Samira Kawash

A hit from the past, I read this in January 2019.

This is one of a couple of books on candy out there, and I think it's a good one because it doesn't condemn people for liking candy! A few other books out there are pretty nasty about our candy obsession, but this one is a fun, non-judgmental look at sweet treats.

One review I read says it's about how candy became food and how food has become candy, and that's a pretty fair assessment. It's about the slow development of our sweet tooths (teeth?) and how changes in the manufacture of sugar helped that along.

From candy as a luxury good to an everyday snack, from an energy food to a lazy treat, from heavenly goodness to a sinful addiction, this book looks at how this all developed.

Her final assessment: Enjoy candy, but be reasonable about it. Recommended.

Read more of my reviews at Ralphsbooks. … (mer)

A study of the downside of candy and sugar in general. Anything that can give pause to the usual happiness of eating candy is included: the rise of the industrial machine that made candy cheaper and put people out of work, female big business owners who are now forgotten, nutrition experts who touted candy as meal replacements, then other experts who said eating candy was the same as alcoholism, unsafe adulterated candy and the urban legend of poisoned Halloween candy. And so much more.

Whew. This book should have been called "The Encyclopedia of Bad Candy Knowledge". To say it covers every angle of sugar bummers gives you an idea. The author leaves out nothing. At 342 pages that barely have breaks between topics, the author really has packed too much information in, as topics tend to jump from one into the other every three or four paragraphs. It really should have been broken into two books, one for the "how it came to be" aspect and another for the health topic. The author's (truly) exhaustive research is to be admired.… (mer)