties. Once I had them perfected, I tested them on live subjects. The results were astonishing...I began to implement these practices in my daily life and was astounded by the immediate difference. For the first time, people seemed to warm to me - authentically. That there was nothing authentic about my interactions didn't matter...These changes, hardly noticeable to anyone else, were extremely powerful to me. They were like breadcrumbs, leading me down a path toward social inclusion. To be clear, it wasn't approval that I craved. It was integration." (p. 95)

End of Story by A.J. Finn (Evening Edition)

Sebastian Trapp is a famous mystery writer who is nearing the end of his life. He asks a pen pal, Nicky Hunter, to come and help write a collection of his life stories. But Mr. Trapp is known for a real-life mystery in his own life. On New Years Eve 1999 his wife and young son disappear - neither is ever seen again, alive or dead. Nicky is a fan but also secretly hopes to be the one to crack the real-life Trapp family mystery. After Nicky's arrival strange things start happening - could it be Nicky? Is Cole really alive? The suspects are many - Sebastian Trapp, his daughter Madeline, his nephew Freddy, Freddy's new friend Jonathan, Sebastian's sister-in-law Simone. Those who make it to the End of Story will find out the truth.

Maybe I went into this one with too high of expectations. I was surprised by how much I liked Finn's debut, The Woman in the Window, so I was actually looking forward to this one. I did not like this one. It was SO SLOW and the characters were all SO WEIRD. Why would a famous mystery author ask a stranger to write his life story? And come and LIVE IN HIS HOUSE? I will say I did NOT see the two major twists coming. One I suspected but in a different way than how it actually played out in the storyline. Even with the twists revealed and looking back at the storyline in new light it was still just a WEIRD, slow book that was very light on mystery and very heavy in Lifetime-TV-drama at the end. I would have definitely put this one down less than 50 pages in if not for my book club. Definitely disappointed and would not recommend.

Tidy Up Your Life by Tyler Moore

Tyler Moore and his wife Emily live in New York City in a two bedroom one bath apartment with three daughters. After their second child was born Tyler had a crisis - he had accepted a promotion at work but was miserable and adding the second child had made their routines at home much harder. He ended up taking a leave and started trying to make their apartment work better for their family. He started an Instagram account, Tidy Dad, to show his tips and tricks. That led to this book. I wasn't familiar with Tyler before (but am now following him on IG), I just like a good organizing book. I like that his three main steps are declutter, tidy, and clean and need to be done in that order to be effective. The first half of the book is "tidy up your mind" and focuses on why you hang on to things, your organizing methods and routines, etc. The second half is "tidy up your space" and give specific tips for each area of your house. Because he has three children in a small home, there is a LOT about kids and toys. But I do think his tips would work for any size space - it's just more crucial in a smaller space. Throughout the book tips and suggestions are highlighted in margins or half pages. I especially like the "decluttering calendar" he includes because it helps with seasonal things like taxes, Christmas, vacation, etc. I can see why Tyler is a great school teacher - he is very positive and upbeat. It wasn't amazing or life changing for me, but I liked it and it was a quick read.

Relinquished: the politics of adoption and the privilege of American motherhood by Gretchen Sisson

In the US adoption is seen as a win/win - a young woman who's not ready to parent can give her child to a more stable family and a family struggling with infertility can have a child to love. Adoption is also seen as a "middle ground" between abortion and parenting - something seemingly everyone can agree is a good thing. More recently open adoptions have become the norm after the backlash from the pre-Roe era when many women in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s were forced to give up children produced out of wedlock in closed adoptions. But in Relinquished Gretchen Sisson pulls back the curtain on adoption after spending 10 years interviewing birth mothers about their experience with giving up a child for adoption. What she reveals is eye-opening. I think most people who know someone involved in adoption either know adoptive parents or an adopted child. Birth mothers are still shamed and not really publicly discussed unless they are used as a symbol of the anti-abortion movement. There are MANY factors that contribute to a woman choosing abortion or adoption. But now that we're in a post-Roe US that changes things even more. Sisson is very thorough in the book covering the history of adoption in the US, the pre-Roe era, all the way to our current adoption climate. I think this is a hard book overall to read - especially for adoptive parents or birth parents. But I think anyone who pushes adoption as the best choice for everyone really needs to read this book. My main takeaway from this book is that probably 99% of birth mothers regret their decision and that is something that needs to be heard.

