I’m in Paperback (or, The Desk Digest, June 2024)
‘No Meat Required’ is out in paperback tomorrow!
I’m not going to write you something meandering this month: I’m just going to implore you to order my book No Meat Required (if you haven’t done so already!) from your favorite independent bookstore in paperback (or Bookshop.org). It comes out tomorrow, and it would be nice to hit some paperback lists, if possible. The hardcover was a Bookshop.org, North Atlantic Indie, and IndieBound best-seller—basically, I’m an indie darling, like my screen queen Parker Posey in the late ’90s. Who could ask for anything more? (It was 55 on USA Today—hitting a national list is an achievement in and of itself, let’s say!)
As a gift for paid subscribers, my July Recommends post book giveaway will be five copies of No Meat Required in paperback, personalized and signed. If you’ve already got a hardcover but have a friend you think might appreciate it, I’ll send it to them with the note of your choosing!
A few quotes about the book…
“I like the honesty and reasonableness of this one, so that it sits on the nightstand where Kennedy’s powerful voice helps elevate it above the field. It’s in large part a synthesis of resistance to industrial diets, which is another reason I bought it (food studies research), and it’s nice that it doesn’t lean on needless theoretical yawning (justice, sovereignty, colonialism). Yet the stuff of that theory is threaded throughout, it’s just, you get a work about veganism and vegetarianism that lifts the reader up rather than being knocked down.” Benjamin R. Cohen, Public Books’ Public Thinker Series editor
“Her catholic, roving approach to writing—wide-ranging interests, vivid sensory descriptions, and a briskly explanatory style—is a manifestation of not just her palpable curiosity but also her focus on how to live a rich, enjoyable, and ethical life.” Lily Jean Meyer, The Atlantic
“I didn’t read this book to change my diet. But it has changed.” Diane Zatz, The Cook’s Cook
“What surprises me the most about No Meat Required, the debut book from prolific food writer Alicia Kennedy, is its optimism. Optimism is not, I imagine, what most of us feel when reminded of the environmental and ethical tolls of eating meat. And yet, Kennedy manages to find it in No Meat Required, out from Beacon tomorrow. Where some might see vegetarianism and veganism through only the lens of loss — ‘cutting out’ or ‘giving up’ meat — Kennedy argues a different case: that meat is unnecessary for understanding abundance or pleasurable culinary experiences.” Bettina Makalintal, Eater
June 3: “How Do You Eat? No. 1”
“But what I personally really want to know about is how people stock their kitchens and pantries. Not just what’s in their kitchen, but how does the infrastructure of the city where they live and who they live with affect what they eat and how they go about getting it?”
June 7: “From the Desk Recommends... Finding Hope in Honesty” (Paid)
“I’ve been reading about barley and hops production, how changing weather conditions are leading to shortages in Europe and the U.S. There are ‘solutions’—winter barley, new varieties—but for how long do those solutions solve the problem if nothing else changes about ways of life so dependent upon fossil fuels and extraction? Ways of life obsessed with the appearance of false abundance, from burgers to Budweiser?”
June 10: “On Avocados”
“Living in the Caribbean where avocados grow means I’m well aware of their seasonal nature: Either there are avocados, or there aren’t. I could go looking for the imported varieties, but I don’t love avocados enough to warrant going against Mother Earth in this way. I’ll eat them when they’re around, and it’ll be one of those seasonal food thrills, and then I won’t think about them again for a while.”
June 14: “The Monthly Menu: Good Green Sauce” (Paid)
“I’ve been reporting a piece lately that has seen me talking to a couple of small farmers. What do they want people to know for their work to continue, so that they can continue to steward their land? How to cook, and how not to waste food that makes it into their kitchens. These are, to my mind, basically the same skills.”
June 17: “The Desk Dispatch: ‘Eating the Museum’ by Adriana Gallo”
“While wall paint colors, acidity of framing materials, and the temperature of lighting is agonized over, the museum café is allowed to infiltrate and leak into galleries as if the designed boundaries of the café place it beyond the jurisdiction of curatorial intent or responsibility.”
June 21: “The Desk Book Club: ‘Longthroat Memoirs’ May Discussion” (Paid)
Finished the book and had a Sunday afternoon Zoom discussion about it.
A reminder that it’s just $30 per year — or $2.50 per month — to support this newsletter. If you open it every week, please consider supporting my work.
If you’re looking for cooking inspiration, remember to scroll through The Desk Cookbook.
A new thing I’ll be starting in July will be a weekly paid subscriber thread in the chat, where we’ll discuss writing questions and workshop ideas, sentence problems, give recommendations for reading. This will likely morph into Zoom writing workshops in 2025, where we’ll deeply study and discuss the essay form with a special focus on food writing.
News
My book No Meat Required: The Cultural History and Culinary Future of Plant-Based Eating will be out in paperback on June 25. Please consider a preorder!
So cool, so deserved, so major. Congratulations!
Congratulations on your paperback release!