The Life of Mammals by David Attenborough. This book was written in conjunction with the filming of the documentary on the Discovery channel (which I haven't seen) with the same title. There are plenty of pictures to look at if you're not into reading, but if you are, there really isn't much new to learn if you've even watched a nature documentary or been to the zoo lately. Or maybe that's just my biologically slanted education showing. I'm pretty sure fifth-graders would gobble it up though. The only quibble I have with this book is the organization. Animals are somewhat loosely grouped by habitat and diet--if I wanted to look up an animal I didn't know about without consulting the index, I'd probably have to do some flipping without much idea which section I should look through.
Food: A Culinary History edited by Jean-Louis Flandrin and Massimo Montanari. Finishing this book this month seems oddly appropriate. Julia Child, who passed away at the age of 91 a couple days ago described Food: A Culinary History as "literally overflowing with facts, anecdotes, and histories, [...] a major compendium for those in the [culinary] profession as well as a delightful store of knowledge for anyone who loves to read." Sure, there is some really dry history stuff in the essays (I mean, who really wants to read food and farming statistics for fun?) but some of the ideas and theories are pretty interesting. In ancient times up the Middle Ages, people's diets were mostly restricted by religious and medical reasons--i.e. categorizing and eating foods in order to balance the four humors--blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile. It was only during the eighteenth century that European people ate because of taste, making the statistics for sugar, salt, and spice consumption actually informative. It is only now that the purpose for eating has turned full circle--back to the medical with all the concern about fats and cholesterol (among other things). An interesting tidbit--the French have far less knowledge about the nutritional value of food than either other Europeans or Americans, yet their cholesterol levels are lower than everyone else with the exception of the Japanese. Perhaps we should pay more attention on taste and gastronomy than mindlessly shoving fast food into our mouths just to satisfy an inconvenient appetite.
Staying Dead by Laura Anne Gilman. Wren Valere is no ordinary inhabitant of New York. She's a retriever--a mage who works for hire. One particular job seems simple enough: to retrieve a cornerstone that has been stolen from a business building. But of course, if you're dealing with magic, nothing is ever as simple as it seems. I found it a bit of amusing fiction although the setting, I'm afraid, would probably make it dated in five years. The best analogy to describe the story would probably be what I speculate an hour episode of Buffy: The Vampire Slayer without the vampires would be like except I've never seen that show--only heard of it second hand. (Uh oh, now that I've noticed, this author has written Buffy novels.)
Currently reading: See the previous week's entry or take a look at the bookrolling page once I get that updated.