Some quotes I liked:

"...the same CDC report would suggest that there are at least forty-five prospective families waiting to adopt for every infant relinquished for domestic adoption." (p. 16)

"In April 2020, I was invited to attend a meeting hosted by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. This convening of adoption researchers, advocates, and lobbyists was intended to help develop ' strategies for overcoming barriers to private infant adoption.'...What was never asked: Why do we want to increase adoptions? If the decrease in adoptions reflects a lowering birth rate because people have more tools to prevent unintended pregnancies, why is that a problem? If fewer relinquishments means that more people feel equipped to parent in the way they would like to, why do we want the number of adoptions to go up? Who is being served here?" (p. 41-43)

"What is particularly sad about these stories is that, more often than not, little was done to support these mothers, even as they came into contact with social service workers, healthcare facilities, and adoption agencies. The only intervention offered to them was the opportunity to transfer their child to another family. They received little support accessing safe and affordable housing, medical treatment, or addiction services; they were almost never offered options like temporary guardianships, crisis nurseries, or other types of care that would allow them to retain their parental rights while navigating their own paths to safety and wellness." (p. 76)

"This idea of openness overlooks the ways that ongoing connection is valuable and protective for everyone involved, and often means that adoptive families have less of a commitment to making the open adoption work than the birth parents do. Often the burden falls on relinquishing mothers to initiate visits, stay in the adoptive family's good graces, and accommodate the adoptive parents' conception of an open adoption over their own desires - or risk having contact cease altogether." (p. 115)

"So much of adoption is adoptive parent centered, and if you think that adoption is a beautiful thing from that side, then you can't really accept how dark it is from the losing side." (p. 166)

"My colleagues [of the Turnaway Study] found that women who relinquish infants experienced the highest incident of regret and the most negative feelings about their pregnancies, compared to both women who received the abortions they wanted and women who chose to parent after being denied abortion care...many of the mothers I interviewed turned to adoption because they believed they would be less likely to regret that outcome than if they were to have an abortion." (p. 176-77)

2024 Year of Reading

 This year my reading goal was 75 books but I fell short and read 68. I also read 28 cookbooks. I need to make more time to read and less time staring at my phone! Here are my Top 10 books, Top 5 cookbooks, and Worst 5 books for 2024. 

Top 10 Books

The Movement by Clara Bingham

Horse by Geraldine Brooks

Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus

The Wager by David Grann

While You Were Out by Meg Kissinger

The Chair and the Valley by Banning Lyon

Our Missing Hearts by Celeste Ng

Eat Everything by Dawn Sherling

Disobedient Women by Sarah Stankorb

Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts by Crystal Wilkinson

Top 5 Cookbooks

Baking in the American South by Anne Byrn

Big Book of Bread by King Arthur Baking Company

Spend With Pennies Everyday Comfort by Holly Nilsson

Homestyle Kitchen by Julia Rutland

The Heirloomed Kitchen by Ashley Schoenith

Worst 5 Books

Justice is Served by Leslie Karst

Class by Stephanie Land

The Fury by Alex Michaelides

The Comfort of Crows by Margaret Renkl

Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt

December 2024 Cookbook Reviews

 

Half Baked Harvest Quick & Cozy by Tieghan Gerard

This is the fourth Half Baked Harvest cookbook. I really liked her first two but didn't love her last one or this one. I think often in cookbooks or recipes "cozy" equates to food to fatten you up for winter hibernation. As another review pointed out there is a LOT of cheese in the recipes in this book. I LOVE cheese but I don't need every meal to be covered with melted cheese though. There were a couple recipes I want to try but I didn't love this one. There are tags for the recipes that are 30 minutes or less but many of the recipes take an hour+ to make which is not my definition of "quick." Overall, the photos of the food are beautiful but this one isn't for me.

