This was really informative and educational on the decision to not eat meat. The writing style wasn't for me, but I learned a lot from this book.

DNF @41%

I liked the concept for Once Upon A Time We Ate Animals, but I couldn't get past the writing. I'm not sure if the problem is just the writing of the author or the way it was translated, but the author comes across as passive-aggressive and demeaning towards the reader. I do think the author did achieve her purpose of finding compelling arguments to persuade the reader to stop using animal products, but again I'm unsure if reading a more educational book and having the author belittle you the whole time is the right way to create this change.

This was sold as a work of speculative non-fiction. There are two mini-chapters that’s actually do that. The rest of it is a history lesson for someone who is not already on the team, which I am, or a history of the Author’s life. She told us that wouldn’t be case, but it was. Also, I have to say the “I’ am not trying to compare eating meat to…” moments are problematic. If you don’t want to compare eating meat to Slavery or The Holocaust, don’t bring it up. It was icky and makes me understand why people hate me and my fellow non-animal consumers.

I was very interested in reading this book I am considering giving up meat.I really found this book to be informative written in a conversational style & lays out the path to follow and the benefits to not eating meat.Well written lays out a compelling reason for changing our eating habits.#netgalley #harperone

Eye-opening, optimistic yet not rosy, and down-to-earth, this book makes a strong case for no longer eating meat as a way to care for ourselves and our habitats. The writing style is conversational yet authoritative, and the personal anecdotes make it relatable while the historical anecdotes and visions of the future give it weight.

I really wanted to give this one a chance. However, due to allergies and food int7lerances, meat is my only stable form of protein and while I agree with the points Roanne van Voorst is making, I feel incredibly unsettled reading this. I will continue to try other ways to live an environmentally conscious life, but at the moment, giving up meat is not a reality for me.

Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC of this title. I am a longtime plant based eater (almost 10 years), and have read the majority of books about the ethics/facts for conversion to a plant based diet. This was not one of my favorites, and I wonder how much might've been lost in translation. It was very heavy handed with the shaming of non-vegans, which is not usually a convincing approach. I had to skip some sections with in depth descriptions of animal slaughter because they were too upsetting. I'd hoped for more examples of new & exciting ways to live plant based, and this was not it.

This book was a page turner from beginning to end. As someone who has has struggled with the morality of eating meat and also the way that it affects us in a dietary sense this book really breaks it down in a eloquent and non argumentative way. I looooooved the looks into the future to see how if we keep moving the way we are how our future could be. Strongly recommend. I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

When reading a new book about veganism, I always feel compelled to ask “What new light on veganism does this author have to shed?”. While reading Once Upon a Time We Ate Animals by Roanne van Voorst, I found myself returning to this question. The book provides a nonfiction account of vegan living while interspersed with scenes from a fictitious vegan future. The concept of a vegan future has been imagined by many already. Similarly, overviews of why a vegan future is necessary to address ever present social and environmental issues are standard talking points of the vegan activist. Yes, animals do feel pain. Yes, ditching factory farming is an essential step to address climate change. These are facts that vegans are familiar with. Once again, when asking myself what new light Once Upon a Time We Ate Animals has to shed on veganism, it appears the answer is none.

Voorst’s work does not contribute anything new to the field of vegan writing while repeatedly falling into the trappings of vegan toxicity. Voorst’s repeated body shaming is particularly notable. There is no vegan body type. Vegans come in all shapes and sizes. And yet, Voorst both uses the turn of phrase “fat as a whale” when referring to “unhealthy” vegan diets and (in an embarrassingly titled chapter) refers to individuals living Voorst-approved lifestyles as “...Sexy as Fuck”. With that said, I struggle to determine who Once Upon a Time We Ate Animals is for. Prospective vegans will be turned off by Voorst’s sarcastic condescension and current vegans will find little information they do not already have.

However, by far the worst chapters of Once Upon a Time We Ate Animals are those that portray a theoretical vegan future. A future in which schoolchildren are taught about the inhumanity of factory farming and elders must answer for their past animal consumption. Though this is an interesting concept, Voorst’s narrative falls victim to poor execution. Scenes of this imagined future are forced, filled with awkward dialogue, and so glaring that they border on parody. Any self-aware, reflective vegan is sure to feel at least a little embarrassment reading Voorst’s imagined future. With this said, self-aware, reflective vegans should look elsewhere.

I love this concept, but for some reason this one was a hard book to get into. I thought the tone/writing style sometimes felt conversational, and sometimes felt like reading a research paper. There's a lot of good information here, but it just didn't hook me.

Roanne van Voorst tackles the latest developments towards animal welfare and modern vegan food practices in Once Upon a Time We Ate Animals. Adopting a book title envisioning a future generation being told of our old way of eating by an elder, van Voorst is passionate about the subject matter but unfortunately didn't quite add as much nuance as needed to stand out in an increasingly crowded field of works on the topic. That is not to say that the message is not important or timely but a decent chunk of the book will be very familiar to those already sympathetic to the cause. I also didn't personally care for the chapters detailing how veganism has become increasingly "instagrammable" or the repeated name drops of celebrities. I understand this is very important to a certain set of people and their decision making, but it just seems a bit vapid to me.
I'd probably recommend this one to a newer convert to the movement or someone sitting on the fence.

