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List Price: $14.95Amazon.com's Price: $10.17 You Save: $4.78 (32%)Prices subject to change.
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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 394.10973
EAN: 9780060838584
ISBN: 0060838582
Label: Harper Perennial
Manufacturer: Harper Perennial
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 416
Publication Date: July 01, 2005
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Release Date: July 05, 2005
Sales Rank: 1569
Studio: Harper Perennial
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Editorial Review:
Product Description:
Fast food has hastened the malling of our landscape, widened the chasm between rich and poor, fueled an epidemic of obesity, and propelled American cultural imperialism abroad. That's a lengthy list of charges, but Eric Schlosser makes them stick with an artful mix of first-rate reportage, wry wit, and careful reasoning.
Schlosser's myth-shattering survey stretches from California's subdivisions, where the business was born, to the industrial corridor along the New Jersey Turnpike, where many of fast food's flavors are concocted. Along the way, he unearths a trove of fascinating, unsettling truths -- from the unholy alliance between fast food and Hollywood to the seismic changes the industry has wrought in food production, popular culture, and even real estate.
Amazon.com Review:
On any given day, one out of four Americans opts for a quick and cheap meal at a fast-food restaurant, without giving either its speed or its thriftiness a second thought. Fast food is so ubiquitous that it now seems as American, and harmless, as apple pie. But the industry's drive for consolidation, homogenization, and speed has radically transformed America's diet, landscape, economy, and workforce, often in insidiously destructive ways. Eric Schlosser, an award-winning journalist, opens his ambitious and ultimately devastating exposé with an introduction to the iconoclasts and high school dropouts, such as Harlan Sanders and the McDonald brothers, who first applied the principles of a factory assembly line to a commercial kitchen. Quickly, however, he moves behind the counter with the overworked and underpaid teenage workers, onto the factory farms where the potatoes and beef are grown, and into the slaughterhouses run by giant meatpacking corporations. Schlosser wants you to know why those French fries taste so good (with a visit to the world's largest flavor company) and "what really lurks between those sesame-seed buns." Eater beware: forget your concerns about cholesterol, there is--literally--feces in your meat.
Schlosser's investigation reaches its frightening peak in the meatpacking plants as he reveals the almost complete lack of federal oversight of a seemingly lawless industry. His searing portrayal of the industry is disturbingly similar to Upton Sinclair's The Jungle, written in 1906: nightmare working conditions, union busting, and unsanitary practices that introduce E. coli and other pathogens into restaurants, public schools, and homes. Almost as disturbing is his description of how the industry "both feeds and feeds off the young," insinuating itself into all aspects of children's lives, even the pages of their school books, while leaving them prone to obesity and disease. Fortunately, Schlosser offers some eminently practical remedies. "Eating in the United States should no longer be a form of high-risk behavior," he writes. Where to begin? Ask yourself, is the true cost of having it "your way" really worth it? --Lesley Reed
Average Rating: 
Rating:  -
Fast Food Nation is a fine "Social Thriller" bringing you to the edge of your seat right from beginning till the end.
If "Erin Brockowich" is for P&G, then "Fast Food Nation" is for MacDonald's.Author has not spared a single stone unturned to make this book an "encyclopedia" of fast food "facts"( read evils)
Going right into the production of raw materials,beef, french fries, potato farms, cattle feeds, workers apathy, production plants overseas, rules,legalities, food poisoning etc, Author has managed to bring the complete loop or lifecycle into this 300 pages "encyclopedia".Author has to commended for the way he has presented the topic to be an interesting reading and not a dull thesis.
And as a reader , I respectfully disagree with the author on the following areas :
Authors blatant attack on the low paid jobs - It is true that pay scales in fast food joints are going down, but we need to understand that fast food joints have created enormous amount of "low quality-high quantity"jobs that helps the economy. Do not expect any industry (even the government) to hire millions of employees even on short term contracts with zero to no skills at close proximity to employees homes at hours that are flexible. In fact America is called a "service economy" and a service economy is mostly nothing more than flipping burgers .
So many people read the book for sheer one reason:
How does it affect me and my children ?-
... Read More
Rating:  -
I'm a vegetarian who doesn't eat at fast-food restaurants. I thought this book was going to be an interesting expose of the fast-food industry. Instead, it was a series of meandering stories that weren't all that compelling. I got about halfway through the book and realized there was really no point in finishing it.
I noticed that whenever someone was portayed negatively, the word "Republican" invariably cropped up. When one meatpacking company owner became less sympathetic to workers, Schlosser goes out of his way to let the reader know that he went from being a liberal Democrat to a conservative Republican.
It's this kind of political posturing (Schlosser is obviously a liberal Democrat who can't keep his disdain for Republicans out of his writing), along with the fact that Schlosser just isn't that good of a writer, that helps to sink this book.
I kept wondering when I was going to learn something interesting that wasn't obvious. All I learned was what I already knew. Fast-food is a giant industry that pays teenagers low wages and uses a lot of potatoes from giant agribusiness companies and beef from giant cattle companies. Oh yeah, and they use flavorings from companies in New Jersey.
Stop the presses.
Rating: -
This book is truly interesting in that it explains a process that many consumers thought that they were already familiar with.
This book will explain why:
1) it always seems the person at the register is being "trained".
2) children flock to most fast food joints.
3) the fast food industry exploded with growth in the last 30 years.
4) This country needs an alternative to our current and growing feeding trends!
Rating: -
Outstanding You: Discover, Design and Achieve Ultimate Fitness
This book should be required reading at all American schools. The purpose behind this book is not to convert people to vegetarian/vegan diets, but instead to educate them about the disastrous state our food supply is in. Though I use this book for information to support my vegan/vegetarian diet, I found it incredibly detailed and thought provoking. Highly recommended for anyone seeking more information on where their food comes from.
Ron Betta
Author - Outstanding You
Rating: -
received the book quicker than expected. the book was in excellent condition. I highly recommend this seller
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