Everyday Indulgence by Lindsay Moser

The premise of this cookbook is that you don't have to give up tasty food in order to eat healthy, hence the title Everyday Indulgence. Each recipe has a section at the bottom that lists macro and micro-nutrients and also a QR code for the full nutritional info for that recipe. I did feel like some of the recipes had a lot of ingredients or several components and each component had its own recipe. While there weren't really any recipes I wanted to try, I was more turned off by all the photos of the author. I guess because it's an "indulgent" cookbook that's more healthy the author showed a lot of skin in the pictures - I guess to show how great she looks while also "indulging" in food. The cover is particularly ridiculous with her in a dress with such a deep v-neck that it's almost to her belly button and she's got a HUGE pan of macaroni & cheese in front of her. I know she may not have had a say in all the final pictures but the pictures were ridiculous and in my opinion took away from the recipes and the cookbook as a whole.

Everybody Loves Chocolate by Jennifer Donovan

I was so excited to check out this cookbook because like the title says, Everybody Loves Chocolate! But I was a little disappointed first because there were not pictures of each recipe. Second the recipes didn't sound that interesting to me. I didn't realize the subtitle was "recipes from around the world" so the book is divided into sections of recipes by geography - Americas, Asia Pacific, Europe, and Middle East & Africa - with an opening chapter on basic recipes. Overall, I was sadly disappointed to have no new chocolate recipes I wanted to try.

Big Book of Bread by King Arthur Flour Company

This is a hard book to review because it's not something you could really just pull one or two recipes out of to try. It's more of a reference book for the home baker. The recipes are organized by type of bread - flatbreads, pan breads, sourdough, hearth breads, buns, bagels & rolls, fancy breads, and things to make with bread. There were so many recipes that looked AMAZING. This is definitely one I'd like to own when I have more time to put into home baking. I also liked that each recipe had a timeline at the top with how much time each part of the process would take - again most of these recipes are not quick but require fermentation, rising, shaping, resting, all before baking. I would definitely like to spend more time in this cookbook one day.

December 2024 Reviews

 

Horse by Geraldine Brooks (Evening Edition and Books & Banter book clubs)

In the 1850's Lexington was the country's fastest racehorse - breaking records with ease. After his racing career (cut short by both fading eyesight and the Civil War) he went on to become one of the most sought after breeding studs of the time. In Horse, Geraldine Brooks gives us a unique look at Lexington's career and legacy. Told from three different time periods and by several points of view - Kentucky 1850's by Jarret, an enslaved horse groomer and trainer and Thomas Scott, an animal artist who became known for his racehorse portraits, New York City 1954 - Martha Jackson a gallery owner known for her support of radical, new artists, and Washington, DC 2019 - Jess (no last name given) who works for the Smithsonian and Theo Northam an art history student working on his PhD. These three time periods and unlikely characters fill in the story of Lexington the horse - how he was born, trained, raced, painted, and lived through the tumultuous time of the Civil War in the South, as well as, his impact on modern day culture.

I wasn't sure how I was going to like a book all about a racehorse but I absolutely LOVED this book. I could have done without the relationship between Jess and Theo - and seriously there is SO MUCH info about ALL the other characters and I could NOT find Jess's last name written out anywhere. I also read several reviews that accused Brooks of having a "woke agenda" because of aspects of the Theo/Jess relationship and chapters. While I think those chapters and their relationship was heavy handed, I think Brooks included it to highlight both the differences and similarities between Jarret's experience as an enslaved Black person in the South around the time of the Civil War and Theo's experience as a Black American who grew up aboard but was now back in the US. I could totally see why she did that but the ending with Theo and Jess especially felt forced and over the top. But I LOVED Jarret and Lexington and their bond. As soon as I finished the first chapter from Jarret's perspective I was hooked. Overall, this is another winner (no pun intended) from Geraldine Brooks!

