Currently reading

You may have noticed Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle sitting happily on my "Books I'm Reading" list for several weeks now. In truth, I'm not still reading it-- I read it weeks ago over the course of a couple evenings. See: Book Vampire. (Though I confess I'm still slogging through What Hath God Wrought: The Transformation of America, 1815-1848. It's 855 pages long! SEND HELP. AND COOKIES.) But since finishing it, I've been recommending Kingsolver's book to anyone who'll listen, and even to those who won't. It's easily the best book I've read since, well, the last Harry Potter book last summer. Though, understandably, in quite a different vein. I'd hate for you to come away from this thinking that Kingsolver has to face a life-or-death battle with an evil squash overlord or something. But, I digress (LOTS). Kingsolver writes about a year her family spent living off their land and off of the food they could acquire locally. We've gotten so used to being able to get strawberries year-round, or bananas in climates that can't actually support bananas, that we've gotten completely away from the concept of eating what's in season locally. And it could help in so many ways. The tomato problems of late? Not a problem if you grow your own tomatoes! Anyway, if you haven't already read it, I highly recommend you do. It's informative and entertaining, and Kingsolver (as always) writes beautifully.