Ocean Book of the Month

Each month in 2008, The Ocean Project will highlight a book focused on our blue planet or environmental sustainability. Books for all age groups will be covered, non-fiction and fiction, prose and poetry. If you have a suggestion, please let us know.

Hope's Edge: The Next Diet for a Small Planet

by Frances Moore Lappé and Anna Lappé

Frances Moore Lappé writes:

"Food has a unique power. With food as a starting point we can choose to meet people and to encounter events so powerful that they jar us out of our ordinary way of seeing the world, and open us to new, uplifting and empowering possibilities.”  

In the late 1970’s, a young Frances Moore Lappé wrote her first book, Diet for a Small Planet, and with it profoundly changed the way in which the world thinks about hunger and food. Advocating a whole-foods diet filled with plant-based proteins Lappé was blazing a new trail in the way in which we spoke about food, equity, and hunger.

30 years later, Moore Lappé challenges us again to re-visit the issues around hunger and food. With help from her daughter, Anna, she brings us a fresh perspective on many of the issues presented in her first book, placing them within the context of a mother and daughter’s journey around the globe, to explore the people, stories, and cuisines from regions such as Pakistan, the United States, Holland, and Brazil.

Along the way, the Lappés introduce us to incredible people living "on hope's edge" - breathing new life into democratic action while confronting every range of food crisis - and winning: winning back their lives, their resources, and their future. These stories are woven together with facts and information in a way that brings the issues of hunger and equality back to life while also managing to lend new perspectives to modern-day issues such as globalization and genetically-engineered foods.

The Lappés gracefully present problems and creatively challenge the way in which they themselves, as well as we the reader, construct our thoughts on these large issues. By constantly returning to the ideas of individual action and a "living democracy" the authors lead us towards a new vision of the future of our planet's food: a vision in which we have control over the outcome of our farms, our communities, our health, and our blue planet.

Though this book (much like its predecessor) may change the way we look at the world and how we eat, Hope's Edge also happens to be an interesting read. It draws the reader into the world of hope, guided by those living on its edge and pushing towards a new tomorrow.

This is a book to inspire us to personal action.

• Find out how you can help do your part at the Seas the Day action pages.

• If you are interested in reading this book but also want to be a conscious consumer, please visit your local library and check it out.

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• If you have any suggestions for a future "Ocean Book of the Month", please let us know. Send us your favorite recent or not-so-recent read so we can share it with all!