The House is on Fire by Rachel Beanland (Books & Banter book club)

On December 26, 1811 the Richmond, Virginia theater catches fire and quickly goes up in flames. Over 100 people die and many are injured. Rachel Beanland takes this real life tragedy and imagines what the fire and the aftermath would have been like through four characters. Jack works for the theater company putting on that evening's play, Sally attends the theater with her sister-in-law and brother-in-law and barely escapes, Cecily is an enslaved woman who accompanies her master's daughter and ends up using the fire to fake her death and escape North, and Gilbert an enslaved man who helps rescue women jumping from the second floor of the burning theater. All four of these characters have extremely different situations but the fire affects them all deeply. In the Author's Note, Beanland explains that all these characters were real people (some names and circumstances were changed) which makes the story more interesting. Rather than focusing on the actual fire, the story is more about who people reacted and how this tragedy showed people's true colors - for better or worse.

I did not love this book. I could have DEFINITELY done without Cecily's first chapter where she recounts every horrific way her master's son has been molesting and raping her since childhood. I did like the four main characters and I liked how Beanland showed various sides of the tragedy from their different perspectives. I agree with some reviews I read that it was too long and too detailed. Some of the storylines could have been cleaned up a little without losing any important parts of the story. I also hate a book that doesn't have chapter numbers and the chapters (each by one of the main characters) were too short. I would have rather had fewer chapters with more info from each character. It started out being a good example of human nature and how fear/death/tragedy can show who someone really is but it got too bogged down in details and the ending was lacking too. Overall, if not for book club I wouldn't have gotten past chapter 2.

A quote I did like:

"These men have no consciences. Not Elliot, not Mr. Price, not Archie or Tom or any of the other men she encountered in the theater. They pay lip service to the idea of civility, while doing whatever they want at all times. Even Robert, whom she has missed so terribly these last three years, was not a perfect man. She likes to believe that, were he in the theater, he'd have stayed with her until the end, but how can she be sure, after everything she's witnessed?" (p. 283)

What the Chicken Knows by Sy Montgomery

Originally a chapter in Montgomery's 2010 book, Birdology, this book is all about What the Chicken Knows - which is a lot more than people think. If you've never interacted with chickens you might think the stories in this book sound made up. Sy Montgomery shows us just how smart chickens are especially when you take the time to hang out with them. We got chickens last year and initially I did not want them because of our area having a lot of predators (hawks, owls, foxes, raccoons, coyotes, etc.) but my husband persisted and eventually I gave in. They have definitely grown on me more than I thought they would for many of the reasons Montgomery discusses in this short book - they definitely have personalities and are resourceful and fun to watch with the bonus of fresh eggs. If you don't know much about chickens this book is the perfect opportunity to learn something new.

Land of My Sojourn by Mike Cosper

Mike Cosper was one of the founding pastors of Sojourn church in Louisville, KY. What started as a dream church with a group of like-minded young pastors turned into a toxic situation that eventually fired Cosper via a reorganization chart (he was left off - that's how he found out he was fired). So, how did he get there? What would he do without vocational ministry that had been his entire career to that point? Add into the mix the huge division within many churches and Christians over the 2016 election and Donald Trump and you have a recipe for being in the wilderness. In this book Cosper correlates some of his Christian wilderness experiences with physical places that were important in Scripture and re-examines some of those places through a wilderness lens.

I agree with some reviews I read that while he was trying to not name names in relation to the issues at Sojourn, it sometimes felt like a lot of necessary information was left out. You did get the general gist and saw his struggles when his ministry and church turned against him. While I did like aspects of the book, it felt a little incomplete. But if you've ever been burned by a church, then you can definitely relate to the overall message here. I can't say it's amazing or that I would highly recommend it though.

Some quotes I liked:

"The persecution narrative merely justifies the militarization of the faith. It turns out that everyone wants to be a martyr, but no one wants to die. We want a revolutionary. We want a fighter. We want a Savior with a sword, not a cross. A pastor with a bully pulpit. A president who will shoot his enemies in the middle of Fifth Avenue." (p. 65)

"The harder question for me, though, is why was what I experienced as deception toward the entire staff not enough to make me leave?" (p. 75)

"I looked back at the seventeen years leading up to that season. We had such a profound sense of community and purpose that guided us. It felt like it would last forever...But slowly, then all at once, the spell had broken. I felt a tiredness and brokenness that I cannot, even years later, put into words." (p. 92-93)

