Reviews

The Book of Difficult Fruit: Arguments for the Tart, Tender, and Unruly by Kate Lebo

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teagwood's review against another edition

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adventurous informative lighthearted reflective fast-paced

4.0

dinokadich's review against another edition

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5.0

I found this to be a lovely memoir that used fruit, food, and gastronomy more generally to explore difficult corners of the author’s personal history as well as social context (largely colonialism and racism). Lebo is a compelling writer and somehow threads the needle between fixating on her own idiosyncrasies and offering beautiful and insightful reflections on relatable situations like family relationships, love, and having produce rot in your fridge.

a_islandcriptid's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring lighthearted reflective relaxing medium-paced

4.25

mjenae's review against another edition

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4.0

Well-written. The taste descriptions are bursting with life—blunt and mouth-watering. That part I loved.
I enjoyed most of the stories, too, but I'm just not so sure I liked the author. She was too ambivalent; by the end of the book, I really didn't know what her values were, except that she supported abortion (she was very vocal on this subject, which added to my distaste). She talked about God on one page, then yoga and crystals on the next. She spoke a lot about her former relationship with a man with celiac disease; sometimes she was blaming him for everything that went wrong (even though she ended the relationship on her terms), other times she sounded as if she were still in love. It felt like she was trying to please everyone by tackling all the big topics from a neutral perspective, and it made me want to scream. I wish she'd stuck to writing about food. She's very talented at that.