Review by New York Times Review
MARTIN LUTHER: The Man Who Rediscovered God and Changed the World, by Eric Metaxas. (Viking, $30.) Metaxas' effort to make Luther attractive to a wide readership presents its subject as a titanic figure who rescued God from medievalism, invented individual freedom and ushered in modernity. THE STORY OF THE JEWS: Volume 2, Belonging: 1492-1900, by Simon Schama. (Ecco, $39.99.) Schama's panoramic study begins around the time of the Spanish Inquisition and ends with the Dreyfus case, circling around the question of whether the Jews could ever find a safe haven. Across four centuries, that quest seemed never quite attainable yet never definitely out of reach. FURNISHING ETERNITY: A Father, a Son, a Coffin, and a Measure of Life, by David Giffels. (Scribner, $24.) Giffels lovingly but never worshipfully traces the craft of coffin-making, and in so doing lets the essence of himself and his father be revealed through the action of building one together. MEETINGS WITH REMARKABLE MANUSCRIPTS: Twelve Journeys Into the Medieval World, by Christopher de Hamel. (Penguin Press, $45.) A gloriously illustrated introduction to a collection of extraordinary illuminated books, conducted by a supremely learned and cheerfully opinionated guide. WHAT THE QUR'AN MEANT: And Why It Matters, by Garry Wills. (Viking, $25.) When a leading Catholic intellectual reads the Quran, especially one as attuned to language as Wills, the result is a delight. He challenges religious and secular ignorance, yielding an overview that is both elegant and insightful. THE EXODUS, by Richard Elliott Friedman. (HarperOne, $27.99.) Friedman seeks to answer, once and for all: Was there an exodus from Egypt? He insists there was, just not quite the way the Bible describes; his Exodus story is really the tale of how the people we call Levites left Egypt and joined up with the Israelites already in Canaan. WHERE THE WILD COFFEE GROWS: The Untold Story of Coffee From the Cloud Forests of Ethiopia to Your Cup, by Jeff Koehler. (Bloomsbury, $28.) An absorbing, almost Tolkienesque narrative of politics, ecology and economics that documents the spread of (the misnamed) Coffea Arabica. THE BOOK OF SEPARATION: A Memoir, by Tova Mirvis. (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $26.) Mirvis tells an intimate tale of departure - of leaving the Modern Orthodox community that served as the inspiration for her first two novels, and of leaving her marriage too. She movingly conveys the heartache that accompanies the abandonment of one way of life in search of another. SLEEP NO MORE, by P. D. James. (Knopf, $21.) Half a dozen murderous tales from the late great crime fiction writer. The full reviews of these and other recent books are on the web: nytimes.com/books
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [August 30, 2019]
Review by Booklist Review
In his newest endeavor, veteran food journalist Koehler makes a lateral yet organic move from his previous book, Darjeeling (2015), to the hallowed grounds of coffee. He conjures a bewitching atmosphere by opening with a traditional coffee ceremony taking place in the secluded Kafa region of Ethiopia, an area now believed to be the birthplace of coffee. Tracing the origin of Coffea arabica is anything but straightforward, but Koehler confidently leads readers along that winding path, taking relevant detours to reveal the bean's rich history, dedicated stewards, rise to fame, and precarious future. Koehler regularly links the separate pieces of his history with stories of individuals he's met during his research farmers who tend the wild coffee of Kafa's highlands; coffee breeders and botanists charting the plant's DNA giving the cultural and economic importance of coffee a currency and personal resonance beyond one's morning cup of java. Though very real environmental threats face modern coffee production, Koehler closes his flavorful history on a hopeful note, ultimately transforming this seemingly pedestrian bean into something much more magical.--Smith, Julia Copyright 2017 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Koehler (Darjeeling) nicely captures the natural beauty and mystery of the birthplace of Arabica coffee. He begins with a poetic description of Ethiopian province of Kafa and its highland rainforest ("A tartan of paths wove through the weedy expanses... the conical tukuls sat slight askew") before detailing the history of Ethopia. Foreign explorers found it "nearly impenetrable" for centuries, which kept coffee a local secret. In the 17th century, traders and conquerors took the plant and tried growing it throughout the Arabian Peninsula and Europe. Koehler concludes this section with the downfall of what was once the rich kingdom of Kafa in 1897. In the second half of the book, Koehler focuses on contemporary coffee commerce and cultivation, outlining Starbucks's rise to market dominance and the new wave of artisanal coffee purveyors. Koehler then explains how coffee could completely disappear off the face of the Earth because of the perfect storm the incurable coffee leaf rust fungus, rampant deforestation of the Ethopia cloud forests, and climate change. This is a wonderfully informative book about a bean on which many people rely. (Nov.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Review by Library Journal Review
Coffee is ubiquitous in our society, whether it's a quick pick-me-up from a drip pot, a cappuccino with latte art, or a pour-over from single-origin, fair-trade beans. What is less known, however, is the origins of coffee. Koehler, author of the IACP-winning Darjeeling, explores the history, development, and spread of coffee throughout the globe in this well-researched book. From the remotest parts of the world to large cities, coffee is truly a global product, and the trade is a nexus for colonialism, religion, culture, economics, and agriculture. While focused on the beverage's past, this book argues that Ethiopia may also be the future of coffee, as its trees are the hardiest at battling rust and other diseases along with being the most trait-diverse, which is increasingly important as climate change is affecting various growing regions. VERDICT With a mix of evocative descriptions and a scholar's eye for detail, this is a good academic history of coffee, although perhaps too detailed for casual readers.-Devon Thomas, Chelsea, MI © Copyright 2017. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