"But when Russell [Moore] began to surface and highlight problems with sexual abuse in the SBC [Southern Baptist Convention] in 2018, I saw a groundswell rise against him - something I don't think I'll ever understand. In the years that followed, survivor advocates like Moore and Rachel Denhollander - the whistleblower in the USA Gymnastics sexual-abuse scandal and an attorney and advocate herself - were branded enemies of the church. Somehow sexual abuse became a kind of partisan issue, and the dividing lines happened to match those that separated Trump supporters and never-Trumpers in the SBC. (That doesn't seem coincidental, given the allegations surrounding Donald Trump.)" (p. 102)

The Hawk's Way by Sy Montgomery

This is the second chapter from Sy Montgomery's book Birdology that has been republished as it's own short book. I've always been fascinated by hawks and owls so I thought this would be an interesting book. I also love Montgomery's writing. But I didn't like this one much. While Hawk's are interesting and there are lots of hawk facts and photos in the book, the main focus is on falconry. I guess after reading about how wild and instinctual these birds are it just seems wrong to keep them in captivity for hunting. They could just be in the wild hunting for themselves. There was also a lot of weird commentary from Montgomery about her vegetarian reactions to the hawks hunting and training (using cut up frozen chicks). Like The Hummingbird's Gift and What the Chicken Knows it's a very quick read - like an hour or less. I still love watching hawks and other birds of prey but I didn't enjoy this book much.

One quote I liked:

[On thinking about taking up falconry] "My concern is this: Could I in good conscience take a bird out of the wild?" (p. 54)

Between Two Trailers by J. Dana Trent

Dana Trent grew up in an extremely dysfunctional home. Her parents, (known as Lady and King) who met while they were both working in a mental hospital, were both mentally ill (her father had schizoaffective disorder and her mother had a personality disorder with narcissism), enjoyed partaking in and selling illegal drugs, and lived in squalor and poverty. When Dana was six-years-old her mother left King and Indiana to go back to North Carolina where she was from. Dana feels pulled between her two parents and her two identities as King's daughter in Indiana and the Southern Belle her mother wants her to be in North Carolina. While Dana understood something wasn't right with her father, it was much harder for her to see how emotionally abusive her mother was and how dysfunctional their relationship was. In college Dana ends up becoming addicted to pills, alcohol, and food as a way to cope with the dysfunction in her life. She also ends up going to the Duke Divinity school because her older half-brother went to Duke and her mother REALLY wanted both of her children to have gone to Duke so she could feel rich and important. Only when she meets her future husband and gets engaged does she start to realize how dysfunctional she's become because of her dysfunctional family. She is really only able to untangle herself from her parents after they both die. Then she's able to reconcile her two halves.

Despite her mother having her in various therapies since she was a child, no one seemed to understand or talk to her about just how dysfunctional her situation was. Her mother also spent her entire life chasing a diagnosis she liked, while trying and quitting every type of therapy and treatment under the sun. It doesn't seem like Dana was even trying to break away from her mother until shortly before her death.

I liked the book in the vein of dysfunctional family memoirs. Some reviews compared it to Educated but it was definitely no Educated. I found it really odd that she just went along with this Divinity degree because her mother wanted her to go to Duke. She did grow up going to church, but never seemed like a true believer. There is obviously a difference between getting a Divinity degree and being a professor and being a minister or pastor. It's not super clear but in her bio it lists both as her career. Overall, it was a good book and I liked it. I do wish her path to recognizing and working on her own dysfunction was a little more detailed - that seemed kind of glossed over at the end. But it was a great story of someone who reconciled their past with their present and learned to accept and love their family for who they really were and not who she wished they had been.

