Beware! There are plenty of books about sugar which are bigoted, ill-informed, or just plain boring. This book is definitely not one of these. Recommended.

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Product Description

Our lust for sugar has changed the shape of the world economically culturally and scoially. Sanjida O' Connell reveals, in accessible and scintillating prose, the extraordinary and illuminating story of sugar's journey from a grass to world domination.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1056867 in Books
• Published on: 2005-11-10
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 288 pages

Independent
‘O’Connell pulls the material together in an accessible and interesting way.’

Health and Fitness Magazine
An amazing insight into the development of the first sweets...with some brilliant evocative descriptions.

New Scientist
...absorbing and illuminating history of sugar.

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Customer Reviews

Stick with Cod and Longitude or even Salt
"does for sugar what David Sobel did for Longitude" said the cover - quoting "Guardian". Well it doesn't do it that well.
I have read a lot of these "single issue" books - this is not the best of the bunch. It was in impulse buy based on my enjoyment of other, similar, titles - I should have spent my money on something else.

The early chapters are fair - lots of interesting scientific and historical facts but the text is poorly structured (or edited?), with non-sequitors, muddy logic and inaccuracies - quite often I found myself stopping and thinking "no that's not right?", "where are we now then?", "what was that bit about?", "what was that aside for?"

For example - I think it was the Avon that ran through the centre of Bristol and has since been re-routed - I cannot see how, in geologically recent times at least, it was the river Severn (page 67)

The second half read like a set of notes for a student dissertation or a magazine article - trawled from the web, reference books and inteviews and hastily hacked together to meet a deadline. Bitty and a struggle to get through. it was hard to keep myself immersed in the book and I was glad when it was over.

The reader may wish first to consider:

COD: a Biography of the Fish That Changed the World - Mark Kurlansky (just the right size)
Longitude - Dava Sobel (!)
Salt: A World History - Mark Kurlansky (Though it is VERY comprehensive and really quite long)
Nathaniel's Nutmeg: How One Man's Courage Changed the Course of History - Giles Milton (Big surprise at the end!)

Honorable Mention:

The 13th Element: The Sordid Tale of Murder, Fire, and Phosphorus - John Emsley (How to make light from 200 gallons of wee and a lot else you did not know)

The best of these monographs are full of lovely stories, unanticipated connections and interesting characters.

DDW