'After Kilimanjaro' is a novel that I wouldn't have imagined I would review, but I am. In fact it is a book I wouldn't have imagined I would have read, but I did.
I have never read a Harlequin romance, but I have taken a course on how to write one and this novel, with some unusual variants, seems like it could be one.
The reader is soon disabused of the idea that 'The Fate of Food: What we'll Eat in a Bigger Hotter, Smarter World' by Amanda Little is about the pros and cons of different menus.
In fact it is indirectly about food and really about modern hi-tech agriculture and the twists and turns it could take going forward.
The looming pressure effecting it is climate change, particularly heat and disrupted water supply.
Many years ago in one of my university courses, the professor prefaced his presentation of an essay with, “I am a retailer of knowledge. This writer is a primary producer of knowledge.”
I am not certain, but I think it was an essay by the political economist Joseph Schumpter. By about the sixth read through, I had tamed the piece to a 'difficult read'. Before that it was mostly opaque, with ideas I hadn't encountered and words I hadn't seen used in that context.
This book urges readers to beware, but not despair about the threats, dangers and complexities that accompany the rewards of the expanding opportunities of pervasive data.
Then the author proceeds to go though the history of reasons to despair and then some suggestions for how the dangers may be mitigated.
Although two authors are credited for the book, the entirety is in the voice of Smith, a lawyer by training and the president of Microsoft.
'The Claws of the Panda:Beijing's Campaign of Influence and Intimidation in Canada” by veteran journalist Jonathan Manthorpe is a call to beware of the machinations of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to advance its interests and reputation in this country.
Manthorpe, with much experience in China, makes clear his target is the CCP and not China, the Chinese, Chinese immigrants or Chinese Canadians.
'The Future is Asian' by Parag Khanna is a comprehensive book reflecting the size and complexity of Asia and how inclusive he is in portraying it. The Arctic, Israel, Japan and Australia/New Zealand are on the margins of Khanna's Asia.
I would put this book in the top half dozen of the best in the last 100 I have read. Without excusing 'bad behaviour in western eyes' the author tries, and succeeds to a large extent, to explain it, and the characters involved, in an illuminating way.
'Deer Hunting with Jesus' is an evocative title and highlights two of a half dozen values held by the poor U.S. white underclass, whose voting patterns confound most liberals.
Review
'Younger Next Year for Woman' is more than a pronoun change and a pink cover from the original 'Younger Next Year'. That 'more' involves discussion of health issues more particularly related to women with a chapter on menopause.
The authors Chris Crowley, a retired lawyer, and Henry Lodge, an M.D., are the same with no addition of a female writer, but that doesn't deny that there is a slightly different orientation, although much of the text, as should be expected, is identical.
Review
Author Frans de Waal answers the question in the title early and in the affirmative. This is the latest offering of the animal behaviouralist, whose book 'The Bonobo and the Atheist' is profiled on this site.
But in this book, the scope of his insights and observations is broader. And maybe more importantly, his political challenge is more pointed. Those who still insist on measuring animals capabilities against those of humans in a human context have to deal with a twist.
You can make your 'own cheese', the 'ultimate selfie', with a swab from your armpit, navel and between your toes for an appropriate microbe sampling to apply to the milk.
And if you can get past this idea, the author, Tim Spector, a British professor of genetic epidemiology presents a subtle, comprehensive, imaginative, yet scientific look at a subject that many obsess over, their diet.