**I was given a copy of this book by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. My thanks to Netgalley and HarperOne**

Overall it’s an alright book, but the tone didn't stay consistent. It started off strong with compelling arguments and a nice writing style. But as the book progressed the quality and message seemed to dip and spike at different intervals.

There were a few times when the author had tried to make a point but I didn't see the need or the point. And I felt that there was one part when the author tried to make another point but it seemed a little contradictory of itself to me. Overall, I think it's a good book; I'm a vegan myself and I'm glad that there are vegans trying to spread the vegan movement with not only facts about the meat, egg, and dairy industries but also historical facts. Which is what this author did in Once Upon A Time We Ate Animals and I think she did a great job!

Thank you Netgalley for sending me this ARC.

I have been pondering this book all day and night until I finished it. @roannevanvoorst I believe you have accomplished with me what you have set out to do with readers. I don’t know much about vegans or vegetarians so I am starting from the beginning.
I am for the environment, actively trying to fight climate change and plastic consumption, but yet ate meat 6 out of 7 days of the week. Embarrassingly, I am a reader but never really delved into the lives of the animals we eat. I think this was the kick in the butt I think I needed to take it one step further. I am late to the game.
The blinders have been removed and rabbit hole found. Things cannot be unseen.
Thank you Roanne Van Voorst, translator Scott Emblem-Jarrett, @netgalley and @harperonebooks. When this comes out Dec 28th, I will be gifting a few ebooks....

Written in an incredibly accessible way, this book didn’t seem to add anything new to the conversation of veganism. I did enjoy the theme of “the future” that was mentioned quite often- how in the future we’ll look back and think “we really are animals huh?” amongst other thoughts, but it seemed a little far fetched to me. I think it strives to share this mindset with other readers and it’s based on accurate data pointing towards a more vegan-ized society but to state something so undeniably came off as slightly far-fetched. It was well written and again, accessible for a range of reading levels, but it didn’t bring anything new to the topic. I’d much rather enjoy reading books about tackling environmental racism and how to actually make veganism more accessible to impoverished communities and people who lack time and supplies to actually cook at home. We can’t forget those often overlooked in the topic of veganism any longer.

What a good book to make you start eating vegetables and somehow make the readers to be vegans. There are several things that make this book a bit weird but it's still a good book.
Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the chance to review this ARC

"But now he didn't long for my pancakes, a dish that a child could make, and I now couldn't even manage that."- From Once Upon a Time We Ate Animals

2.5 stars *warning, this review contains spoilers*

I loved the premise of the book. I've been vegan for 20 years, and my education was in biology and anthropology- why wouldn't I love this book? There were some major flaws though, especially in the science and methodology. The start was rough, with a misrepresentation of the big bang theory, after having to slog through all the farmer stories. (side note--having so much time devoted to individual farmers stories seemed redundant.) Then the next part goes on to talk about the era of Enlightenment where it is stated, "people change their opinions without even noticing", which sort of contradicts that part. Do people change their minds overnight like the farmers, or is it a gradual process? I'm sure it's different for each person specifically, but I think this contradiction was worth exploring. Then OMG we move onto Adam and Eve. Like, the biblical ones. Whaaaat? What are religious creations doing here? Don't get me started please on the genetics chapter, with what I think are newspaper articles as the source material, but it is hard to tell, as the sources aren't mentioned numerically in the text as it was relevant, just stuck all together at the end. Also, I'm not sure if it's a translation issue, but she goes back and forth saying "we" using it assuming we aren't vegan (which is odd for many reasons), but then also in other segments uses "we" as vegans. The shifting pronoun was another thing that made it hard to read.

The strongest part was probably the health segment, but I would expect a nutritionist or something to have that as their strongest bit; not a futures anthropologist.

It is also clear that she doesn't inherently understand using and consuming animals as wrong. When you state it is hard to say no to (nonvegan) food "lovingly" cooked for you, it is clear you still see animals as something to be consumed. It's not hard- as it isn't food; it's another being, same as if somebody cooked me up a human baby, it wouldn't be hard for me to say no to. Additionally she states she isn't sure her current way of living is "better" (i guess from an environmental standpoint) than when she was using animal products. She brings up "Impossible Meat" as a casual "plant based" alternative, without diving in at all into the animal testing that went into it (and the fact the company has stated they aren't vegan). Her book reads as a surface level interpretation of the movement. As the last line in the book reads, "It's time to evolve".

On a lighter note, I also would like to know how she messed up making pancakes; they are about the easiest thing to make. The whole "learning to cook again" segment seemed so dramatic. If I had time, I might want to unpack all my additional feminist interpretations from the line I quoted at the start, but I'll save you. The book wasn't really long enough even for this length of a review.

I received an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.