Some quotes I liked:

"For the next few hours, Dr. Yancy administered a variety of tests...It was the kind of intensive analysis that would determine if Lady's hypothesis about me was right. 'You may just be a sociopath like your father,' she'd said. 'I'm seeing the signs' But Dr. Yancy disagreed. He met with the Lady to review his findings, which were decidedly healthy but reflective of my home life. Though Mom was confident I had a personality disorder, in his paperwork he declared me a youngster 'operating at a superior level of intellectual functioning,' but with 'post-traumatic stress disorder' and 'present emotional resources insufficient to cope with current stressors.' According to him, the only intelligence area I didn't excel in was process-oriented tenacity. 'Lazy!' the Lady said. 'That's it! I knew it. Just like your father...' She smiled because something had been found." (p. 104)

"I realize now that the real danger of my drug-trafficking childhood wasn't the weapons or the fight training or the drug business. It wasn't King's schizophrenic psychosis or the Lady's personality disorder. The real danger was denying what happened between two trailers. The real danger was in not accepting my parents for who they were, mental illness and addiction and poverty and all. The real danger was in not realizing that they were doing the very best the could with what they had. The real danger was in hiding it all. Maybe King was right: You can't fix crazy. Or better yet, maybe you don't need to." (p. 227)

Rift: a memoir of breaking away from Christian patriarchy by Cait West

Caitlin West grew up in a fundamental Christian home that subscribed to an extremely patriarchal theology where women were only meant to be wives and mothers and daughters were expected to be "stay-at-home-daughters" until being married off to a man of her fathers choosing. West's family attended several different churches and even started home churches when they couldn't find a local church extreme enough in its beliefs. West learns quickly that it's better to be quiet and compliant than face her father's wrath for doing something wrong. But in her early 20's she realizes that any man who approaches her father about "courting" her is scrutinized to the point where he finds something wrong and a reason to end it. She begins to realize that maybe that's the point - he doesn't want her to leave his household where only he has authority and control. Eventually Caitlin secretly falls in love and makes plans to marry outside her father's control. But getting married and finally escaping her father doesn't immediately fix everything. It's just the beginning of unraveling the years of spiritual abuse she suffered growing up and figuring out who she really is outside of that. This is a moving memoir of one woman's story of escaping an abusive (and in my opinion, blatantly incorrect theology) Christian patriarchal religion/cult.

Some quotes I liked:

p. 25 a list of ads appearing in Patriarch magazine from 2000 to 2002.

"The girls who were picked by husbands became women and moved away or became too busy to talk anymore. They became pregnant on their honeymoons. They never went to college. They didn't share the secrets of the marriage bed with the rest of us or tell us whether they were happy or whether they regretted it. We thought marriage must be like dying and going to heaven." (p. 63)

"My [homeschool high school] graduation didn't mean transitioning into adulthood, or the next chapter in my life, or the stepping stone to college. It meant nothing. It meant less than nothing. It meant staying at home but not having homework to complete. It meant being a 'helpmeet' to my father as practice for being a wife one day. I did not understand that turning eighteen meant I had a right to leave. I had never been taught that I had individual rights at all." (p. 78)

"It occurred to me that stories like Pride and Prejudice were appealing because they mirrored my life in a way that modern-day books couldn't. Like the female characters in Austen's books, I was a woman in her father's home, waiting for marriage, waiting for destiny. I had no money, no education, no prospects. There was little I could do to change my life." (p. 82)

"He would scold me every week after Will went home, berating me until I retreated to the bathroom to cry in the shower. My tears were just one more sign that I was emotionally compromised. My father was asking the impossible of me: to think about if I wanted to marry Will, without having any affection for him...I felt like he wanted me to be like stone, emotionless. And I started to think he was wrong to ask this of me. I began to wonder what else he was wrong about." (p. 113)

"The system of patriarchy thrives when we [women] hold each other back." (p. 172)

"Patriarchy thrives anywhere men are praised for their will to dominate - and Christian patriarchy blesses this pursuit of earthly power by imagining it's a heavenly duty. Like abuse, Christian patriarchy, at its core, is about power and control - at any cost." (p. 212)

The Movement: how women's liberation transformed America 1963 - 1973 by Clara Bingham

