The Sexual Politics of Meat

"The dissonance they produce is not due to their being false, but to their being too accurate."
Carol J. Adams
The Sexual Politics of Meat

The Sexual Politics of Meat, by Carol J. Adams, is an extremely interesting book. It's well written, a feminist-vegetarian critical theory, which are two things that I didn't think were linked. This book was fascinating, and, truth be told, it got under my skin a little. Truth be told, it got under my skin a lot.

In the book, Adams examines how culturally ingrained misogyny is related to our cultural obsession with meat and masculinity. What is more masculine than eating a bloody steak? and a salad for the lady, please. It examines a history of vegetarianism among civil and sexual rights advocates, breaks down several of the arguments for and against vegetarianism, and looks at several examples of sexualizeing animals and animalizing women that are present in our culture. It extremely well done, so much so that it has me convinced.

Anyone who has ever wondered why eating a steak is manly, or why women who have been sexualized us metaphors of animal products do describe the experience should read this book. Everyone should read this book. It's changed my life, though I find it extremely difficult to talk about. So read it, and message me what you think.

    

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea

Hey everyone! Heres the next book. I read it with the We Read Drinks crew. Check it out!

Slouching Towards Bethlehem

"As it happened I did not grow up o be the kind of woman who is the heroine in a Western, and although the men I have known have had many virtues and have taken me to live in many places I have come to love, they have never been John Wayne, and they have never taken me to that bend in the river where the cottonwoods grow."

Joan Didion

Slouching Towards Bethlehem

I am convinced that Joan Didion has said the things she has said better than anyone who has ever said them or ever will be able to say them. Her prose was beautiful, her composition spectacular, and her voice incredibly unique.

Slouching Towards Bethlehem is a collection of essays by Joan Didion. They range in subject from a murdering housewife to trips to Mexico, from John Wayne to the San Francisco drug culture of the 60's. She approaches all of these subjects with honesty, wit, and insight, and casts them onto paper masterfully. 

Most of the pieces are centered around the idea of the 'American Dream,' what it was, where it went, and the lengths that people will go to find it, all the while questioning its existence and, if it ever did exist, whether it was a dream worthy of our desire. 

I really liked this book. I thought the essays were masterfully done, and they were arranged in the perfect order in this book. Her prose is unlike any I have ever read before. Its lyrical, almost meandering through her thoughts, and then towards the end of each piece she ties her thoughts together in a way that is always poignant. If you haven't read it you should. I feel like this is one of those books that everyone should read at least once. Especially if you have lived in the west, or have ever contemplated the american dream.

Jade Mountain Dragon

"When Li Du finally went to sleep that night, he dreamed of being lost in a library whose books were spinning stars that would not remain on their shelves. They moved around him in bright circles and arcs, so that he did not know where he was or how to find the volume he sought."

Elsa Hart

Jade Dragon Mountain

I don't normally read mysteries. I often find that I'm extremely disappointed if I can guess the ending, I generally don't respect the characters on an intellectual level (after Sherlock Holmes, everyone else is so-so), and I often feel like I'm reading the script to a blues-clues episode. This was not the case with this book. It was extremely well written. Elsa Hart blends a spectacular cast of characters in this mystery set during a tumultuous China in the 1700's. Mixing several different characters from several different countries, it draws on the clashes that arise when two countries with different customs meet and have difficulty communicating. 

Our hero is Li Du, an exiled librarian traveling through the outskirts of China. In the town of Dayan, just south of Tibet, a Jesuit priest is murdered in the magistrates house, days before the Emperor will visit and summon an eclipse of the Sun. Li Du must find the killer before the eclipse and salvage his honor, if he fails the disappointment of the Emperor could be fatal. Through the story he encounters a fantastic cast of characters: a storyteller from Egypt, or perhaps Arabia, a merchant from the Dutch East India Company, a nervous botanist, and a mistress that is as cunning as she is beautiful.

I really liked this book. The characters were fantastic, the use of place and historical political tensions added to the story, and the plot kept me guessing (there is a fantastic twist in the last twenty pages). I highly recommend this book. Something light and fun while still being engaging and exciting. 

I Hold the Stone and the Stone Holds Me

I don't read a lot of poetry, though I love hearing poetry read to me. I have a hard time finding the beat, the rise and fall of the tones, the pauses. I'm much better at listening to it. It helps when you know the person who wrote the poetry. In your head you can hear their voice, where they would place the pauses, and it helps the words hold their shape in the air.

That is how it was with this collection by Joel M. Jones. Joel comes into the bookshop often. He is one of those fantastic customers who makes a point of knowing your name, and having fantastic conversations about books, and meaning the question when he asks how your day is going.

This collection of poetry covers a vast range of subject matter, from the desert and a sense of belonging in the landscape of the south west, to academia and the strange disjoint between the hopes and dreams of teachers and students and the bureaucracy that finds its home in the system, to his birth and his fathers death. He talks about all of these things elegantly and poignantly.

I really liked this collection, though it seems weird reviewing poetry. It seems so personal, it feels much like having an opinion on the tragedy of a friend, or the joy of a sister. While the writing style can be separated from the events depicted, they are intertwined, and shouldn't be divided.

Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret

Book 91 is also part of the We Read Drinks project, and you should check it out here!

More to come soon!

Letters to a Young Contrarian

"One must have the nerve to assert that, while people are entitled to their illusions, they are not entitled to a limitless enjoyment of them and they are not entitled to impose them upon others."

Christopher Hitchens

Letters to a Young Contrarian

I have never read Christopher Hitchens before. I'd heard his name often, he has been mentioned in many of the books I've read, and is often portrayed as an asshole (I can see where people who say that are coming from). And seeing as I've been shaking the table a lot recently, and have been having a very hard time dealing with some of the injustices of the world, I figured Letters to a Young Contrarian would be a good place to start.

This book took me a bit to get into. Hitchens can be a bit of an ass. But once I got past that I really enjoyed it. It is written as a series of letters from Hitchens to a young man, outline different ways to deal with controversy and confrontation. He talks about how its okay to feel like you are beating a dead horse, because if the issue is important you do not want to give up on it. He talks about how there will be people who disagree with you, after all it wouldn't be controversial otherwise. 

For the most part, it was well written. And it was reassuring to know that its okay to have backlash for standing up for something that you think should be obvious to others. I recommend

it.