In the back of Skinny Bitch, ideas for further reading are provided, as well as cookbooks, vegan hygiene products, and an assortment of vegan websites. Skinny Bitch in the Kitch is a cooking book assembled by the bitches, but there are many, many, many vegan cookbooks. I journeyed through the vegan/vegetarian cook books in Barnes and Noble and was overwhelmed with the plethora of literature. They ranged from specific ethnic cuisines, like Mediterranean Vegan Cooking, to more general vegan cookbooks. PETA even publishes a cookbook for college students, which includes recipes that incorporate items found in most grocery stores and at a cheap price, like ramen noodles (no, really. There are recipes in there about how to jazz up ramen). After looking through the selection I chose Vegan Planet by Robin Robertson. It has 400 recipes that are completely vegan. It also includes tips on how to properly buy fruit and veggies, store them, and serve them. The ingredients required for some of the recipes are not as easy to find or prepare or as cheap as the ones included in PETA's book, but the variety and nutrition of the recipes are more apparent. As I cook through the book, I'll probably end up posting a few of the recipes I thought were worth trying.
Also, other great literature to read, especially for women, is Feed Me, Life Doesn't Begin 5 Pounds from Now, Just for the Record.
I just randomly picked Feed Me off the women's studies shelf at Barnes and Noble last week and became really invested in it. Basically, it's a collection of anecdotes about food, diets, health, peer pressure, etc. from various authors, models, cooks, and editors lives. Each piece was written by the author especially for this book. Some are hilarious, especially when they deal with authors' mothers going to extreme lengths to keep diet food in the house. Others are enraging, like forcing stewardesses to stay below a certain weight or get fired. Many of them are truly sad and are easy to relate to since they explore women's first diets, failure keeping the weight off, peer and family comments, etc. One authors major weight loss due to disease is particularly sad since everyone else around her keeps complimenting her on how fabulously skinny she is. The book isn't about weight loss, obviously, but it's definitely worth reading.
Life Doesn't Begin 5 Pounds from Now is by Jess Weiner, who you may know from the body peace section of 17 Magazine. Her book isn't saying don't loose 5, 10, 15, or whatever pounds, it's saying that you shouldn't let that dictate your life. Don't say that you'll be so much happier once you loose the weight. Be happy now. Don't say you can only go out once you've lost the weight. Go enjoy life now. If you're not content now, are you really going to be content once you loose that weight? The lost weight isn't going to make you a better or happier or successful person. You have to work at that and make it true for yourself no matter what your weight. Jess brings up personal accounts of her struggles with eating disorders and her recovery process, as well as other girls' stories. All in all, it looks at weight as something that isn't the end all of end alls of life or something that defineswho you are.
Lastly, Geri Haliwell's Just for the Record. Yes, that Geri. The Geri of the Spice Girls. Ginger Spice. Why is she on the list? You may have had no idea that Geri has dealed with eating disorders her whole life. From anorexia to bulimia to binge eating. Yes, that girl who strutted the stage with barely more than a bra and her knickers on has serious body image issues. Her book is filled with photos of herself singing with the Spice Girls, practicing yoga, acting as an ambassador to Africa, posing for professional photos, and acting generally silly. She speaks about cooking a dinner for her family, throwing away the left over cake, then later scrounging the trash can to eat it. Her book delves into depression, OCD, life with paparrazzis, and addiction. It's not an expose tell all or a cry fest. The book isn't perfect, obviously. Her personal letters are impossible to read in her complicated cursive handwriting. Also, many of the pictures she includes are when she managed to get over a binge (that resulted from her not eating enough) and then went on an exercise binge and got really, really slim. Like she mentions in the book, she has a hardtime not going to the extremes. Either no exercising and healthy eating or all exercising. True, she's amazingly fit, but she also becomes obsessive about exercising. Like life, the book does not reach a conclusion about how to equalize healthy living and living life normally. While the book doesn't offer a final resting point, it's an interesting read that shows even celebrities who take the risk of wearing a union jack mini dress in front of millions of people aren't confident in themselves.
Are there any good body image books you've read lately?
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