The Movement is an epic oral history of the decade that defined the feminist movement in the US. Clara Bingham spent two and a half years interviewing eye witnesses to some of the historic events that took place in the decade from 1963 - 1973. For me this made the book. It's one thing to read about a historical event and quite another to hear the people who were actually THERE tell their experiences. This book covers a LOT of information from a LOT of people - there is a helpful "cast of characters" section at the end of the book with a brief description of each person. There are also several photos included in the middle of the book. As someone born in 1979, it's hard to imagine living in the world these women lived in before the feminist movement when it was legal to fire a woman for being pregnant or tell a woman to their face that you would never consider hiring a woman. For women in college or law school to be told "you're taking a man's place here." I think the word revolution is often thrown around casually, but this decade was a revolution. Minorities and women were sick of being second class citizens and were determined to make society change - and many of those changes are discussed in this book. It's not a super easy read (although the oral history style makes it more readable in my opinion) but it's a very important read. Younger women need to see how things were before the women's movement and how quickly things can go back if we're not careful. This was a great book to end 2024 on!

There were a LOT of quotes I liked:

"A. Philip Randolph, the leader of the march, accepted an invitation to speak before the National Press Club, which at the time excluded all women reporters...If they were covering something, they had to do it from the balcony. When these women protested to [civil rights leader] Bayard Rustin about Mr. Randolph's accepting this invitation, he said, 'What's wrong with the balcony?' And they said, 'What's wrong with the back of the bus?'" (p. 10) [The struggles of Black women in the Civil Rights movement was eye-opening and sad to me.]

[Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 added the term 'sex' to prevent racial and gender discrimination in hiring] "Various women arose to speak for the amendment, and with each argument advanced, the men in the House laughed harder. When [Martha Griffiths] arose, I began by saying, 'I presume that if there had been any necessity to point out that women were a second-class sex, the laughter would have proved it,' There was no further laughter...[and that addition to the amendment passed]" (p. 22)

"When doctors first organized as a group and founded the American Medical Association (AMA) in 1847, the male doctors surveyed the landscape of reproductive care workers and phased out the existing community of female midwives and ob-gyn nurses. Most male doctors at the time did not have much expertise in pregnancy, childbirth, and abortion, which had been left to the female sphere. The AMA then began the process of criminalizing abortion and standardizing medical education, which essentially cut women practitioners out." (footnote on p. 43)

"Like most urban hospitals, Chicago's Cook County hospital devoted an entire ward to women suffering from medical complications caused by illegal abortions. By the mid-sixties, the hospital treated one hundred women with abortion-related medical emergencies every week." (footnote on p. 43)

[Marilyn Webb was working on her PhD at the University of Chicago and needed professors for her dissertation committee. Every professor she asked assumed that she would sleep with them in exchange. So she quit her program and moved away.] "Encouraged by the #MeToo movement, Marilyn Webb wrote the president of the University of Chicago in 2017, told her story, and asked the university to remedy her past injustice. After rewriting her previously published book to fit a dissertation committee's requirements, Webb was awarded her PhD at age seventy-six and walked in the graduation ceremony with the class of 2019." (footnote on p. 68)

"Involuntary and coerced sterilization of Black, Latina, Native American, and poor women in government-funded hospitals and clinics were prevalent in the first half of the twentieth century and expanded in the 1960s. Laws allowing involuntary sterilization existed in thirty-one states and were even more draconian in the South...Between 1964 and 1966, 64 percent of the women sterilized in North Carolina were African American. In 1961, when Fannie Lou Hamer needed medical attention for a uterine cyst, she was given a hysterectomy at a Mississippi hospital without her consent. Hamer...later testified against Mississippi's sterilization law, calling the procedure a 'Mississippi appendectomy.'" footnote on p. 156)

p. 254-255 The FBI stole a member of NYC NOW's wallet to have a meeting and offer her $750 a month to spy on the NYC chapter of NOW.

"I think that Ms. was seen as mainstream by radical feminists and seen as radical by most other people. Ms. had a foot in both worlds." (p. 354)

"The ERA [Equal Rights Amendment] was not considered that revolutionary. Richard Nixon supported it, and it was in the Republican platform right up to Ronald Reagan in 1980. Then the counterrevolution, led by Phyllis Schlafly, very successfully defeated the ERA. We did not see it coming." (p. 379)